{"id":12519,"date":"2025-05-12T06:41:06","date_gmt":"2025-05-12T13:41:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/?p=12519"},"modified":"2025-05-12T06:43:32","modified_gmt":"2025-05-12T13:43:32","slug":"reconnect-network-drives-feature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/alwaysup\/reconnect-network-drives-feature\/","title":{"rendered":"AlwaysUp Feature Spotlight: Automatically Reconnect Network Drives"},"content":{"rendered":"<div align=\"center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"no-lazy-load\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/connect-network-drives.webp\" style=\"margin-bottom:20px;\" title=\"Automatically Reconnect Network Drives\" alt=\"Automatically Reconnect Network Drives\" border=\"0\" width=\"256\" height=\"256\" \/><\/div>\n<div id=\"blog-toc-container\" style=\"margin-top:20px;\">\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"#overview\">What is the &#8220;automatically reconnect network drives&#8221; feature? When should I use it?<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"#how-to-use\">How do I activate the feature in AlwaysUp?<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"#drive-not-mapped\">How do I know if AlwaysUp hasn&#8217;t mapped my drive?<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"#help\">AlwaysUp isn&#8217;t reconnecting my drive. Help!<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"#map-drive-at-startup\">How do I map my drive when AlwaysUp cannot do it automatically?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p><a name=\"overview\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"blog-caption\">What is the &#8220;automatically reconnect network drives&#8221; feature? Why would I use it?<\/h2>\n<p>To answer those questions, let&#8217;s start with the basics. You can skip the next section if you already know what a network drive is and how it works.<\/p>\n<h3>Network drives, explained<\/h3>\n<p>A network drive is a drive letter that allows you to access data not stored on your computer&#8217;s hard disks.<\/p>\n<p>To explain a bit more, a network drive consists of:<\/p>\n<ol style=\"margin-bottom:24px\">\n<li>\n<p>A drive letter, in the range of A-Z, where the remote data will be available;<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>The full <a href=\"https:\/\/learn.microsoft.com\/en-us\/dotnet\/standard\/io\/file-path-formats#unc-paths\" target=\"_blank\">UNC path<\/a> of a folder on a remote computer.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>For example in our company, each workstation has &#8220;P&#8221; &mdash; a network drive mapped to a shared folder on our server&#8217;s hard drive. You can see our P drive&#8217;s properties here:<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><a href=\"\/blog\/images\/p-network-drive-properties.png\" class=\"zoomPopup\" title=\"The P drive is mapped\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image-padding\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/p-network-drive-properties.png\" title=\"The P drive is mapped (click to enlarge)\" alt=\"The P drive is mapped\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>And with the P drive in place, Windows Explorer simply shows it alongside the other drives on the computer:<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><a href=\"\/blog\/images\/p-network-drive-windows-explorer.png\" class=\"zoomPopup\" title=\"The P drive in Windows Explorer\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image-padding\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/p-network-drive-windows-explorer.png\" title=\"The P drive in Windows Explorer (click to enlarge)\" alt=\"The P drive in Windows Explorer\" border=\"0\" width=\"520\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>So instead of typing in &#8220;\\\\ctc1\\\\data\\&#8221; when working with programs and scripts, we can simply use &#8220;P:\\&#8221; in its place &mdash; like other, normal folders on our machine. That&#8217;s because P is a helpful <b>alias<\/b> for the &#8220;\\\\ctc1\\\\data\\&#8221; folder.<\/p>\n<p>Maybe you have a &#8220;G drive&#8221; or a &#8220;W drive&#8221; at work? Those are network drives too, that share documents across your team. Aren&#8217;t they convenient?<\/p>\n<h3>Windows Services and network drives<\/h3>\n<p>By default, network drives are mapped in the context of a specific user. To say it another way, the network drives that you create are only available in your Windows account. That makes sense; not everyone may have access to the network locations that you can visit.<\/p>\n<p>However, that approach creates an obstacle when AlwaysUp runs your application as <a href=\"https:\/\/learn.microsoft.com\/en-us\/windows\/win32\/services\/localsystem-account\" target=\"_blank\">LocalSystem<\/a> &mdash; the default account for Windows Services. In that scenario, the drive you mapped in your account may not be visible to your application because it&#8217;s running in the LocalSystem account.<\/p>\n<p>But even if you <a href=\"\/blog\/alwaysup\/user-account-feature\/\">instruct AlwaysUp to run your application in a normal user account<\/a>, Windows will not automatically restore your network drive letters. In that case, your application will still have access to the network location (via the UNC path), but the convenient drive letter will not be available.<\/p>\n<h3>AlwaysUp will restore your drive letters for you<\/h3>\n<p>When you enable the &#8220;automatically reconnect network drives&#8221; feature, AlwaysUp will cycle through your drive letters and restore each one. That way, the application you&#8217;re running with AlwaysUp will have full access to the network drives that it needs to do its work.<\/p>\n<h3>You don&#8217;t need this feature if your application doesn&#8217;t use a network drive<\/h3>\n<p>Of course, restoring network drives won&#8217;t do you any good if your application doesn&#8217;t use them! In that case &mdash; or even if your application uses UNC paths instead of mapped drives &mdash; you can ignore the &#8220;automatically reconnect network drives&#8221; feature. You don&#8217;t need it.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"blog-section\">\n<p><a name=\"how-to-use\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"blog-caption\">How do I activate the feature in AlwaysUp?<\/h2>\n<p>To tell AlwaysUp to automatically reconnect your network drives, edit your application&#8217;s entry in AlwaysUp and check this box on the Startup tab:<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><a href=\"\/blog\/images\/automatically-reconect-network-drives-option.png\" class=\"zoomPopup\" title=\"The option to automatically reconnect your network drives\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image-padding\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/automatically-reconect-network-drives-option.png\" title=\"The option to automatically reconnect your network drives (click to enlarge)\" alt=\"The option to automatically reconnect your network drives\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<hr class=\"blog-section\">\n<p><a name=\"drive-not-mapped\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"blog-caption\">How do I know if AlwaysUp hasn&#8217;t mapped my drive?<\/h2>\n<p>If AlwaysUp was unable to restore a network connection, you&#8217;ll see an error in the activity. It should show up in the activity panel (as shown in the screenshot below) or when you generate a report by selecting <b>Application &gt; Report Activity<\/b> from the menu:<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><a href=\"\/blog\/images\/restore-network-drive-error.png\" class=\"zoomPopup\" title=\"Error restoring a network drive in AlwaysUp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image-padding\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/restore-network-drive-error.png\" title=\"Error restoring a network drive in AlwaysUp (click to enlarge)\" alt=\"Error restoring a network drive in AlwaysUp\" border=\"1\" width=\"520\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<hr class=\"blog-section\">\n<p><a name=\"help\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"blog-caption\">AlwaysUp isn&#8217;t reconnecting my drive. Help!<\/h2>\n<p>For unusual situations like this, we recommend <a href=\"\/blog\/alwaysup\/troubleshoot-alwaysup-command-prompt\/\">troubleshooting from a command prompt launched from AlwaysUp<\/a>. Follow the directions and once the command prompt comes up on your screen, change directory (CD) to the drive. Hopefully Windows will return a helpful message that sheds some light on the problem.<\/p>\n<p>In some circumstances, Windows may require you to enter the password to restore the network drive. Naturally, those drives cannot be reconnected without some help. The next section presents an alternative way forward.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"blog-section\">\n<p><a name=\"map-drive-at-startup\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"blog-caption\">How do I map my drive when AlwaysUp cannot do it automatically?<\/h2>\n<p>If AlwaysUp fails to map your drive automatically, you should map the drive with a script and configure AlwaysUp to run that script before it launches your application. Here&#8217;s the step-by-step process:<\/p>\n<ol style=\"margin-bottom:24px\">\n<li>\n<p>Compose a version of the <a href=\"https:\/\/learn.microsoft.com\/en-us\/previous-versions\/windows\/it-pro\/windows-server-2012-r2-and-2012\/gg651155(v=ws.11)\" target=\"_blank\">NET USE<\/a> command that maps your network drive.<\/p>\n<p>For example, your command may look like this if you need to provide a password to map the H drive:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>net use H: \\\\fileserver1\\shared-documents \/user:mjones [mjonespassword] \/persistent:yes<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Test to ensure that your command does the trick when you run it from a prompt.\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>Save your command to a batch file (*.bat). Be sure to protect the file from non-authorized personnel if it contains a password!<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>Start AlwaysUp and edit your application.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>Switch to the <b>Startup<\/b> tab. From there, check the <b>Run the following program\/batch file<\/b> option and provide the full path to the script you created in step 2:<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><a href=\"\/blog\/images\/alwaysup-map-drive-at-startup.png\" class=\"zoomPopup\" title=\"Map your network drive at startup\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image-padding\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/alwaysup-map-drive-at-startup.png\" title=\"Map your network drive at startup (click to enlarge)\" alt=\"Map your network drive at startup\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>Save your updates.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>With that change in place, AlwaysUp will map your drive whenever it starts. And after doing that, AlwaysUp will launch your application &mdash; with your drive ready and available.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"blog-section\">\n<div style=\"margin-top:30px\" align=\"center\">\n<div class=\"cta-button-1\">\n<table role=\"presentation\" cellspacing=\"0\" cellpadding=\"0\" border=\"0\" align=\"left\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td align=\"center\"><a href=\"\/blog\/tag\/alwaysup-feature-spotlight\/\" title=\"More AlwaysUp features\"><span><nobr>More AlwaysUp features&#8230;<\/nobr><\/span><\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<!-- relpost-thumb-wrapper --><div class=\"relpost-thumb-wrapper\"><!-- filter-class --><div class=\"relpost-thumb-container\"><style>.relpost-block-single-image, .relpost-post-image { margin-bottom: 10px; }<\/style><h3>You may also like...<\/h3><div style=\"clear: both\"><\/div><div style=\"clear: both\"><\/div><!-- relpost-block-container --><div class=\"relpost-block-container relpost-block-column-layout\" style=\"--relposth-columns: 3;--relposth-columns_t: 2; --relposth-columns_m: 2\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/alwaysup\/version-11-5-released\/\"class=\"relpost-block-single\" ><div class=\"relpost-custom-block-single\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"relpost-block-single-image\" alt=\"New Version\"  src=\"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/new-version-150x150.png\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1\/1\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1\/1\"><\/img><div class=\"relpost-block-single-text\"  style=\"height: 75px;font-family: Arial;  font-size: 12px;  color: #333333;\"><h2 class=\"relpost_card_title\">AlwaysUp 11.5: Improvements for Session 0 Isolation, Server 2019, and more<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/alwaysup\/v10-released\/\"class=\"relpost-block-single\" ><div class=\"relpost-custom-block-single\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"relpost-block-single-image\" alt=\"New Version\"  src=\"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/new-version-150x150.png\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1\/1\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1\/1\"><\/img><div class=\"relpost-block-single-text\"  style=\"height: 75px;font-family: Arial;  font-size: 12px;  color: #333333;\"><h2 class=\"relpost_card_title\">AlwaysUp Version 10 Released: Keep Your Windows App Running 24\/7\/365<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/alwaysup\/wellsoft-hospital-emergency-departments\/\"class=\"relpost-block-single\" ><div class=\"relpost-custom-block-single\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"relpost-block-single-image\" alt=\"Customer Spotlight\"  src=\"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/cusomer-spotlight-150x150.png\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1\/1\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1\/1\"><\/img><div class=\"relpost-block-single-text\"  style=\"height: 75px;font-family: Arial;  font-size: 12px;  color: #333333;\"><h2 class=\"relpost_card_title\">&quot;AlwaysUp Powers our Mission Critical Application in Hospital Emergency Departments&quot;<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/a><\/div><!-- close relpost-block-container --><div style=\"clear: both\"><\/div><\/div><!-- close filter class --><\/div><!-- close relpost-thumb-wrapper -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What is the &#8220;automatically reconnect network drives&#8221; feature? When should I use it? How do I activate the feature in AlwaysUp? How do I know if AlwaysUp hasn&#8217;t mapped my drive? AlwaysUp isn&#8217;t reconnecting my drive. Help! How do I &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/alwaysup\/reconnect-network-drives-feature\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12522,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[26,345,80,379],"class_list":["post-12519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alwaysup","tag-alwaysup-tag","tag-alwaysup-feature-spotlight","tag-feature-spotlight","tag-network-drives"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12519"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12519\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12994,"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12519\/revisions\/12994"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coretechnologies.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}