Time Capsule setup and security

[TeckniX]

I'm sort of new to the Time Capsule and still trying to wrap my head around all the different services.

Currently I've setup my Time Capsule via ethernet and have setup mobile me on it.
I've been trying to setup 'back to my mac' with no luck, the time capsule never shows up in the mobile me account.

I'm able to connect to the Time Capsule via AFP protocol, but I couldn't find any documentation detailing the level of security of this connection. So far all that I've found is that my documents are being sent as clear text, not even the slightest hope of SSL.

I would hope that enforce SSL and deny clear text connection would be an option but I couldn't find it in the control panel.

My last question is regarding the Time Capsule network share option. Obviously the share works well, as it can be access by any computer, but how would one setup the Time Machine to back it up too? As of right now it seems that the general belief of having your network share on the device that backs up your mac, means that the network share itself is being backed up. This is obviously not true, unless it's setup.

A little bit of help/light would be greatly appreciate on these questions. I may have been caught in the middle of apple commercial propaganda and therefore believe that the peripheral can do more than it physically can.

Thanks!

 

[deboni]

I believe you're confused; at least, your questions confuse me.

1) You put your Time Capsule on Ethernet, and you should be able to use Time Machine software on any Mac running 10.5 or later to back up to it.

2) Back to My Mac is a Mobile Me feature that allows one to control a Mac from a remote location. It has nothing to do with backing up or restoring or otherwise accessing a Time Capsule.

3) The Time Capsule drive can be mounted on the desktop and used just like any other disk drive. I don't think there's any security involved; it simply acts like any drive directly connected via USB or Firewire.

4) If you are using a portion of the Time Capsule drive as a regular storage device, you should be able to order it to be backed up to the Time Capsule as a part of the using machine's normal backup suite, but why would you want to?

I use my Time Capsule to serve as Time Machine backup target for both a desktop (wired to the TC via Ethernet) and a laptop (connected to the TC via wireless). It works fine.

Tom

 

[TeckniX]

Thanks Tom for all the answers.
I think you've captured all of my points.

The backup of shared info on the drive is to have a backup, I haven't been able to find anything on the time machine setup to allow it to be backed up.


I know that the time machine will mount just like any other USB drive, but what security can be put in place for the AFP server? Right now I can access the time capsule's folder while outside of my network. Is there a way to lock it down to be an intranet only setup?
I'm just surprised there isn't more security over the file sharing protocol that's all.

 

[deboni]

You're welcome. I don't know of any security that can be applied to a Time Capsule other than a password. You specify a password in the Airport Utility that will control access to it as a storage device. And you can use a potentially different user account password to control backup/restore access to it for the machine using it for those purposes.

If you encrypt a disk volume on a Mac, and then tell Time Machine to back up that volume, whether to a Time Capsule or another storage device, I do not know whether the encryption will remain in place on the backup device.

And I do not know if it's possible to encrypt the data stream between Time Machine and any storage device it uses as a target.

I DO know that most any of the settings and preferences you can specify will be available either through the Time Machine system preference or through the Airport Utility. The latter is not a simple item to use, but there are special parts of it for the Time Capsule's Disk. And, for what it's worth, there's always its Help system.

Tom

 

[Ruahrc]

What do you mean by "outside your network"?

If you go to Airport Utility and click Manual Setup (lower left) then Disks (in the top row) and finally File Sharing (right below Disks) you get the page where you can configure some file sharing limitations on connected disks and the TC disk itself. You should find the pertinent file sharing options here.

Do you have the Share Disks over WAN enabled?

Ruahrc