Using Network Resources Effectively


Tips are scattered throughout this chapter, but I want to collect a few of the best ones here for easy reference. The following tips and strategies will help you make the most of your LAN.

Use My Network Places

My Network Places not only serves as a convenient place to collect shortcuts to network resources, but it also appears under My Computer when you open or save files in any application. This feature can save you lots of time when you use the same network folders over and over.

You can make shortcuts in My Network Places for the handful of the network shared folders that you use most frequently.

You can add the names of subfolders when you make these shortcuts, if you find that you always have to drill your way into the main shared folder to get to the folder you actually want.

Make Folder Shortcuts

You can drag the icon appearing in the address field from any shared folder view to your desktop, to My Network Places, or any other convenient place for reuse later. (The Address bar might not appear on your Explorer windows. You might need to right-click the toolbar and check Address Bar. You also might need to uncheck Lock the Toolbars to drag it into a visible position.)

I like to organize projects into folders on my desktop and put related network resources in each. For example, I might have three project folders on my desktop, and in each one, three shortcuts to related shared folders.

Because shortcuts aren't the "real thing," you can have shortcuts to the same network places wherever you need them.

Use Offline Network Folders

If you use network resources from a portable computer or a computer with an intermittent network connection (by design or by accident), you can use the Offline Folders feature to keep local copies of important network folders in your own computer for use when the network is unavailable.

If you would like to learn more details about Offline Folders, p. 697.


Put Tools and Documentation Online

Administrators and power users should put management batch files, Registry installation and setup files, special program utilities, and documentation in a shared network folder, for convenient access from any computer on the network. Your network's users don't need to know it's there unless you want them to.

Organize Your Network to Fit Your Users

You should organize shared folders to fit the way users actually work. For example, if your organization frequently passes documents back and forth between users, you could make a shared folder named Inbox, containing a subfolder for each user. Co-workers could deliver documents to each other by dropping them into the appropriate network Inbox. Users could each have a shortcut to their Inboxes on their desktops for quick access.

For more suggestions about workgroup management,


Special Edition Using Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Special Edition Using Microsoft Windows XP Professional (3rd Edition)
ISBN: 0789732807
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 450

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