Change Sharing Options or the Public Folder
Vista offers easy sharing with the Public folder, which is shared with other users on your network and also with additional user accounts on your computer. By default the Public folder will contain sub folders for the following: Public Desktop, Public Documents, Public Downloads, Public Music, Public Pictures, Public Videos,and Recorded TV. To share any files out on the network with other users you can simply drag and drop (or save) the files in the Public folder or any Public sub-folder. The capability to automatically share your Public folder, however, changes when you are connected to a public network, like Wi-Fi hotspots for example. When you initially set-up Vista Networking options you’re required to specify the type of network you are connecting to a Home, Work or Public network. If you connect to a Public network then Vista will default disable sharing, including Public folder sharing.
Still, there will be some users who, when connected to a Home network, might not want these folders shared out at all. To disable sharing of the Public folders you will need to make the change in the Network and Sharing Center. The easiest way to access the Network and Sharing Center is to do the following:
1. Locate the Network Status icon in the system tray.
2. Left click the icon and select Network and Sharing Center.
You can also access the Network and Sharing Center this way:
From the Vista Start Orb select Control Panel
From the Control Panel left-click Network and Sharing Center
Under Sharing and Discovery you’ll see a series of green and grey lights to indicate which features are currently turned on or off. Click the down arrow to the right of Public folder sharing and you will see the following three options available to you:
- Turn on Sharing so anyone with network access can open files
- Turn on Sharing so anyone with network access can open, change and create files
- Turn off sharing (people logged in to this computer can still access this folder).
3. Check the radio button for Turn off sharing.
4. Click Apply
5. This will prompt the User Account Control (UAC) to bring the “Windows needs your permission to continue…” window to come up. Click Continue.
6. Wait a moment for Vista to make the changes, and your Public folders should no longer be shared on the network.
Tags:access, folder, Network, share, uac, wifi, Windows, windows vista
