I admit it's been a long time since I tried it, but I found sshfs: to be distinctly unstable. It was prone to disconnecting even when it had a 24x7 network connection, and didn't seem to have a reconnect mechanism. And that left errors and disconnected shares lying around. Whereas SMB is incredibly forgiving about network outages, including reconnecting after hours disconnected. I love SSH, and really, really wanted sshfs to work (more secure than SMB, and a technology I'm even more familiar with) but it sure didn't for me. My experience, YMMV, etc. etc. Should you wish to pursue the SMB thing, I recommend `smbclient` for command line debugging of SMB shares (this probably applies to Linux and Mac with Homebrew, but not Windows). It behaves very like an FTP client (I realize how few people know what that is these days, never mind have history with it). It's fairly good for coughing up the configuration errors that are blocking your GUI clients. In searching for "smbclient for Windows" I saw this quote "[from] Windows 10, new Installs of Windows disable SMB1 by default in an attempt to prevent security vulnerabilities (which SMB is known for) ..." That triggered a memory that may help: in the "[global]" stanza of the smb.conf file, you'll want to have "min protocol = SMB3_00" - which Samba should, but does not yet, default to. At least not under Debian. It still defaults to SMB1, which is insecure and won't work with any modern Windows. On Fri, 23 Jan 2026 at 13:20, William Park via Talk <talk@lists.gtalug.org> wrote:
I found it. "SSHFS for Windows" - https://github.com/winfsp/sshfs-win - https://github.com/evsar3/sshfs-win-manager
Long story:
1. I tried OpenMediaVault and Rockstor. They are (mini) Linux distros based on Debian and OpenSUSE, respectively. They are more for fresh disks, because they keep insisting me to format and mount the disks. But, I already have data on my disks and already mounted. All I need is GUI frontend to SMB/NFS. NFS was easy. But, just can't get SMB working for Windows10 laptop. The laptop sees the remote host in the "Network" portion of File Explorer, but can't get inside.
2. I was expecting more like "router" webpage. But, no. They require way too many clicks, and you have to "Apply" every change.
3. I knew about SSHFS on Linux, but didn't know you can do it on Windows. You can connect from - File Explorer (\\sshfs\user@server\path), - command line (net use ...), - "SSHFS-Win manager" -- very much Windows way.
On 2026-01-23 12:33, Giles Orr via Talk wrote:
A lot of people use bundled NAS software, which usually has checkboxes to decide what underlying FS, or what network protocol. I've found installing and managing them worse and more complex than doing a regular Linux install and firing up Samba. As always, YMMV.
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-- Giles https://www.gilesorr.com/ gilesorr@gmail.com