Forum Discussion

Aspirant

Jul 06, 2023

ReadyNas remote file share

Hi Since the termination of Ready Cloud:( i need to sort a different method for my family members to access my readynas. im looking into webbased access, im gathering i need to use port forwarding...

StephenB

Guru - Experienced User

Jul 06, 2023

Mattwood wrote:

but i also only want them to ONLY access one folder as my other folders have my personal docs in it.

If the folder is small, then I suggest just switching to cloud storage instead (google drive, onedrive, icloud, ...).

Or move it to an always-on PC, and install owncloud or nextcloud on the PC. Then back up the PC folder to the NAS.

If you feel you need to use the NAS, set up local NAS user accounts for them to replace their ReadyCloud account. Then adjust the file permissions to keep them from accessing the shares you want to keep private.

FWIW, it's important to test afterwards to make sure the permissions are working as you expect.

Mattwood wrote:

im looking into webbased access, im gathering i need to use port forwarding for this (not sure what ports to use)

I suggest using a VPN instead. I use openVPN via my Orbi router, others here use ZeroTier installed on the NAS.

One problem with port forwarding for web access is that OS-6 doesn't let you limit connectivity to https for share access. So if you go that route, you'd need to tell your family to be very careful to use https when they browser to the NAS. And even if they do use https, they will get security exceptions that they will need to click through.

A safer path would be to use secure FTPS with FileZilla as the client. Then you can force the use of encryption.

You'd also need DDNS in the router, to allow the family to access by URL, and not via the IP address of the router (which can change w/o notice). No-ip.com offers a free DDNS option (and is bundled with most Netgear routers).

Sandshark
Sensei
Jul 06, 2023
I believe ZeroTier may offer a better solution in your instance because it can be installed on only those devices you want the users to access. Unfortunately, however, installing ZeroTier (and anything else) on a ReadyNAS is becoming more and more difficult because of the age of the Debian distro upon which ReadyNAS OS is based, which may be an overriding factor. OpenVPN does allow you to limit access by IP groups to specific user groups, and you may want to do that if you go with it.

In any case, a VPN simply gives you remote access of the NAS "local" interfaces, so ReadyCloud accounts won't work over it. You'll have to give users a local account (if they don't already have one) and move any files in personal folders from the ReadyCloud users' folders to the local users' folders. If any of the users use ReadyCloud file sync, you'll also need a separate sync program.