[nfbcs] USB drive on two machines at the same time?
Trevor Saunders
trev.saunders at gmail.com
Wed Apr 6 19:12:17 UTC 2011
Hi,
If its allowed it seems like the simplest solution would be to
disconnect the desktop from the network, and then create a network that
is only your laptop and the one desktop and then have your laptop
provide a windows share thingy or nfs or any other distributed fs to
the desktop over the 2 machine network. While a its seems easiest to
just connected the two machines directly with a piece of cat 5 I supose
you could also setup a wireless router that isn't connected to the
network, but is still providing a wpa2 wireless network, then your
laptop can again provide some sort of distributed file system for the
desktop to use. I'm not familiar with windows networking, but its
pretty easy to set two linux boxes up so they can talk to each other
over a piece of cat 5 but aren't connected to any other network.
I'm not sure but I'm pretty sure you won't find a USB device that does
what you want, since the storage media will escentially have to be a
computer running a reasonable operating system that provides some sort
of distributed file system. I can't see any sain way for two machines
to have access to the same block device at the same time.
Trev
On Wed, Apr 06, 2011 at 01:19:00PM -0400, Doug Lee wrote:
> The problem I'm trying to solve is this: I frequently script at
> company and government locations that will not allow me to connect my
> laptop to the local network. Some sites don't allow write access to
> USB drives either. I develop scripts on my laptop much of the time
> because I have tools there for managing the process, but of course the
> scripts must be installed on the machine at the location where I'm
> working.
>
> So the two-USB-connector drive idea would work like this: I would
> write code on my laptop and run an installer from the same drive to
> install on the office machine. The same can of course be achieved
> without the extra USB connector just by moving the drive back and
> forth between machines, but in rapid-turnaround testing situations,
> which are frequent, that becomes much slower than my idea would be.
>
> On Wed, Apr 06, 2011 at 12:07:52PM -0500, Steve Jacobson wrote:
> Doug,
>
> I think you are right, that just using two connections is going to be unreliable. I would think that your best approach would be to share the drive on one
> computer and make it available to the other through a wireless network connection. I assume that the problem with networks is that you don't want to be on
> a larger network and you may not have ethernet connections. I know that Windows has a create wireless network wizzard that seems to be for sharing
> resources and devices as opposed to just connecting to a network, but I have never tried this. Good luck.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Steve Jacobson
>
>
> On Wed, 06 Apr 2011 12:56:38 -0400, Doug Lee wrote:
>
> >I think any drive or device allowing simultaneous connections would
> >have to be designed especially for this usage, because something has
> >to arbitrate the simultaneous access, deal with caching issues, etc.
> >You do highlight a curiosity I've long had though, about what would
> >happen if I try two connection types at once as you suggest. The same
> >would apply to any drive with both a USB and a Firewire connector.
>
> >On Wed, Apr 06, 2011 at 11:15:38AM -0500, Bryan Schulz wrote:
> >hi,
>
> >i suspect you would overload the drive with double the voltage but...
> >if you have the drive to experiment with destroying,
> >get a usb/esata external enclosure as newer laptops have the new esata
> >port then one computer could connect by regular usb and the other
> >computer could connect thru the esata cable.
>
> >Bryan Schulz
>
> >----- Original Message ----- From: "Doug Lee" <dgl at dlee.org>
> >To: "NFB in Computer Science Mailing List" <nfbcs at nfbnet.org>
> >Sent: Wednesday, April 06, 2011 10:02 AM
> >Subject: [nfbcs] USB drive on two machines at the same time?
>
>
> >>I'm not sure where best to ask this question, so besides actual
> >>answers, I welcome pointers on where to send this one. My excuse for
> >>posting this here in the first place is that I need the device I'm
> >>about to describe for scripting projects. :)
> >>
> >>I am looking for a USB drive, or better yet, a USB device that allows
> >>a drive to be connected to it, that then allows the drive to be
> >>plugged into the USB ports of two computers at the same time. To each
> >>computer, it would be a USB drive pretty much like any other. I know
> >>this issue is normally solved with a Network Appliance, but that is
> >>not possible in my situation for security reasons.
> >>
> >>A specific example: I want to plug this device into, say, a desktop
> >>computer's USB port and a laptop's USB port at the same time, write
> >>files to the drive from the laptop, and read them off the drive with
> >>the desktop. I'm even ok if the drive is mounted read/write by the
> >>laptop but as read-only by the desktop. (This would cover most
> >>security issues I've encountered in my work, since most sites will let
> >>you bring data into a machine but not write it back out of it.) The
> >>device must use USB connections, not Ethernet (Cat 5) connections. As
> >>a last resort if the two-USB idea doesn't exist, I could probably work
> >>with something that allowed one USB connection and a simultaneous WiFi
> >>connection, as long as the WiFi connection supports WPA2.
> >>
> >>I notice one technical detail that may present a problem: The OS on
> >>the desktop, in my above example, would somehow need to know not to
> >>cache the drive data aggressively, even if it mounts the drive as a
> >>read-only device, because the laptop could change the data at any
> >>moment.
> >>
> >>Does such a device exist anywhere?
> >>
> >>--
> >>Doug Lee dgl at dlee.org http://www.dlee.org
> >>SSB BART Group doug.lee at ssbbartgroup.com
> >>http://www.ssbbartgroup.com
> >>"The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit
> >>of it. You have to catch up with it yourself." --Benjamin Franklin
> >>
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>
> >_______________________________________________
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> >--
> >Doug Lee dgl at dlee.org http://www.dlee.org
> >SSB BART Group doug.lee at ssbbartgroup.com http://www.ssbbartgroup.com
> >"Believe, when you are most unhappy, that there is something for you
> >to do in the world. So long as you can sweeten another's pain, life is
> >not in vain." --Helen Keller
>
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>
>
>
>
>
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> --
> Doug Lee dgl at dlee.org http://www.dlee.org
> SSB BART Group doug.lee at ssbbartgroup.com http://www.ssbbartgroup.com
> "Innovation is hard to schedule." -- Dan Fylstra
>
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