File and Printer Sharing Overview

File and printer sharing is the ability of a computer running Windows XP to share a folder or attached printer with other computers on a network.

• File sharing allows you to make files and folders in a shared folder accessible to others on the network to view, copy, or modify.
• For example, with file sharing, you can store all of your documents on a central computer and share the folder that contains them. Then, from another computer attached to the same network as the computer that contains the files, you can connect to the shared folder and work with the documents as if they were locally stored. For example, you can access files that are stored on a central desktop computer from a wireless laptop computer that you can carry from room to room in your home.
• Printer sharing allows you to make an attached printer available to other computer users on the network.
• For example, a color printer is attached to a central computer in your home. You share the color printer. Then, from another computer attached to the same network as the computer to which the printer is attached, you can add the printer as a network printer and print to is as if it were locally attached. When you print to a shared printer, the information normally sent to the locally attached printer is sent across the network to the print server, which stores the print information and then sends it as a normal print job to its locally attached printer.
• In a file or printer sharing connection, there is a client computer (the computer making the connection to a shared folder or printer) and a server computer (the computer with the shared folder or printer).