Windows 7: Create a directory symbolic link to a network share

Mklink creates a symbolic link to a directory or file. I had been waiting for this feature in Windows; Unix and Linux systems already offered it.

Windows Vista introduced symbolic links, and Windows 7 lets us use them with libraries. In this example, I want a directory link to a network share.

Start with an elevated command prompt. Without it, the operation returns this message:

You do not have sufficient privilege to perform this operation.

Open an elevated command prompt

1. Click the Start button.
2. Type cmd in the search box.
3. Hold Ctrl and Shift, then click cmd in the results.
4. Click Yes at the UAC prompt.

I want to create a directory symbolic link to a network share located on \\IP\Share.

Create the symbolic link

First, connect to the IPC$ share. My share is on a NAS without guest permissions, so the operation will fail without that connection.

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mklink local_dir \\ip or servername\sharename /d