Making external drive available to network

[jdelgado]

Hello
I have an 2018 Intel Mini running Catalina with a couple of external drives attached to it.
I want to setup the mini so that I can share the external drives over my local network.
I have no problem making them available if a user logins into the mini. However, I would like to make the external drives available *without* having to login into the mini; something similar to what a NAS does.
Right now, the only shares that show up without a user logged in are the individual user’s shared folders, which reside in the internal drive.
I searched, but I have not found explicit instructions on how to do this. I also tried replicating the internal folders attributes to the externals, but without success.
How do I do this?
Thanks

 

[mwidjaya]

You might be concerned about a user account with login privileges on your mac.

The trick is to create a sharing only account; the account is restricted to that purpose only.

How to Set Up Network File Sharing on macOS, Without Sharing Your Username and Password

Sharing files over the network is convenient, but not without risks.

www.howtogeek.com

 

[jdelgado]

You might be concerned about a user account with login privileges on your mac.

The trick is to create a sharing only account; the account is restricted to that purpose only.

How to Set Up Network File Sharing on macOS, Without Sharing Your Username and Password

Sharing files over the network is convenient, but not without risks.

www.howtogeek.com

Thanks for your reply. However, the method above did not make external drives connected to the mini available. They become available only if a user logins. Again, thanks for your help.

 

[mwidjaya]

They become available only if a user logins.

Not sure what is the hang up with a login.

It is restricted to that file sharing.

Oh, well. Go ahead and find your own solution.

 

[Slartibart]

Thanks for your reply. However, the method above did not make external drives connected to the mini available. They become available only if a user logins. Again, thanks for your help.

wether with a NAS, a router, or in this case your Mac Mini - you will have to provide a user account, even if it is just “guest” without a password. Depending on which devices connect to the shared volumes the user credentials will have to be entered just ones (as long as they are stored on each device).

 

[jdelgado]

I can recommend using a very cool tool - CloudMounter. This is a fairly good tool that combines many useful features.

Thanks. Will look into it

 

[jdelgado]

wether with a NAS, a router, or in this case your Mac Mini - you will have to provide a user account, even if it is just “guest” without a password. Depending on which devices connect to the shared volumes the user credentials will have to be entered just ones (as long as they are stored on each device).

Thanks. I guess this is the way to go.

 

[daabido]

I can recommend using a very cool tool - CloudMounter. This is a fairly good tool that combines many useful features.

A subscription app for your cloud subscriptions. Ingenious.

 

[AJK13K]

I have a shared hard disk attached to my router. It is shared by anyone using the network. It has worked for a long time with no problem. NB this is an all Apple house and all the macs can access the drive.