Physics file servers for Windows

<note> If you're using one of our managed windows computers, access to most of these areas should be automatic.

If you are connecting from outside the University of Minnesota network, you will first need to either connect to the University VPN service, or you can connect using ssh.

VPN downloads and guides </note>

You can connect to your home directory and other shares using native Windows file sharing, either by typing the path into the address bar in a file browser such as Windows Explorer, or by using “Map network drive”. These are some of our commonly-used file servers:

spa-home contains some shares for departmental offices, etc.

• Browse to \\spa-home.spa.umn.edu to find available shares
• or go directly to \\files.umn.edu\cse\UmSaveDocs\<your X500> for your home directory
• If prompted for a username/password to access these shares, enter AD\<your X500> and your umn password.

physhome.spa.umn.edu contains your physics unix home directory:

• Go to \\physhome.spa.umn.edu\<your_physics_username> to access your unix home directory
• If prompted for a username/password, enter SPA\<your physics username> and your physics password.
  • if you are mapping the drive, first check the box “connect using different credentials”

<note> Access to these areas usually depends on some kind of group membership. You can see what groups you're a member of here in MyPhys.

If you aren't a member of the appropriate group, the group manager can add you (if you can figure out who the manager is - we will add more useful info if we think of some!) </note>

physgroups.spa.umn.edu contains shares for various workgroups such as website files, class grading dropboxes, and several research groups.

• Browse to \\physgroups.spa.umn.edu
• If prompted for a username/password, enter SPA\<your physics username> and your physics password.
  • if you are mapping the drive, first check the box “connect using different credentials”

spa-data contains shared volumes for research groups

• Browse to \\spa-data.spa.umn.edu
• If prompted for a username/password, enter AD\<your X500> and your umn password.

This is an alternative way to connect to your Windows file storage from outside the university, without first connecting to the VPN.

Use winscp to connect to spa-home.spa.umn.edu. Login with username of AD\internetid and your x500/internet password.

Note, winscp has two interfaces available (and asks which you want during installation) - the “Explorer” interface is most similar to the regular Windows file manager.

Alternatively you could try mapping a drive letter using either Dokan (free but untested) or ExpanDrive (tested, but you have to pay for it)

A graphical client for accessing files over ssh called FileZilla (Windows and OSX) is available - we have more details on our wiki page about ssh.

From most linux distributions (including departmental linux systems) you can simply run:

mkdir targetdir
sshfs -o uid=$UID youx500internetID@spa-home.spa.umn.edu:/home targetdir

Non-UMN Windows XP installs *may* need NTLMv2 auth policy set in gpedit.msc. Of course, nobody should be using XP any more, but there could be some use in research labs on protected subnets, so we'll continue to provide these directions for now.

• Click on the Start menu and select Run…
• Type gpedit.msc and click OK.
• Navigate to Local Computer Policy/Computer Configuration/Windows Settings/Security Settings/Local Policies/Security Options.
• Double click on Network security: LAN Manager authentication level.
• Set the value to Send NTLMv2 response only. Refuse LM & NTLM.
• Click the OK button.
• Restart the computer.