We all use cloud services to store files securely on the web, ensuring that they are synchronized across multiple PCs or platforms (smartphones and tablets for example).
The most popular are certainly Microsoft's OneDrive and Google Drive, which owe much of the success to integration on Windows Phone and Android; 15 GB or more to use for photos, documents and general files.
These two services offer clients to keep files synchronized and available on Windows; in this guide we will see how to “do without” the clients by exploiting what the system already offers, Explorer.
If you need a method to connect Dropbox as a network disk, you can refer to our specific guide.
Connect OneDrive as a network drive
We open the Onedrive web page and log in with our Microsoft account.
LINK | OneDrive
We log in if necessary.
On the OneDrive page, click on Fillet from the menu on the left and let's go to the top of the address bar: from there we will have to fetch the code CID of the cloud, which you will find after the word & cid in the address.
We only need to retrieve the numerical part of the CID, obviously different for each account.
To map Onedrive as a network drive, simply use the link https://d.docs.live.net/, adding at the end the numerical part of the account's CID.
We then create the following URL https://d.docs.live.net/XXXXXXXXX (replace the Xs with the CID obtained, only digits). In case of difficulty, prepare the address on Notepad; alternatively we can try with d.docs.live.net@SSLXXXXXXXX.
To connect to the cloud we open a Windows Explorer window, right-click on Network in the tree on the left and then on the option Connect network drive.
In the window that opens, assign any letter to the drive and paste the link where you are asked to specify the server address; Windows will attempt to connect to the specified network drive and will ask for a username and password to log in.
We select the option to remember the credentials so as not to have to enter the password again. After authentication, the Microsoft OneDrive archive will be visible as if it were a computer disk, we will be able to copy, move and delete any file.
The same procedure can be carried out comfortably from the command prompt using the following command:
net use y: https://d.docs.live.net/xxxxxxxxxxxx
To delete a mapped drive the command is as follows.
net use and: / delete
Connect Google Drive as a network drive
Here perhaps we touch a very sore button: although Google offers its cloud space as a "real alternative" to other cloud services, especially in companies and highly computerized business environments, it suffers from a not just shortage, I would dare to say a real "defect 90 ": Google Drive does not support WebDAV, so it cannot be natively integrated into Windows or other operating systems as a network disk.
Commercial choice? Choice of opportunities? It is not up to us to judge, but if we really care about accessing Google Drive from a PC, I recommend installing the client offered by Google directly or (on company PCs or stuck in software installation) take advantage of the service offered by NetDrive, which will act as a "filter" by offering the online space of our Google Drive accessible with the WebDAV protocol.
LINK | NetDrive
The service is free without limits for 30 days, after which we will be able to use it only on one of the many supported services (if we use it only on Google Drive we will not have any problems whatsoever even after the trial period has expired).
Once Google Drive has been configured on NetDrive, we will repeat the same procedure on Windows as for OneDrive, only with the link provided directly by NetDrive.
An inexplicable lack on the part of Google, which considerably lowers my opinion on the cloud space signed BigG (for example with WebDAV support even GNU / Linux would have benefited from access to Google Drive without waiting for the release of the official client).
