Using USB to connect two PCs

[Barburo]

I have a Multi-LinQ USB 2.0 File Transfer Cable. It is advertised as follows

Our USB 2.0 File Transfer Cable is the perfect solution for high speed peer-to-peer file transfers between two computers via USB 2.0. The transfer rate is up to 400 times faster than using a Serial or Parallel port connection and 40 times faster than standard USB 1.1. The included Super-Link software application program, provides a Windows Explorer-like interface that makes file transfer as easy as drag-and-drop.

Some internet googling taught me that a regular USB to USB cable would probably fry one or both motherboards, so I got the special link cable that has a chip in it.
The included software is for transferring Windows files so it's limited to what Windows can see - vfat or ntfs, and to windows sessions. I have tried to get it working from the supplied software in Windows XP on both machines and failed. The supplied CD has a driver for Mac that seems to consist of a resource.frk that contains a file USBNET~1
I would like to use it to access files back and forth between my desktop and my laptop both running Puppy 3.01.
I did some searching on this forum but couldn't find anything specifically about this. I thought maybe through networking or ftp but I do not know how to proceed.
I dug a bit on the internet and found this site http://www.linux-usb.org/usbnet/ but I was not able to understand what I specifically need to do.
If the drivers necessary are included in the Linux kernel, maybe you use modprobe to start them.
Can anyone point me in the right direction?
B.

[madscientist]

Well, this is just a guess, but it may very well solve your problem.

I would try to install WINE on each machine. This would allow you to load the Windows software that came with your cable (cross fingers). If it does than you can just transfer files as you would using Windoze by launching the cable application on each machine from within Puppy.

When you do the install don't use the default /.wine/etc, directory, but rather install the cable software to your /root/my-applications folder.

You can't use a normal USB to USB cable to transfer the files. The software you obtained with the cable should have a driver included that will be installed. You need to talk to the electronics in the middle of the cable you purchased that a normal USB cable does not have.

[Béèm]

As far as I understand the article a module, usbnet, is needed.
Do find / |grep usbnet and see if you get a usbnet.ko file.
If yes do modprobe usbnet
Once done, I understand you should have an extra usb device like usb0
You have to give an ip at it by issuing ifconfig usb0 10.0.0.1 on one PC and ifconfig usb0 10.0.0.2 on the other.
You could test with the ping command.

(I do a similar thing with a firewire connection between two PC's)

Now if you don't have the usbnet.ko in puppy 3.01 you're stuck unless you try 4.1.1
I checked and the usbnet.ko is in 4.1.1
The modprobe did work, so the module is loaded, but not having such a usb device, I didn't get a usbX device neither.

I hope you got the idea.

[TheProphet]

I've got the device, actually a belkin easy transfer basically the same device and (i think) same chipsets.

so I did

modprobe -a usbnet cdc-subset

which is the two modules needed for fundamentally linking your usb0 to eth0 thus having all the properties of pppoe

errr "bridging" I mean.

Using Puppy Legacy OS2 and running it from CD.

I believe I can do the same thing once switching back to my hd-install of the same. (I do potentially destructive experiments in RAM) so if I do the modprobe again (in my permanent setup) I should be able to reboot with a /dev/usb0

fingers crossed.

[Rickrandom]

One approach might be to get 2 USB to serial cables, or 2 USB to TTL cables, and connect them to each other. The USB to serial cables would need a null-modem, and the USB to TTL cables would need the transmit pin on one connected to the receive pin on the other (and vice versa),

Then each would be a port on one computer, and provided the baud setting, etc is the same on both, then the 2 computers should be able talk to each other.

I admit not having tried it...