IT Office

Staff and PhD

Working from home

Undergrad and MSc

File access (VPN)

Brief instructions

  1. At work: find out the address of your network drive/shared folders by typing net use into a command prompt.  (The addresses begin \\...)
  2. At home: connect to the Virtual Private Network (VPN).
  3. Click Start, Run, enter the address of your drive, and click OK.

For access outside the School but inside the University, just skip step two.

Apple OS X users: please see the Apple help page.

Full instructions

1. Find out the address of your network drive

  1. On your work PC or a C33 PC: click Start, then Run.
  2. Type cmd in the box and click OK.
  3. Type net use in the black box and press Enter.
  4. Write down the address of your drive (lines starting \\...).

Here are some examples of shared folder addresses:

Address Description
\\cufs1.bris.ac.uk\homes. Your K: drive. Also available through the MyBristol Portal.
\\dfs1.bris.ac.uk\DeptFS\biosci School home folder. Look in GroupShares, GroupShares2 and GroupShares3 for research data.
\\dfs1.bris.ac.uk\DeptFS\biosci\Users\Staff\ab1234 Staff personal (P:) drive for username ab1234
\\dfs1.bris.ac.uk\DeptFS\biosci\Users\PhD\ab1234 PhD personal (P:) drive for username ab1234
\\bio-nt2.bio.bris.ac.uk\BatGroup Bat Lab
\\dfs1.bris.ac.uk\DeptFS\biosci\GroupShares\MammalGroup Behavioural Ecology
\\dfs1.bris.ac.uk\DeptFS\biosci3\CommunityEcology Community Ecology
\\dfs1.bris.ac.uk\DeptFS\biosci4\GroupShares\CerealGenomics Cereal Genomics

2. Connect to the Virtual Private Network (VPN)

Follow the University's instructions for setting up and connecting to the VPN.  If you get stuck, check which VPN services you can access.

3. Connect to your shared folder/network drive

  1. Click Start, then Run.
  2. Enter the address of your drive, and click OK.

If it doesn't work, make sure you're connected to the VPN.  If it still doesn't work, email sobs-computer@bristol.ac.uk with details of what you're trying to access.

Automatically connect in future

If you'd like your computer to automatically reconnect to your shared folders in future, follow these guides: