Sharing Pictures and Other Digital Media Files

If several people work on your computer, you can make your pictures, music, and video files available to them by storing them in your computer's Public folders. If your computer is connected to a network, you can share the folders in which you store your media files so that other people on your network can access them.

You can also use Windows Photo Gallery or Windows Media Player to share a collection of media files with other computers running Windows Vista. Usually this type of sharing happens on a home network.

In Windows Photo Gallery, you turn on media sharing by clicking the File button on the toolbar and then clicking Share With Devices. In Windows Media Player, you click the Library arrow and then click Media Sharing. In either case, the Media Sharing dialog box opens. However, in the case of Windows Media Player, you can look for media files that have been shared by other people in addition to sharing your own media files.

In this exercise, you will use Windows Photo Gallery to share your media files with other people on your network.

1.	On the Start menu, point to All Programs, and then click Windows Photo Gallery.
2.	On the toolbar, click the File button, and then click Share With Devices. The Media Sharing dialog box opens. [View full size image]
3.	Under Sharing settings, select the Share my media check box, and click OK. Then in the User Account Control dialog box, if you're logged on as an administrator, click Continue. Otherwise, enter an administrator password, and click OK. The Media Sharing dialog box expands so that you can allow or deny specific users. [View full size image]
4.	In the expanded dialog box, click Settings. The Media Sharing - Default Settings dialog box opens. [View full size image] In the Share media as box, you can change the name of the collection of media files you are sharing.
5.	Select or clear the check boxes under Media types, Star ratings, and Parental ratings to include only the specific media files you want to share.
6.	Click OK to close the Media Sharing Default Settings dialog box, and then click OK to close the Media Sharing dialog box. Nothing appears to have happened, but the specified media files are now available to other people on your network.
7.	Display Control Panel, click Network and Internet, and then click Network and Sharing Center. Under Sharing And Discovery, Media Sharing is now turned on.