Inexistent PC servers showing up in "shared" sidebar

since updating to SL, I have two new PC servers showing up in the sidebar's "shared" column. Both have cryptic names as "npi9f1b89".
I do not have any Windows PCs in my office, it's a Mac only environment. However, I have only moved two iMacs to SL, the other three are still 10.5.8. (one Intel, two G5).
There are three printers in my network (HP 2650 and Brother 5270 on Bonjour, the HP 2200 runs on Apple Talk) and I suspect that somehow Bonjour is messing things up. Any ideas?

Amal,
Are any of your Macs running Windows in a virtual machine? This is one way a PC would show up in "Shared." Also, any Mac with SMB sharing enabled would do the same. Of course, SMB services running on any network devices (Airport Express, Time Capsule, etc.) will also show up as a PC.
In short, it doesn't sound like you have anything to worry about.
Scott

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This is really weird. The same thing is happening to me.
There is a machine showing up as "Nikhil Vaddiboina's MacBook" under the shared section in finder.
I have a Wi-Fi network that I believe is extremely secured with WPA2 and MAC address Filtering. Also, SSID broadcasting is off so its a closed network.
When I go into my router and check for wireless clients it only shows the two machines that are in my home.
I'm able to access Nikhil's Public Folder where he has some random PDF's about computer programming.
Is this something kind of spooky untrackable hacker guy that's leeching off my network?
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Strange PC servers showing up in sidebar

Hello,
For some reason, I'm getting these strange PC servers showing up in the sidebar of Finder.
One of the PC servers has a really long name: mac001ec212402a, and one of them has the same name as the home folder of another Mac on my network. I'm sure that no one but our own household is connected to our network (which is password protected) and we own no PCs.
Additional Info: We have an Airport Extreme base station (802.11n) with 2 Airport Extremes (1 802.11n and 1 802.11g) and a Time Capsule extending that network.
Any help is appreciated!
Thanks

Amal,
Are any of your Macs running Windows in a virtual machine? This is one way a PC would show up in "Shared." Also, any Mac with SMB sharing enabled would do the same. Of course, SMB services running on any network devices (Airport Express, Time Capsule, etc.) will also show up as a PC.
In short, it doesn't sound like you have anything to worry about.
Scott

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I have a time capsule installed and 2 time capsule servers showing in the finder sidebar under shared.
One is active and accessible with the name I gave it when first configured and the other with a generic name (time-capsule) and a PC icon is not.
How can I delete it?
Thanks.

How do they get created?
They get created if a program tries to access the Time Capsule or other drive when it isn't available to the computer.
I have an alias in there for the Time Capsule as well, but it won't let me delete it. Do you know how I can delete it?
Leave it as is as well as any other aliases in that folder. Each mounted volume needs to have one, and it's located there by default.
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How do I get shared computers to show up in the sidebar in Leopard?

Still trying to come to terms with Leopard's way of doing things, and can't get shared computers to show up in the sidebar. I've never shared computers before, so need very basic instructions on how to do this. I thought I had set up for other specific computers to share, but nothing happens. Do they need to be using Leopard too?
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All of the things that folks seem to be having problems with are broadcast or multicast based. If you're not seeing things, chances are really good it's because you're not seeing the broadcasts / multicast packets. Why? Donno... shouldn't be any different than Tiger and "works fine for me".
Here is how you see what multicasts are going on the wire (broadcast are just another type of multicast):
sudo tcpdump -nvvXi en1 -s 1500 multicast
When you do this, if it's the first time you've run sudo, it will give you a warning and ask for your password since this is a privileged command. The next time, it will only prompt you for a password (unless you ran it recently and your password is cached).
There are a few different types of broadcasts that you'll want to be looking for. Note: These are only examples of each type - there are multiple sub-types of these to advertise other details. I'm only giving generic descriptions of each - the packet data in yours will be different, but a similar format.
_This is a AFP Multicast (udp/5353)_
You'll see here my wife's macbook advertising its services. This data gets collected and put in the mDNSResponder cache for when you need it. It is also used to make stuff show up on your finder.
21:08:18.189071 IP (tos 0x18, ttl 255, id 26790, offset 0, flags [none], proto: UDP (17), length: 232) 192.168.15.101.5353 > 224.0.0.251.5353: [udp sum ok] 0*- [0q] 5/0/1 Melissa.device-info.tcp.local. TXT "model=MacBook2,1", Melissa.afpovertcp.tcp.local. (Cache flush) SRV Macintosh-3.local.:548 0 0, Melissa.afpovertcp.tcp.local. (Cache flush) TXT "", services._dns-sd.udp.local. PTR afpovertcp.tcp.local., afpovertcp.tcp.local. PTR Melissa.afpovertcp.tcp.local. ar: Macintosh-3.local. (Cache flush) A 192.168.15.101 (204)
_This is a NetBIOS/NBT/SMB/Windows Share Broadcast (udp/137)_
This is what your system looks for to make Windows systems show up on your finder.
21:06:34.226681 IP (tos 0x0, ttl 64, id 41952, offset 0, flags [none], proto: UDP (17), length: 78) 192.168.15.101.50581 > 192.168.15.255.137: [udp sum ok]
NBT UDP PACKET(137): QUERY; REQUEST; BROADCAST
TrnID=0x28DB
OpCode=0
NmFlags=0x11
Rcode=0
QueryCount=1
AnswerCount=0
AuthorityCount=0
AddressRecCount=0
QuestionRecords:
Name=_MSBROWSE_ NameType=0x01 (Unknown)
QuestionType=0x20
QuestionClass=0x1
_This is a UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) Broadcast (udp/1900)_
These are used for things like your Internet router, UPnP Music Servers, and other similar devices to advertise what they can do (similar to the Bonjour packets - but a different standard).
21:08:25.042607 IP (tos 0x0, ttl 4, id 25012, offset 0, flags [none], proto: UDP (17), length: 353) 192.168.15.1.1900 > 239.255.255.250.1900: [udp sum ok] UDP, length 325
0x0000: 4500 0161 61b4 0000 0411 9434 c0a8 0f01 E..aa......4....
0x0010: efff fffa 076c 076c 014d d47e 4e4f 5449 .....l.l.M.~NOTI
0x0020: 4659 202a 2048 5454 502f 312e 310d 0a48 FY.*.HTTP/1.1..H
0x0030: 6f73 743a 3233 392e 3235 352e 3235 352e ost:239.255.255.
0x0040: 3235 303a 3139 3030 0d0a 4361 6368 652d 250:1900..Cache-
0x0050: 436f 6e74 726f 6c3a 6d61 782d 6167 653d Control:max-age=
0x0060: 3630 0d0a 4c6f 6361 7469 6f6e 3a68 7474 60..Location:htt
0x0070: 703a 2f2f 3139 322e 3136 382e 3135 2e31 p://192.168.15.1
0x0080: 3a38 302f 7570 6e70 2f73 6572 7669 6365 :80/upnp/service
0x0090: 2f64 6573 5f70 7070 2e78 6d6c 0d0a 4e54 /des_ppp.xml..NT
0x00a0: 3a75 726e 3a73 6368 656d 6173 2d75 706e :urn:schemas-upn
0x00b0: 702d 6f72 673a 7365 7276 6963 653a 5741 p-org:service:WA
0x00c0: 4e50 5050 436f 6e6e 6563 7469 6f6e 3a31 NPPPConnection:1
0x00d0: 0d0a 4e54 533a 7373 6470 3a61 6c69 7665 ..NTS:ssdp:alive
0x00e0: 0d0a 5365 7276 6572 3a4e 542f 352e 3020 ..Server:NT/5.0.
0x00f0: 5550 6e50 2f31 2e30 0d0a 5553 4e3a 7575 UPnP/1.0..USN:uu
0x0100: 6964 3a75 706e 702d 5741 4e43 6f6e 6e65 id:upnp-WANConne
0x0110: 6374 696f 6e44 6576 6963 652d 315f 302d ctionDevice-1_0-
0x0120: 3030 3137 3366 3638 6364 3861 3a3a 7572 00173f68cd8a::ur
0x0130: 6e3a 7363 6865 6d61 732d 7570 6e70 2d6f n:schemas-upnp-o
0x0140: 7267 3a73 6572 7669 6365 3a57 414e 5050 rg:service:WANPP
0x0150: 5043 6f6e 6e65 6374 696f 6e3a 310d 0a0d PConnection:1...
0x0160: 0a .
If you're not seeing these packets, you're not going to see anything in your finder.
Why would you not see them?
1) Your firewall is blocking them from going out from the system that is sharing data
2) Your firewall is blocking them from coming in from the system that is looking for the data
3) The necessary services are not started on either system
4) Your network does not properly forward multicast and broadcasts between hosts
I've posted a number of threads on how to figure out each of the above situations. An easy thing to check is to do a 'netstat -anp udp' and see if there is a *.XXX where XXX is the port number listed in each of the descriptions. If there is, your system is listening for the packets and I'd check the firewall. If there is not, your system isn't setup right to listen for them (double check your file sharing settings and options).

Behavior of "Shared" sidebar - PCs show up erratically

Hi everyone,
until recently, all running PCs with an SMB share in my network at work showed up under the "Shared" sidebar. Now, half of the time, they don't, and I can only see the other Macs on the network and the servers I am already connected to. Then sometimes they all show up again.This is very frustrating, because it is unpredictable, and as per Murphy's law, if I really need to connect to a PC, the list will definitely not show up.
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My husband and I had been sharing an iTunes account, which meant that when he synced his iPhone, all his apps and music appeared on mine as well, and vice versa. This was annoying, so I created my own account and have changed the Apple id on my phone. However, when I try to sync it on iTunes, no devices at all show up in the sidebar. What am I doing wrong?

Whenever a menu choice is grayed out, that is because you have Restrictions turned on in Settings. Be sure to turn it off.
You are confusing an itunes store account with an icloud account. You two can continue using the same ID for itunes (thus sharing purchased music, apps, etc.), but you really should have separate accounts (different IDs) for icloud, since an account is intended for one user to keep his/her devices in sync.
To create a new icloud account, go to
http://www.apple.com/icloud/setup/
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how does another computer show up as "shared" in my file sidebar?

If you are seeing someone else's computer in your sidebar it is because they have 'shared' something on their computer and hence made it available to you. If you share something on your computer then your computer would become visible in their sidebar.
You can access their shared computer without them being able to access yours. They do not have to do anything on your computer to make theirs available to you. All they have to do is tell you what username and password to use to access their computer.

I'm trying to use iTunes sharing between my windows computers. My computer playlist is showing up on the sidebar but there is no content with it. Why won't the music from my other computer show up?

I'm trying to use iTunes sharing between my windows computers. My computer playlist is showing up on the sidebar but there is no content with it. Why won't the music from my other computer show up?

The computer has to be authorized for the account that purcchased the media.
What error message are you getting when you try to lauthorize the computer for that account?
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Yes. Visit My Apple ID and click Find your Apple ID. See Finding your Apple ID if you'd like more information.
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Our company uses a Mac Mini running OS 10.10 Yosemite to share files. File Sharing is setup to share contents on the Mac Mini with other Macs and PCs. Sharing is working fine. However, in the last couple days when logging into the Mac Mini the mounted volume (Mac Mini) no longer shows on the desktop, sidebar or when accessing the client hard drive. In order to access the Mac Mini after mounting via log in an alias to the Mac Mini needs to be created and access via the alias. Folders from the Mac Mini can be added to the side bar and accessed that way, but the main folder for the Mac Mini is only accessible through the alias. Preferences in the Finder are set to show mounted volumes and servers on the desktop.
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Check the settings in the General tab of the Finder's preferences.
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I suddenly have 2 people i never met and don't know showing up as 'shared' on my computer. this may have happened when i visited the genius bar with wifi but i can't seem to delete these 2 strangers.

I visited the genius bar at my mac store two weeks ago and now I notice two people I don't know are showing up as SHARED on my computer. This is really disturbing to me as I don't know if these people have access to my computer. Could this have happened because of the WIFI at the computer store? There are so many people there at once could it be this accidentally happened? AND HOW DO I GET RID OF THESE SHARED PEOPLE? I've tried to find a way to delete them but I can't find anything that allows that. Also can't 'drag' them to the trash. PLEASE HELP. Thanks.

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How to have Windows computers show up in shared...

I am having the worst trouble with this. My parents' Windows computer showed up under "Shared" on the sidebar at first on Leopard, but then all of a sudden it disappeared and I haven't been able to get it back there. What is the secret?

Hi Matt,
I'm having the same problems, really irritating! I've no answer I'm afraid, though a temporary solution is:
In the finder menu, select Go -> Connect to Server (or hit apple+k)
In the server address box, type smb://Target_Computer Name
Obviously, replace TargetComputerName with the network name of the computer you want to connect to. So it could be smb://dev or smb://johnscomputer etc...
Hope this helps a little.

Unknown computers showing up under "Shared" on secured wireless network.

After reading through the forums, it looks like I am not the only person who has encountered this, but I haven't found any real answers and my situation is a bit different.
Yesterday, unknown computers started showing up in the "Shared" sidebar in Finder. This happened both on my MacBook Pro and my iMac. I have a password protected wirelss network. I know these are other people's computers and not just printers or peripheral accessories on my wireless network because they have names like "John Doe's Mac Mini" and "Smith-pc."
I understand that this doesn't mean that someone is trying to hack into my computer, that they could just have sharing enabled on their computer and it is broadcasting its availability for a connection. However, I don't understand how these computers are broadcasting it. I live on a farm in an isolated area where it is not possible for someone else to be picking up the signal from my wireless router. I think I have established that these are Bonjour connections because I can make them disappear from the sidebar by unselecting "Bonjour Computers" in Finder Preferences. I have checked all of the MAC addresses that my wireless router (Apple AirPort) says are connected and I can account for all of them.
My ISP comes in through a wireless antenna system. Is it possible that they suddenly changed something yesterday that is letting Bonjour signals from other subscribers to be broadcast through their network? I have used this ISP for a couple of years now and this just suddenly started yesterday.
Should I be concerned? I have gone through and made sure that file sharing is not selected on our computers. I'm not sure what precautions I would need to make with our iPads, iPods, etc. Is the appearance of these computers simply an annoyance, or am I in any way at risk?
I would appreciate any insight anyone can give.

Please read this whole message before doing anything.
This procedure is a diagnostic test. It’s unlikely to solve your problem. Don’t be disappointed when you find that nothing has changed after you complete it.
The purpose of the test is to determine whether the problem is caused by third-party software that loads automatically at startup or login, by a peripheral device, by a font conflict, or by corruption of the file system or of certain system caches.
Disconnect all wired peripherals except those needed for the test, and remove all aftermarket expansion cards, if applicable. Start up in safe mode and log in to the account with the problem. You must hold down the shift key twice: once when you turn on the computer, and again when you log in.
Note: If FileVault is enabled, or if a firmware password is set, or if the startup volume is a Fusion Drive or a software RAID, you can’t do this. Ask for further instructions.
Safe mode is much slower to start up and run than normal, with limited graphics performance, and some things won’t work at all, including sound output and Wi-Fi on certain models. The next normal startup may also be somewhat slow.
The login screen appears even if you usually login automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.
Test while in safe mode. Same problem?
After testing, restart as usual (not in safe mode) and verify that you still have the problem. Post the results of the test.

New MBP Icon not Showing up in Shared

First off, love the new MBP. Situation is: the computer name shows up in the sidebar of the Finder in the Shared items on the network on my MacPro, but there isn't an icon next to it. Any ideas why this might be?
Message was edited by: PacNW
Message was edited by: PacNW

Dear friend,
I have solved the problem by copying the file com.apple.macbookpro17-wi08.icns under /System/Library/CoreServices/CoreTypes.bundle/Contents/Library/MachineTypes.bund le/Contents/Resources/ from my new MBP into the same folder in the MP. Apple is good but "quodammodo bonus dormitat Homerus"...
Best regards,
Macarion.

Two unknown computers show up under "shared." What does this mean?

When I open a finder window, two computers that are unknown to me show up under "shared." What does this mean?
Does this mean someone has broken into my wireless network? Or that these people have access to my files? I don't want to be "sharing" anything with people I don't even know.

It means two of your neighbors also have a wireless network. They cannot access your computer unless you give them your userid and password.
Go ahead and try to access their computers. Unless they have guest sharing turned on, usually to share photos with family and friends, you will not be able to access their computers.
I’m on a university network and have hundreds of names in the Shared section of my sidebar, but do not have access to their computers, nor theirs to mine.

Inexistent PC servers showing up in "shared" sidebar

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