Windows File and Print Services - MCTS Guide to Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Configuration - page 231

6. Click the Search Active Directory toolbar icon. Click the Find list arrow, and click Shared
Folders . Type advertising in the Keywords text box, and then click Find Now . The Marketing
share is listed in the search results. Right-click the Marketing share and click Explore .
7. Open the AdvUser1.txt file you created earlier.
8. On your server, refresh the Computer Management window (by pressing F5 or clicking the
Refresh toolbar icon). You should see the # Client Connections column for the Marketing
share change to 1.
9. Click the Sessions node in the Shared Folders snap-in. You should see that AdvUser1 has a
connection with a non-zero value in the # Open Files column.
10. Click the Open Files node in the Shared Folders snap-in. You should see Q:\Marketing
listed. When a folder is opened in Windows, it's counted as an open file. You might also
see the AdvUser1.txt file listed. However, Windows doesn't display the open file for more
than a few seconds.
11. Right-click one of the files listed in Open Files and click Close Open File . Click Yes . Note
that this action doesn't affect the Explorer window on your Vista computer, and it doesn't
close Notepad if the open file is in Notepad. However, this action does close the connection
between the client computer and the file.
12. Close all open windows on your Vista computer and server, and log off Vista.

6

Accessing File Shares from Client Computers
The file sharing discussion so far has focused on how to create and manage shared resources.
However, for shared resources to be useful, users must know how to access them. You have
already seen some different access methods in this chapter's activities. The following methods of
accessing shared folders are among the most common:
• UNC path —The UNC path, which you've seen in examples and activities, uses the
syntax \\ server \ share [\ subfolder ][\ file ]. The parameters in brackets are optional. In fact,
the share parameter is optional if all you want to do is list shared resources on a server.
Using \\ server by itself in an Explorer window lists all shared folders and printers
(except hidden shares) on that server. The disadvantage of this method is that the user
must know the server name, and in a network with dozens or hundreds of servers, that
might be asking a lot.
• Active Directory search —The Active Directory search, as you have seen, is easy and allows
you to search by keyword or simply list all shared folders in the directory. With this
method, users don't need to know the hosting server's name. However, shares aren't pub-
lished to Active Directory automatically, so this method might not find all shared folders
on the network.
• Browsing the network —You can open the Network folder from the Start menu and see a
list of all computers found on the network (see Figure 6-17). You can then browse each
computer to find the share you want. This method has the advantage of not requiring you
to know the server's name. However, in Windows Vista, you must enable the network
discovery feature (covered in Chapter 8) for your computer to see other computers and
for your computer to be seen by other computers. Plus, in a large network, you might be
browsing for quite a while to find the right computer.
• Mapping a drive —Administrators often set up a logon script for users in which a drive
letter is mapped to a network folder where users can store documents. Users can also map
a drive letter to shared folders that they access often. Users tend to be more comfortable
using drive letters to access files in a Windows environment because all their local
resources (hard drives, DVD drives, flash drives) are accessed in this manner. Drive letters
can be mapped only to the root of the share, as in \\ server \ share , not to a subfolder of the
share, as in \\ server \ share \folder1.