"mapping" a drive---

[eshort]

What does the expression "mapping a drive" mean and how is it done?..is this the procedure where the "find" feature is used to locate a file/program?

Our systems administrator had to "locate a program" on our workstations and said he had top "map the drive" to find it...our workstations have WinNT with several partitions on the hardrive..

thanx.

[mairving]

Mapping a drive is just assigning a drive letter to a network drive. This makes it easier for the user. Also some programs won't work with the UNC path which is \\servername\path . They need a drive letter to work.

[pillainp]

This is where you connect to a remote drive and assign it a drive letter so that the drive is, for all intents and purposes, treated as a drive on your local computer. This drive is only available as long as the remote computer is available and online.

And no, you do not have to map a drive to search it. You can do it right from your server, with the administrator's profile.

[eshort]

thanx..how is this done?

For example, my computer lacked a program called "folio"

My sys ad mapped the drive so the program appeared on a "V" (assigned letter) partition of the hdd...now I have a "new" "V" partition which has the "folio" program installed.

[pillainp]

To map a drive letter to a network computer or folder:

1. Open Windows Explorer.
2. On the Tools menu, click Map Network Drive.
3. In Drive, select the drive letter to map to the shared resource.
4. In Folder, type the server and share name of the resource, in the form of \\servername\sharename. Or click Browse to locate the resource.

Notes

a. To open Windows Explorer, click Start, point to Programs, point to Accessories, and then click Windows Explorer.
b. To reconnect to the mapped drive every time you log on, select the Reconnect at logon check box.
c. Mapped drives are available only when the host computer is also available.
d. You can assign a mapped drive to a different drive letter by disconnecting from the drive and then remapping it to a new drive letter.

[mairving]

Actually right-clicking on My Computer or Network Neighborhood allows you to map a drive.

If you are a member of a domain, I am not sure why your sysadmin is manually mapping drives. Generally it is done through a login script. You can make it conditional as well, if a member is a member of this group, map this drive.