ConnectedNAS Professional SMB Client and Server is a robust, full featured file sharing application that transforms your Android smartphone or tablet into a participating member of a Windows, Linux, or MacOS network. ConnectedNAS is unique and is different from other Android SMB applications in two significant ways. First, the ConnectedNAS client is integrated into Android. Most SMB Clients are integrated into a File Browser application which enables you to browse and copy files between your Android device and computer. But these files are not visible to applications such as Word, Powerpoint or other apps until you have copied them locally onto your device. By integrating ConnectedNAS into Android, all apps that utilize the relavent Android features, have access to your files even when they are remote. This means you don’t need to copy files back and forth and you don’t need to use a File Explorer kind of application to access your files. Second, Connected NAS Professional includes a SMB Server. This allows you to expose files and directories that are stored on your smartphone or tablet with other computers and Android devices on your network.
This help document is designed bring a user up to speed on the use of ConnectedNAS and to explore various features of the application. Please also view our help page on the ConnectedWay website for more information.
NOTE: ConnectedNAS leverages Android’s Storage Access Framework (SAF) and requires Android 4.4 (API level 19) or greater.
The easiest way to demo the capabilities of the ConnectedNAS SMB Client and Server is to provide a simple example walkthrough. A user should learn enough from the walkthrough to be able to configure and use the product in more general configurations for the user.
The sample walkthrough will configure the ConnectedNAS Storage App as both an SMB Client and an SMB Server. In other words, we will expose a directory on the Android device to the SMB network and we will access that SMB share from the same Android device. This will allow us to walk through all aspects of configuring the SMB client and server. While following this walkthrough, you will learn how to enable the SMB server capabilities of your smartdevice and configure a directory so that it is shared on the network. You will also learn how to discover and configure remote computers on your network so that you are able to read and write files stored on those computers.
We’ve chosen to demo this capability in a loopback mode so that we can demonstrate both the client and server capabilities of your app without having to involve other devices.
ConnectedNAS can be installed directly from from Google Play Store. The ConnectedNAS Play Store App page is:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.connectedway.connectedsmb
To run, either hit “Open” from the ConnectedNAS Play Store App page or locate the “ConnectedNAS” Icon in your phone’s apps and click on it to open.
When run for the first time, the app will request access to photos, media, and files on your device.
This functionality is required for operation of the app. Please click “Allow”
You will then be shown the ConnectedNAS Application main screen. The main screen has a title bar with a pulldown menu on the right side of the title bar. Below the title bar is the main window of the app. This window contains tabs which are accessible by swiping right or left on the main window. There are three tabs: File Servers, Exported Directories, and Authentication Realms. As you use the ConnectedNAS as an SMB client, you will populate the File Servers tab with information about remote computers that you wish to access. When used as an SMB server, you will populate the Exported Directories tab with information about local directories that that you will be exporting to the network. The Authentication Realms tab is used for setting up Windows Active Directory servers. These are optional and are only used when the Android device is being deployed in an enterprise network managed by Microsoft or Samba Active Directory.
These screens will look like:
If you wish to share files that reside on your Android device with other phones and computers on your network you will want to enable the SMB server and you will want to configure one or more directories to share. By default, the SMB server capability is disabled.
Select the “Menu Options” icon in the top right of your screen to the right of the ConnectedNAS Title bar. This is sometimes called the “Kabob Menu” for obvious reasons. You will see four menu options: About, Settings, Files App and Help. This is shown below:
Please take the time to read About page by clicking the About menu item. Clicking on the Files App menu item will bring up the Android built in file explorer which you use to browse remote files. This will be discussed more later. The Help page will load the help text in a browser window. The settings menu item will bring you to a dialog window for configuring the server. Click on that now.
This will show you a settings screen that looks as follows:
At the begining of the settings dialog, there are two informational fields: Your phone name and your phone’s IP address on your local wifi. Your phone’s name is set in the bluetooth configuration screens for your phone. If not set by you, there will be a default. The default is fine. The IP address will tell you the IP address of your phone on the local wifi. If this field is blank, you do not have a presence on your local wifi. Be sure you have wifi enabled and that your phone is able to connect and browse the web using wifi as opposed to using the cellular network. The ConnectedNAS Storage app will not be able to operate if your phone does not have an IP address on the local network. Make note of this IP address. Although not necessary, you may need to know it in a subsequent step when we configure the SMB client. You also will need it when configuing proxy settings for Windows.
Please switch the “Server Mode” toggle to on by swiping the button to the right.
The Security Trigger and Security Window are intrusion reaction parameters. By default they are set to 5 and 30 respectively indicating that 5 failed authentication attempts to the phone within a 30 second window will be interpreted as an intrusion attempt. When an intrusion attempt is detected, the ConnectedNAS storage app will immediately disable server capabilities.
The user will have to manually reenable the server when confidence has been restored. You can disable intrusion response by setting the Security Trigger value to 0. For this demo, you can (and should) accept the default.
The User Name and Password fields are the credentials that you will provide to other phones on your local network. These are the credentials that a remote computer or phone needs to present in order to access your local files. Of course be careful who you communicate these credentials to. Fill in these fields with values you feel comfortable with.
Hit “Set” when finished.
Although the server was enabled in the previous step, you phone has not exported any directories to share. So even if a remote computer was to connect to your phone, they will not see any shares. You will need to add a directory to export. This will be called a “Share”. To add a Share, swipe left so that the “Exported Directories” tab has focus.
Click the folder with a + in it icon on the lower right of your screen.
This will bring up the “Exported Directories” Screen as shown below:
In the field to the right of Share, give your export a name. In the demo, we will be sharing your pictures directory so enter “Pictures” in the Share field.
Click on the field to the right of the Export prompt. This will bring up a directory browser. On the left of the title bar is a stack of lines which, when clicked, will allow you to select a “provider” of directories to browse. You’ll see items like “Recents” on the top, and other providers like “Downloads” below. There may, or may not be a provider for your phone’s storage. This will have a small phone icon on the left of the provider name. If it is not shown, click in the main window of the browser to dismiss the provider browser and click on the kabob button (the menu button on the top right of the directory browser) to show various menu items. One of the menu items will be either show or hide internal storage. Once you select “Show Internal Storage”, you can bring up the provider browser again and you will see your phone’s internal storage shown. ConnectedNAS is designed to work with the Internal Storage provider so make sure this internal storage is shown. This will be where you probably want to begin your directory selection.
Navigate through the directory structure on the local device until you are positioned on the directory you want to share. This is a standard Android platform directory browser. The title bar will specify the location where the browser is currently positioned. You can click on the menu icon to the left of the title to select storage devices on your Android device. For most there will be three items: Recent, Downloads, and a item for your phone which will have your phone’s name in it. That’s where we want to start so click the line with your phone name.
This will bring you to the root of your shareable directory tree. Don’t worry, system files are not visible and you will not be able to share them. You are only given a view into the application accessible area of your phone. Pictures are located within the directory “DCIM” so scroll through the listing until “DCIM” is visible and select it.
This will bring up a set of directories where photos are stored. When you take a normal photo from the phone, they are stored in the “Camera” directory so click on that.
Once inside that directory, click the “SELECT” button on the lower right of your screen to select this directory as the one you want to share as “Pictures”.
This will bring you back to the Local Export Dialog. In the Comment field, type anything you want that will help you remember what is in this directory when viewing the shares. In our case, type in “My Pictures”.
Then hit “Add”.
You should see an item added to your list of Local Exports with a folder icon, the share name, and the share comment as shown below:
If you hit set prematurely or wish to change something about the way you exported the share, you simply have to select the export and the same dialog box for adding the share initially will be shown. You can edit the fields, or delete the entire share and start over.
In order for local applications to be able to access shares on remote computers, you must add that computer to the File Servers tab. Swipe the main screen right or left until the screen is positioned on Exported Directories.
See the section on Discovering Remote Computers for more information on disccovering servers.
The most common case for why your phone or some desired server is not visible is simply that the discovery algorithm has not found it yet. Allowing the algorithm to run for a longer time will allow the server to be discovered and added to the list. But waiting may not always be the best option, nor may the discovery option ever find the server. So, if you do not see your server, you can select <new…> in the “Select Server” pulldown. This will bring up the Remote Address Dialog.
This allows you to manually enter a server and address/port pair for the server you wish to access. For the demo, we are configuring the server in loopback mode.
Select the field to the right of Remote Alias and type in a name that you wish to use to refer to the file server. In our case, you may want to type “MyPhone”.
Select the field to the right of DNS or NetBIOS Name or IP Address and type in “localhost” or “127.0.0.1”. Either of these will tell the SMB client that the remote is accessible via loopback.
To the right of Server Type there are a pair of radio buttons, one for computer and one for phone. Select computer if the file server is a Windows, Linux, MacOS or some commerical NAS storage device. Select Phone if the file server is another phone running ConnectedNAS. Since we are configuring a loopback connection to the Android device itself, select the Phone radio button.
When done, hit “Set”. You will be brough back to the File Server dialog and the IP/Name and Port of the recently added server will appear.
Back in the Exported Directories dialog, Select the field to the right of Description and enter a Description for the file server. For the demo, you can enter “My Phone”
In the username and password fields, type the credentials you entered into the fields within the “Settings Dialog”.
Leave the field to the right of domain blank. This will be used only when configuring remote computers that are part of an Active Directory domain.
Toggle whether you wish applications to be able to view thumbnails of images when browsing directories remotely. Usually we recommend this setting remain off because loading thumbnails remotely can be time consuming. Depending on your browsing experience you may wish to slide this Thumbnail toggle on or off.
When complete, hit “Add”
Your File Servers tab will be updated with your recently added server as shown below:
Just as with the “Exported Directories”, if you hit add prematurely or want to edit or delete the provider you just added, you can select the provider and the “File Server” dialog box will reappear. You can edit the info or delete the provider as needed.
ConnectedNAS provides access to the Android operating system’s native file explorer application. With ConnectedNAS, there no longer is a need for a third party file explorer application. To launch to native file explorer application, select the menu bar pulldown in the title bar and select “File App”. This application is very convenient for browsing local and remote file systems, launching applications on particular files, copying, deleting, renaming files and more.
The Android file app supports the same framework that the ConnectedNAS SMB client supports. Therefore, once a File Server is added to ConnectedNAS, it will be visible in the native file app.
When running the files app, you will see a screen like:
The title bar will be set to the name of the directory or in the case of a root directory, the name of the device or provider. In this case, I am viewing the root of my device so it shows the device name. In the main window of the app, the contents of the current directory are shown.
To the left of the title bar is a stack of lines called the “Explorer Pane” Icon. When clicked, it will allow you to select a “provider” of directories to browse. You’ll see items like “Recents” on the top, and other providers like “Downloads” below. If you added an SMB Client using ConnectedNAS, you will see a ConnectedWay icon to the left of the name you gave your SMB server.
Simply select the storage provider with the ConnectedNAS Icon.
Once you select the ConnectedNAS provider, the explorer window will show you all the network shares exported on that server. In our case, we had created a “Pictures” share. You will see a message pop up that says “SMB Server Session Started”. This is so that you will see if someone is accessing your phone unexpectedly. The content pane will look like:
Clicking on the share name (Pictures in this case), will bring up the content of the pictures Directory. If you had selected Thumbnails when you configured the file server, then you will see a thumbnail of each image in your Pictures directory. If you did not turn on thumbnails, you will see a default image icon for each picture. You can actually change the mode interactively. Simply go back into the ConnectedNAS app, open the Network Share for “My Phone”, turn on or off thumbnails, and come back into the Fileapp and reload the directory.
And Clicking on one of the Pictures will actually open the picture in the phone’s photo viewer. Depending on the size of the picture, this may take a 30 seconds or more. You will see a spinning icon.
There is a bit of history to network discovery. With SMBv1, discovery occurred using a combination of NetBIOS and an SMBv1 based browse service. Those are now deprecated. Other mechanisms have not been standardized across all system architectures. This makes discovery a bit of a challenge. ConnectedNAS leverages the Android Network Service Discovery framework for discovering file services. The underlying mechanism uses multi-cast DNS (mDNS) which has also been called Bonjour or zeroconf.
ConnectedNAS Professional version 1.0.20+ uses mDNS for discovering Linux, MacOS, and other ConnectedNAS servers. It uses the Universal Plug ’n Play SSDP protocol for discovering Windows servers. There is nothing you need to do to discover MacOS, Windows, or other ConnectedNAS professional enabled phones. For Linux, you need to make sure the discovery service is installed and running.
Linux supports mDNS as part of the avahi package. This may or may not have been installed on your Linux machines.
To install avahi, issue the following command as root:
# apt-get install avahi-daemon avahi-utilsOnce installed, make sure there is a service for smb. Create a file in /etc/avahi/services called smb.service with the following content:
<?xml version="1.0" standalone='no'?>
<!DOCTYPE service-group SYSTEM "avahi-service.dtd">
<service-group>
<name replace-wildcards="yes">%h</name>
<service>
<type>_smb._tcp</type>
<port>445</port>
</service>
<service>
<type>_device-info._tcp</type>
<port>0</port>
<txt-record>model=RackMac</txt-record>
</service>
</service-group>Then reboot your Linux machine or restart your avahi service:
# systemctl restart avahi-daemonYour Linux machines will now be discoverable by Android devices running ConnectedNAS.
ConnectedNAS Professional comes with an SMB server so that you can share files that are located on your Android device with users on remote computers. There are four types of devices/computers that we support accessing a ConnectedNAS SMB Server: Windows, MacOS, Linux, and other Android ConnectedNAS enabled devices.
Connecting to your Android share from a Windows PC is a bit complicated at the current time. We have documented a procedure for accessing your Android based files from a Windows PC which you can find here.
Linux is not able to automatically resolve the phone’s name to an IP address unless you have the phone’s name in the linux machine’s /etc/hosts file or it is registered in your local dns server. Therefore, you should look at the ConnectedNAS’ settings screen to find the IP address.
To connect to a ConnectedNAS device using Linux, simply mount with the port option. For example:
mount -t cifs //<ip-address>/<exported-directory> <mount-point> -o port=4445,user=<username>Where:
The ConnectedNAS Professional SMB Client is able to authenticate with Active Directory domains. Configuring ConnectedNAS to authenticate against a domain is not much different than simple server authentication although there are a few details to pay attention to.
Your Android device must obtain a IP address on your local network and it must be assigned a DNS server that is aware of your Active Directory domain. This generally occurs by default and there is nothing you need to do explicitly to configure this. But be aware that if you are assigning a static IP address to your device or if your network’s DHCP server is not publishing the domain’s DNS server, you will have to manually configure it.
In the ConnectedNAS Application, swipe right until the “Authentication Realms” tab is visible.
Click on the add realm floating action button (FAB) in the lower right corner of the screen. This will bring up the Realm dialog box. Enter the Active Directory Domain (or Realm) in the field to the right of Realm. This should be a fully qualified domain name (FQDN) entered in upper case. For example, our domain is HURSTCREEK.HOME.CONNECTED.
In the KDC field, enter the FQDN of the Active Directory Domain Controller. This is also referred to as the Kerberos Domain Controller. Often times, the FQDN of the domain controller is the same as the domain name. In our case hurstcreek.home.connected.
Hit Add.
It is possible to configure multiple realms that ConnectedNAS can authenticate against. In order for authentication to succeed though, the domain you wish to authenticate with must be set to the default. This default must be set.
To set a realm as the default, simply click and hold the realm in the list of realms. You will see the domain name turn to bold.
If you have configured multiple realms and wish to authenticate with different realms at different times, you must come back into the Autnentication Realms tab and set the desired realm as the default prior to authenticating.
Swipe left in the Connected NAS application screen until the File Servers tab is visible. Then click on the new server floating action button (FAB) in the lower right hand corner. This will bring up the File Server dialog box. In the server list box, select the file server if listed, or select <new…> if you wish to manually enter it’s address info. There is a liklihood that the server will not appear by default and that you will need to enter it manually.
When entering the address info manually, the Remote Address dialog will be displayed. Give your server a name in the Remote Alias field. Then type in the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of the server in the DNS or NetBIOS Name or IP Address field. When configuring an active directory server, you must enter only the FQDN of the server. The NetBIOS name or IP Address will not work. For example, our Active Directory File Server’s FQDN is WIN-QH6L3DJS3PT.HURSTCREEK.HOME.CONNECTED and we would have entered that in the DNS field. Then selet the Server Type of Computer. Hit Set when complete
After dismissing the Remote Address dialog, the File Server dialog will be visible. You can see that the server is now selected in the Server list and the IP and Port of the server is visible under it.
Enter your Active Directory user name and password in the respective User Name and Password fields. In the Domain field, enter the FQDN of the authentication domain. In our case, HURSTCREEK.HOME.CONNECTED.
Slide the Thumbnail slider on or off depending on whether you wish to see image thumbnails in explorer browser windows.
Click Add when done.
You now can access files on the domain’s file server using either the built in Files app or directly from supported applications using the native Android Picker mechanism.
To configure the ConnectedNAS SMB Client and get started accessing files on remote computers from your Android device, you simply need to add servers to your File Servers tab. Once they are added, the server will appear in the Android Files App, as well as any other Android Application that supports the Storage Access Framework.
To add a server to ConnectedNAS, click the floating server add button on the lower right of the window. This will bring up a Remote Server dialog box. Fill the fields in as follows:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Server | A pulldown that lists all servers either discovered or added. Select the server you wish to access. If your server is not listed, but you know its DNS name, NetBIOS name, or IP Address, you can select <new…> in the dropdown. This will bring up the New Server Dialog. For more information, see adding a new server. |
| IP and Port | A read only informational field detailing the IP address and TCP Port associated with the server name. |
| Description | A friendly description of the server that will be seen by local apps when they are browsing for storage locations. |
| User Name | The user name you have been given to access files on the remote server. |
| Password | The password you have been given to access files on the remote server. |
| Domain | The authentication domain for the user. Use only if server is part of an Active Directory Domain. |
| Thumbnail | A toggle that will tell the ConnectedNAS SMB Client whether it should provide thumbnails to applications. |
Once the form is complete, you can click “Add”. If you change you mind and do not wish to add the remote server at the present time, you can click “Cancel”.
If for some reason, you wish to modify or delete a server configuration, simply click on the server from the list in the File Servers tab. This will bring up the server’s configuration. The fields are identical to the fields you were presented when adding file servers.
You may update one or more fields and click “Set” to update the server configuration. If you wish to remove the server configuration from the ConnectedNAS SMB Client, simply click on “Delete”. If you change your mind and do not wish to modify the provider, simply select “Cancel”.
The ConnectedNAS SMB Client will do its best to locate servers on the local network. For various reasons, it may not be able to discover the server. In this case, it is possible to manually add the server which you would like to access. To add a new server, bring up the adding a file server dialog. In the Server pulldown, select “new…”. This will bring up the Remote Address Dialog box. The fields in this dialog are as follows:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Remote Alias | A name you wish to identify for the address you are adding. |
| DNS or NetBIOS Name or IP Address | The DNS or NetBIOS name, or the IP address of the server. The IP Address can be an IPv4 or IPv6 Address. |
| Server Type | Selects whether the remote server is an Android device running the ConnectedNAS SMB Server (Phone) or a Windows, Linux, or OSX Computer with File Sharing enabled (Computer). Computer type may also be used for other File Servers such as a Buffalo Link Station or similar device. |
After completing the information, hit “Add” to add the server to the server pull down list, or “Cancel” to return to the File Server dialog box without adding a new server.
If you wish to modify a manually entered, or automatically discovered remote address, bring up the adding a file server dialog. In the Server pulldown, select the server name you wish to modify, then select the “edit” icon to the right of the dialog box. This will bring up the Remote Address Dialog box. The fields will be the same as described in the adding a new server section.
After completing the information, hit “Set” to update the server info. If you wish to return to the File Server dialog box without changing the server address, simply hit “cancel”. If you wish to delete the remote you can also hit “delete”.
Once the ConnectedNAS SMB Client is running, applications that use the Android Storage Access Framework (SAF) will be able to access files on servers configured through the File Servers tab.
The following list is a partial list of supported Applications:
| Application | Access Information |
|---|---|
| Android Files Application | To access SMB files through the ConnectedNAS SMB Client, click on the explorer button on the top left of the screen. ConnectedNAS servers will appear with the Connected Way logo, the friendly name, and the Description. |
| Microsoft Word | When Word first comes up, it will list a set of Places. If Places do not appear, click on the “Open” Icon. Within the places screen, click on “Browse”. This will bring up the Android file picker dialog. Click on the explorer pane icon on the top left. This will bring up a list of locations. ConnectedNAS servers will appear with the Connected Way logo, the friendly name, and the Description. |
| Microsoft Powerpoint | Powerpoint does not support opening of presentations within the powerpoint application itself, but it will open a file if launhed through the Android File Manager. Use the Android File manager to navigate to the powerpoint presentation you wish to view or edit and simply open it from the Files application |
| Microsoft Excel | You can follow the same directions as applied to Microsoft Word. |
| Adobe Acrobat Reader | You can follow the same directions as for Microsoft Powerpoint. |
| Microsoft Outlook | Microsoft Outlook does not support attaching items directly from the SMB storage provider. Copy your files using the Android File Apps to a location local to your device, then click on the “Attach” icon in your compose window and select “from your local device” item in the pull down menu. |
| Google Mail | Click on the Attach icon in the compose window, then click on “Attach File”. Use the Android File Picker to navigate to the file to the SMB managed servers and select the file you wish to attach. |
The file servers you have added to the ConnectedNAS SMB Client File Servers tab will be visible in most Android apps through the file pulldown button on the top left of the application along side the application’s title. You will normally see a list of providers of various types. Simply select the relevant provider and you will be brought to a file navigation window for the root of your remote file server.
There are many more applications on Android today that supports the Storage Access Framework and more to follow. If there is a particular app you would like to see added, please contact us through the “About” page and let us know.
ConnectedNAS also allows you to share application files on your phone with other phones and specially enabled devices on your local network.
By default, the server mode is disabled and you must explicitly enable it to share files. To enable file sharing, select the “menu” icon in the top right of the ConnectedNAS application window (the icon with three vertical dots). Click on the menu items for “Settings”.
This will bring up the Settings dialog box. There are two informational fields and five configurable fields in this dialog:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Device Name | Your Phone’s Device Name |
| Device IP Address | The IP Address of your phone on your Local Network |
| Server Mode | A slide to enable or diable server mode. |
| Security Trigger | Number of consecutive login failures that will trigger a security event. |
| Security Window | Window of time that those login failures must occur within to trigger the event |
| User Name | The username that a remote client must use to access files on your phone. |
| Password | The password that a remote client must use to access files on your phone. It is best to keep this password secret and only communicate the user name and password to trusted parties. |
Once you have filled in the fields, you can hit “Set” to enable (or disable) the server. If you wish to leave the dialog box without affecting any change to the previous configuration, simply hit “cancel”
In addition to enabling file sharing on your device, you must also share one or more directories. This is done on the “Local Exports” tab. From the File Servers tab, simply swipe right to show the Local Exports tab. You will see a list of directories you are sharing. The list may be empty.
To share a directory, select the Add Directory icon in the lower right of the pane. This will bring up a Local Export dialog. The fields in this dialog are:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Share | The name of the share. Remote phones will see this name as they browse your device. |
| Export | The path to the local directory. Selecting this export path field will bring up a directory browser. You can navigate around the local file system until you have entered the directory you wish to share. Once inside the directory, you simply need to hit “SELECT” to select that directory to share. |
| Comment | A comment for the share. This is shown in the list of exported shares and can help identify the directory to you. |
Once you have completed specifying the local directory to share, you can hit “Add” to export the share. If you wish to leave without adding a new share, simply hit “Cancel”.
If you wish to either delete or change the share name, location, or description, simply select the share from the list in the Local Exports tab. This will bring up a dialog box identical to the one described in Sharing a Directory with Remote Phones dialog.
Update the fields as appropriate and hit “Set” to update the existing share info. If you wish to delete the share and no longer serve that directory, simply select “Delete”. Please NOTE that no local files will be deleted if you choose to delete an export. It is just that the directory will no longer be shared with remote phones. If you wish to leave the share as is without making any changes, simply hit “Cancel”
This section provides details on the ConnectedNAS Professional SMB Client and Server Application.
On the right side of the Application toolbar, is a “kabob icon” (three vertical dots) to denote a pulldown menu. When selected, there are four menu items presented:
The About Box will show you the Application Title, Version, and Author
Contact Support: There is email icon which will bring up your email client and prepare it to send an email to Connected Way’s support team. Enter in your question or feedback, hit send and someone will be quick to respond.
Leave Review: Click on this to be brought to the playstore where you can provide feedback. We hope you find ConnectedNAS valuable to your workflow. Please leave a review to share with others your experience.
Share: Click on this to share your experience in other Applications.
Facebook: Click on this link to be brought to Connected Way’s Facebook Page. Follow Connected Way to stay on top of developments and blogs.
Web: Click on this link to be brought to Connected Way’s Web Page. Learn about our other products and services and more about Connected Way.
Privacy Policy: ConnectedNAS’ privacy policy is explained here. In layman’s terms, we don’t collect private information although in the process of providing support, there may be some data shared. We never share anything with third parties.
Acknowledgements: View our acknowledgements and open source licenses here. The majority of our application is written by and copyrighted by ConnectedWay. Portions of our security hooks have been leveraged from permissive open source sites.
The Settings menu item will bring up a dialog box that allows you to view and to configure global settings for the ConnectedNAS application.
Device Name: The Name of your device. This is read only. This is a copy of the name that is set in the Android Bluetooth Settings. Remote Computers will discover this name as the SMB Server on the Android device.
Device IP: This is the IP address of your device on the local network. You can use this if your computer is having difficulty discovering the Android device by name.
Server Mode: This toggle allow you to turn the SMB Server on and off. When off, sharing files stored on the Android device is disabled. Turn this on to enable file sharing. Repeated failed attempts to access files on this device will cause the server to be automatically disabled. You can reenable sharing by slideing the toggle to on.
Security Trigger: Number of successive failed login attempts before the server is turned off.
Security Windows: A time window for the failed login attempts. In other words, a number of failed attempts within the security window will disable the server.
User Name: The user name that remote computers must use to authenticate with the SMB server on the Android device
Password: The password that remote computers must use to authenticate with the SMB server on the Android device. NOTE: We recommend passwords of a minimum of 8 characters in length.
Cancel: Click this to dismiss the settings dialog without changing any settings
Set: Click this to dismiss the settings dialog and change the relevant settings.
This menu item will launch the Native Files App. The Files App will be able to browse remotes, and perform other action on remote files.
This menu item will launch a web browser and load the ConnectedNAS Professional SMB Client and Server Help page.
The File Servers tab is used to configure remote computers and Android smart devices that you wish to access and store files on. The tab consists of a list of individual File Servers. If no File Servers are configured, the list will be empty. There is also a “Floating Action Button” or FAB on the lower right hand corner of the window. This will allow you to enter a new server.
If you click on an existing item, you will able to edit that server.
Whether you are adding a new server or editing an existing server, a dialog box will pop up and will allow you to add or edit information. If you are editing an existing server, the current values will be shown.
The File Server dialog box will appear as follows:
The fields are:
Server: This is a list box which will contain address information of the remote server. The list will be populated with current known servers. If you select the list box, you will be able to scroll through known servers and select the one you want to connect to. If the server does not exist in the list but you know it’s IP address or Name, you can select <new…>. New will bring up the Remote Address dialog box.
Edit Server: To the right of the server list, is an icon that represents an edit action. If you click on the edit icon while a remote address is displayed, then a dialog box will appear with information related to the remote. You will be able to edit the information as needed.
Description: The description is general information that is optional but is useful to describe some information about the server that helps you remember what it is used for. For example, “Project Repository”, "Kid’s Pictures. The description will be visible in the File Server item on the File Server Tab.
User Name: The user name to use to authenticate with the remote server. This is likely to be the same user name you use to log in directly on the file server. If you do not know the user name, ask your system admin.
Password: The password to use when authenticating with the remmote server. This is also something that should already be known by you. If you do not know it, ask your system admin.
Domain: If your remote server is part of a Windows or Samba Active Directory domain, enter the fully qualified domain name here. If you are unsure, you can ask your system admin, or leave this blank. If you know your server is not part of an active directory domain, leave this field blank.
Thumbnail: Slide the slider to either On or Off. On will direct applications to display thumbnails for images in listings of directory contents. Off will direct appications to display a generic icon in place of the image. If thumbnails are being displayed, it will cause the directory listings to consume more time and network bandwidth as the thumbnail is loaded. For large directories, this added time may be considerable. We recommend leaving the thumbnail setting as Off.
Delete: The delete button will delete the configuration for the File Server. This button is only displayed if the File Server info is being edited. It is not displayed when adding a new file server.
Cancel: The cancel button will dismiss the dialog box without making any changes to the configuration. This is displayed when adding or editing a File Server.
Set: The set button will update the existing server configuration with the values entered in the various fields. This will only be displayed when editing a server. It will not be displayed when adding a new server.
Add: The add button will add a new server configuration with the values entered in the various fields. This will only be displayed when adding a new server. It will not be displayed when editing an existing server.
The remote address dialog box allows you to associate an IP address, or DNS or NetBIOS name with an alias for the remote computer. ConnectedNAS is able to discover remote servers in some network configurations. In those situations, there will be no need to add or edit the discovered information. In many situations though, it is necessary to explicitly configure the remote computer’s name or IP address. This dialog box also allows you to specify whether the remote is running a computer or NAS device or whether it is an Android device running the ConnectedNAS server software.
Remote Alias: The friendly name of the remote computer. This is how you will refer to the remote within the File Server dialog box.
DNS or NetBIOS Name or IP Address: The remote computer or device can be addressed in one of four ways: - It’s DNS name (e.g. desktop1.example.com) - It’s NetBIOS name (DESKTOP1) - It’s IPv4 address (192.168.1.1) - It’s IPv6 address (fe80::1cff:c91f:3db1:45e%en0)
Enter the respective name or ip address.
Server Type: The remote computer is either running an SMB stack as part of the operating system support and can claim the default SMB TCP port number (445) or it is running as an application on Android where it is not allowed to claim the default SMB port. In the latter case, the Android ConnectedNAS SMB stack will claim an alternative port of 4445. The Server Type field lets you specify whether the SMB stack on the remote is running on the default SMB port or the alternative SMB port.
Delete: The delete button will delete the configuration for the Remote Address. This button is only displayed if the Remote Address info is being edited. It is not displayed when adding a new remote.
Cancel: The cancel button will dismiss the dialog box without making any changes to the configuration. This is displayed when adding or editing a Remote Address.
Set: The set button will update the existing remote address configuration with the values entered in the various fields.
This will only be displayed when editing a remote address. It will not be displayed when adding a new remote.
Add: The add button will add a new remote address configuration with the values entered in the various fields. This will only be displayed when adding a new remote. It will not be displayed when editing an existing remote.
The Exported Directories tab is used to configure local directories that you wish to share with remote computers or phones. The tab consists of a list of individual directories or shares. If no directories are configured, the list will be empty. There is also a “Floating Action Button” or FAB on the lower right hand corner of the window. This will allow you to enter a new exported directory.
If you click on an existing item, you will able to edit that directory share.
Whether you are adding a new share or editing an existing one, a dialog box will pop up and will allow you to add or edit information. If you are editing an existing share, the current values will be shown.
The Exported Directory Dialog allows you to create or edit a directory share. A share has a name, a path, and a comment.
Share: The share name of the directory. The sharename will be visible on remote computers when they browse the Android device and it will be used by remote computers when they connect to or mount the share.
Export: The path to the exported directory. When you click on the region to the right of the Export tab, a “picker” dialog will appear. You can browse around the local file system until you have located the directory you wish to share. Once you are position within the directory, you can hit “select”. If you wish to cancel out of the picker, simply click the Android back button one or more times.
Comment: This is free form text that is used to describe the share. It is visible to remote computers when they are browsing the device for remote shares.
Delete: The delete button will delete the configuration for the directory share. This button is only displayed if the Export Directory info is being edited. It is not displayed when adding a new directory share.
Cancel: The cancel button will dismiss the dialog box without making any changes to the configuration. This is displayed when adding or editing an exported directory.
Set: The set button will update the existing exported directory configuration with the values entered in the various fields.
This will only be displayed when editing an exported directory. It will not be displayed when adding a new share.
Add: The add button will add a new directory share configuration with the values entered in the various fields. This will only be displayed when adding a new share. It will not be displayed when editing an existing share.
The Authentication Realms tab is used to configure active directory realms when using Active Directory to authenticate within the domain. If you are not using Active Directory/Kerberos authentication, you can ignore this tab.
The tab consists of a list of individual realms. If no realms are configured, the list will be empty. There is also a “Floating Action Button” or FAB on the lower right hand corner of the window. This will allow you to enter a new realm.
If you click on an existing item, you will able to edit that realm.
Whether you are adding a new realm or editing an existing one, a dialog box will pop up and will allow you to add or edit information. If you are editing an existing realm, the current values will be shown.
The Realm Dialog allows you to create or edit an active directory realm. A realm has a name, and a address or DNS name of the “Active Directory Server” or “Kerberos Domain Controller”.
Realm: The name of the realm. This should be an upper case Fully Qualified Domain Name for the Realm. You can get this information from your system admin if you do not know it. This is synonomous with the Domain in the File Server dialog box. In other words, there should be one realm for each unique domain in the File Server configurations.
KDC: The Fully Qualified Domain Name of the Kerberos or Active Directory Domain Controller. Ask your system admin for this name if you do not know it.
Delete: The delete button will delete the configuration for the realm. This button is only displayed if the realm info is being edited. It is not displayed when adding a new realm.
Cancel: The cancel button will dismiss the dialog box without making any changes to the configuration. This is displayed when adding or editing a realm.
Set: The set button will update the existing realm configuration with the values entered in the various fields.
This will only be displayed when editing a realm. It will not be displayed when adding a new realm.
Add: The add button will add a new realm configuration with the values entered in the various fields. This will only be displayed when adding a new realm. It will not be displayed when editing an existing realm.
If you wish to learn more about the ConnectedNAS application, or contact developers, sales, or support, simply click on the menu pulldown in the top right of the screen and select “About”