Problem with using UNC links

Development Tools IDE 2.x
1

This UNC link in my text editor to a JPG opens correctly.

file://terry-2016/Users/terry/Dropbox/Electronics/Arduino/Arduino%20(Sundry)/18650Charger-1.jpg

But this UNC link to a sketch folder

file://terry-2016/Users/terry/Dropbox/Electronics/Arduino/SKETCHES/MY%20SKETCHES/PROJECTS_Arduino/TESTING%20UNIT%20proj/TESTINGproj-SKETCHES/DFRbasics-RotEnc26-e1

opens the subfolder but on then clicking the identically named .ino sketch it instead opens the 'new file' sketch.

Presumably somehow due to the unusual 'parent-subfolder' protocol in the IDE? Any ideas on an easy work around?

2

Hi @Terrypin. The workaround is to map the network location to a drive, then open sketches from the path under that drive instead of the UNC path:

The Arduino IDE developers are tracking the bug here:

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3

Those aren't UNC, which start with a double-backslash: \\

Those are just URLs, using the file protocol. Anyway, "opens the subfolder" means in the File Explorer? And the "identically named .ino" is "DFRbasics-RotEnc26-e1.ino"?

Is the behavior any different if you navigate to that folder manually and open the same file?

4

That (file://terry-2016/Users/terry/Dropbox/Electronics/Arduino/Arduino%20(Sundry)/18650Charger-1.jpg)
is what I get on the Windows clipboard after using the tool Path Copy in the context menu (right click menu) of File Explorer. Are you saying it’s not a UNC? Anyway, that’s what I’m working with.

5
  • UNC: \\server\path\to\whatever
  • URL: scheme://server/path/to/whatever

http and https are the schemes you might be most familiar with, but file is also a scheme. In the early 1990s, both conventions were gaining prominence, but in the end I guess URL won, if that's what File Explorer is using.

Aside from the scheme, the direction of the slash is the big difference. To support UNC, the code has to recognize the \ as a special character, with the \\ indicating the start of a UNC path. But that's not what you're talking about: no backslashes in sight.

BTW, having the Arduiino sketchbook in a network drive like Dropbox is a bad idea, but maybe not directly an issue either.

To avoid cluttering the sketchbook, on some setups I have a nested folder with "more sketches"

  • one/
    • one.ino
  • two/
    • two.ino
  • more/
    • alpha/
      • alpha.ino
    • beta/
      • beta.ino

although I can't say I've ever double-clicked an .ino in the File Explorer to open the sketch. Don't have Windows handy to try it.