Server

[Guest]

We have windows server 2003 with a static ip. I recently purchased an external harddrive and was wondering how to go about making it possible to allow others to access this hd from any location as long as they had internet access.
I had thought of creating a vpn and file share, but not sure if that would work quite as well as other possibilities. Thanks for any help.

 

[riser]

I would say making it a web server with authentication would be easier than setting up the VPN. It sounds like you want to be a web server or FTP server.

 

[soundefx]

Personally I would set up an FTP server if there is no streaming media that you are trying to share.

All you have to do is set up the server and open the ports needed in your router.

 

[Catsrules]

If your are just trying to send files to others and not receiving anything, then I would just use the built in Web server on server 2003 and make a web page to the files your want.
But if you want it to be more like a shared drive I would go with FTP. Not sure if server 2003 has a good FTP server built in, but FileZilla (filezilla-project.org) is a grate free FTP server program for Windows systems. You can even get secure socket layer (SSL)working with FTP if your want more security.
Ports to unblock from the server's firewall, and to port forward to the server. (by default)
20,21 for normal FTP and also 990 if your want to add SSL to your FTP.
I think there is a range of ports your need to open, but your choose what they are in FileZilla.
a good FTP client program is FireFTP it can access a SSL FTP. It runs right in Firefox