How do you link to a networked shared drive?

Feb 09, 2015

I would like to create a trigger that links to a folder on an internal company shared drive and can't figure out how to do it. I can get the URL of the folder and it looks something like this: \\drivename\shared\foldername. As expected, using http:\\drivename\shared\foldername doesn't work. I've also tried file:\\drivename\shared\foldername which also is invalid, (this syntax works as a link when using SharePoint).

What I'm hoping to do is to allow the viewer to open shared folders on network drives that they have access to directly from the SL output so they can browse files they need to complete the training. Is this possible?

3 Replies
Brett Rockwood

Hi Leslie,

Thanks for the links. I didn't realize it was that complicated/unpredictable to link to a file share. As some of the people pointed out in their examples, adding resources to the player isn't an option because the files in the folders I want to access are live and constantly changing.

I'm wondering if some sort of web-redirect might work. I can put links in a SharePoint site that can open the folders using the file:\\drivename\shared\foldername convention, and I can link to that SharePoint URL from SL so it seems like I can get something to work in that fashion. It seems like it creates another layer for the user (i.e., they are taken to SharePoint and then have click on the link there to open the folder) but it might work... I'm not savvy enough to create a web re-direct on my own that would make the folder open without the users having to deal with SharePoint.

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