windows

Windows 7 network bookmarks, shortcuts & favourites

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One of the things I find extremely useful in alternative, non-Microsoft operating systems such as Linux’s Gnome is the ability to create links to network locations within your file browser. A function that is like how you bookmark sites using a web browser.

Network location bookmarks to me are great timesavers especially as they allow you to avoid having to scan local networks on first connections. But until Windows 7, was a feature that had been missing from the Windows line of operating system. So in this article I will show you how to quickly add network favourites which will always be accessible from within Windows Explorer.

One of the problems with Windows Networking is that whenever a client connects to the network, it still has conduct a time consuming scan before discovering the nearby, connected devices. In the image below you can see a near, complete network scan where the Media protocol of my NAS (networked storage device) shows up, but its Samba (Linux connecting to Windows) file shares do not!

windows file explorer

Fortunately we can type the device’s name and location into the Windows Explorer address bar and connect to the device without the wait.

windows file explorer
windows file explorer

Now to save this network device connection as a favourite, just right-click over the Favourites folder in the top of the left pane (green arrow) and select Add current location to favourites (red arrow).

windows file explorer

Once complete you should see a new entry under favourites which ought to match the name of your network device. In the future just click the favourite item after your machine connects to the Windows network. Rather than having to scan for, or manually enter in the device’s name, you should be able to connect straight away.

windows file explorer

Written by Ben Garrett

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