DSM-G600, DNS-3xx and NSA-220 Hack Forum

I have been doing something ever since I got my DNS-323, but it hasn't been without its problems, but the troubles were worth it to  me and with Windows 7 I found some more twists and problems, but finally I have found one good solution, which also solves some problems I see some have posted for and might not have as such a good solution.

My goal was that I wanted all my user data stored on the DNS-323.  By this I mean "My Documents", "My Pictures", ..., and the Desktop, Favorites, ...  The main reasons for this are ease of backup and security.  If what I wanted to backup is on my computer the computer has to be on all the time or I had to remember to backup.  If someone broke in and stole my computer they would have all my important information.  If the data is on the DNS-323 I could backup every night with a copy/link/rsync script right on the DNS-323.  If the DNS-323 is in a hidden location, most likely it wouldn't get taken.  I was even pleasantly surprised that I even was able to work around that when Quicken 2010 went to one big data file (90 meg in my case), I was able to enable SVN on the DNS-323 and have it commit a new version every night, and with its binary diff save me a ton of space.  (Many thanks to all the people have made this possible and just everything to make the DNS-323 so much more then what I even thought possible for a NAS!!!)

In Windows XP between moving folders and the Shell Folders in the registry I could do it.

With Windows 7 I ran into the problems.  I found that some install programs wouldn't work if shell folder settings (In the registry or by moving a folder in Explorer, which changes the shell folder registry settings too) where changed to a network drive.  And then there is the libraries and the fact that they would allow you to add "non-indexed" locations, which in turn also meant that you couldn't index them for faster searches.

As it turns out most of the solution is based on something that we have had in Unix from the beginning and has been in since Windows 2000, but is much more reliable these days like in Windows 7, and that is symbolic links.  The fix for indexing though is actually in a Microsoft plug in for searching.

The plug in for searching doesn't say that it works on Windows 7, but it does work.  It says it doesn't work on 64 bit, I don't know I'm using 32 bit for the simple reasons that with Windows 7 I don't need more then 4 Gig of memory, drivers are more likely to be compatible, and 32 bit applications are smaller then 64 bit applications.  If your main goal it indexing you may be stopped here, but my main goal is remote data storage without problems, and such it is this second part that is more important to me anyway.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/deta … 0761e27283

Once you install this plug in you can go to your Index Options in the control panel and modify the settings to index any mapped network drive.

For the remote storage and adding to the libraries.
You can create symbolic links n Windows 7, with the mklink command.  And since they are handled at the file system level almost no programs should "notice" (especially since Windows programs are not link aware) that your data is on a network drive when you link a local directory to a remote one.

But first there is a trick about the libraries.  Even though when you try to add a network drive location to them and it complains that it has to be indexed, I found that even after it was indexed with the above plug in (and search works), the library would continue to reject the location.
The solution is to add a local folder and then delete it and put in a link from that folder to the one on the network drive.

In my case it was even easier because the folders I wanted to move where already in the library (documents, pictures, ...), but if you want a new folder in a library simply create a folder locally like C:\Shares\Folder, put that in a library (Explore to the Libraries-><FOLDER> -> select locations link), and then follow the instructions below.

Here is how to create the symbolic link.
Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> Right Click "Command Prompt" -> "Run as Administrator"
    (Run as administrator is required even if you are an administrator).
C:\>cd Users\Chris
C:\Users\Chris>move Documents Documents.hold    # Move just to be on the safe side, could also be rmdir
C:\Users\Chris>mklink /D Documents \\DLink-NAS\Volume_1\Users\Chris\Documents

There is an interesting note about the renaming folders like Documents.  If you look at it from the command prompt it will be Documents.hold, but from Explorer you will see two Documents (Documents and My Documents) folders since Explorer will dynamically rename the Documents.hold folder to My Documents, but it doesn't seem like any other program sees the renamed (Documents.hold) folder as Documents, they see the symbolic linked Documents folder.  I kept my folders around just so that I would be able to look at the special attributes like this it has on them.  I think I will try to transfer them to my link, for icon and such and then delete them even though they are not causing any problems that I can see.

Chris