16.3 Configuring Home Folders for Display in the My Files Area

Most organizations using Open Enterprise Server (OES) or Windows will have user Home folders. If your organization has existing Home folders for users, the Net Folder Server will be discovered and created automatically when you provision users during the LDAP synchronization process. (For information about how to synchronize users via LDAP, see LDAP Servers and Synchronization in the Filr 5.0: Administrative UI Reference.) After the synchronization is complete, you are reminded to complete the Net Folder Server setup (by adding proxy credentials) when logging in to the Filr administration console.

If your organization does not currently leverage user Home folders on OES or Windows, you must first create a connection to your existing file system by creating a Net Folder Server. Then you can create a connection to specific volumes (on OES servers) and shares (on Windows servers) by creating a Net Folder.

16.3.1 Configuring Home Folders

Prerequisites

If you are using Active Directory, the Active Directory Home folder for users must be configured as if it were on a network folder, even if the Home folder is local to the server. It cannot be configured on a local path.

To change a user’s Home folder to be configured as a network folder:

  1. In the Active Directory Administrative Center, access a user’s profile information.

  2. In the Profile section, in the Home folder area, select Connect.

  3. Select a drive in the drop-down list, then use the To field to specify the path to the local directory.

    For example, \\172.17.2.3\HOME\jchavez

Configuring Home Folders

To configure Home Folders to be displayed in the My Files area:

  1. Configure synchronization from your LDAP directory, as described in LDAP Servers and Synchronization in the Filr 5.0: Administrative UI Reference.

  2. Configure the Net Folder Server, as described in .Creating and Managing Net Folder Servers in the Filr 5.0: Administrative UI Reference

    IMPORTANT:The Filr administrator must supply proper proxy account information for Net Folder Servers that contain home directories before any end user logs in to Filr. This is because Filr automatically synchronizes the metadata for each user’s Home folder using the appropriate Net Folder Server with its associated proxy user credentials when the user logs in for the first time. See How Filr Makes Files and Folders Visible to Users in the Filr: Understanding How Filr Works.

    If you do not supply the proxy account information before the user logs in, the Home directories’ metadata is not synchronized correctly and the internal log files contain Null Pointer Exceptions.

    Similarly, if the user Home folder is moved on the file system to a different volume or share or a different server, a new Net Folder Server is created and its metadata must be synchronized the first time the user logs in to Filr after the move.

  3. (Optional) Allow users to have files and folders in personal storage in the My Files area in addition to the Home folder.

    Whether users are allowed to have files in personal storage in the My Files area affects how the Home folder is displayed in the My Files area. For more information, see Enabling Personal Storage for Users and Groups in the Filr 5.0: Administrative UI Reference.

NOTE:A user’s personal workspace (including the Home folder) is not displayed until the user has logged in to one of the Filr clients (web, mobile, or desktop) at least one time.

16.3.2 Editing Home Folders for Individual Users

After Home folders have been configured as described in Configuring Home Folders, you can edit the Home folder settings for individual users:

  1. Log in to the Filr site as the Filr administrator.

    1. Launch a web browser.

    2. Specify one of the following URLs, depending on whether you are using a secure SSL connection:

      http://Filr_hostname:8080
https://Filr_hostname:8443

      Replace Filr_hostname with the hostname or fully qualified domain name of the Filr server that you have set up in DNS.

      Depending on how you have configured your Filr system, you might not be required to enter the port number in the URL. If you are using NetIQ Access Manager, the Filr login screen is not used.

  2. Click the admin link in the upper-right corner of the page, then click the Administration Console icon .

  3. Under Management, click Users.

  4. Click the drop-down arrow next to the user whose properties you want to view, then click User Properties.

    The User Properties page is displayed.

  5. Click Edit Home Folder... . (This option is displayed only if a Home folder has been configured for the user, as described in Configuring Home Folders.)

  6. Make any modifications to the configuration, synchronization schedule, and data synchronization settings.

    For information about each option that you can modify for Net Folders, see Creating and Modifying Net Folders in the Filr 5.0: Administrative UI Reference.

  7. Click OK to save your changes.

16.3.3 Understanding How Home Folders Relates to Personal Storage

For information about how Home folders relate to Personal storage in Filr, see Understanding My Files in the Filr: Understanding How Filr Works.