[ubuntu] how should I work with Apache's web folder (network sharing permissions)? topic

I need to put my web files under /var/www/ which is the web root. I'd like to do my editing in Windows and save them under the web folder. So, I tried sharing /var/www/ via the GUI, but it tells me 'could not change the permissions of folder'. If I change the permissions of www to 777, and tried sharing again, I get error that sharing folder we don't own is restricted, 'ask the administrator to add the line "usershare owner only=false" to the [global] section of the smb.conf to allow this'.

Before I go ahead with this, is this a safe approach, or is there a better way? The site is not live and I'm just working with it. Thanks.