Network Drive

Open your Files from your computer like a drive: in Finder on a Mac, or File Explorer on Windows, with nothing to install. You see exactly what you see in Files, and nothing is stored on your computer except a temporary copy while a file is open.

What It Is

The Network Drive shows your company's folders and files as a drive on your computer. Open, edit, and save a file in any app, drag files in to upload them, make folders, rename, and move, the same as on the Files page. Every change follows the same rules as the Files page and is written in your Activity Log, marked via Network Drive.

• Your folders: the top of the drive is the top of Files, with every folder you can see, including folders brought in from another system.
• Organized for You: a folder for each project, company, contact, and other record with files (Organized for You). You can open, add, and rename files there.
• Private folders: you see a private folder only when you are one of its people (Private Folders). For everyone else it does not exist on the drive either.

Address and Sign-In

• Address: https://drive.cascadiawebservices.com/, the same for every company. Your Network Drive page shows it with a Copy button.
• User name: the email you sign in with.
• Password: a drive key. Finder and File Explorer call it a password.

A drive key is a long random key made for you, never one you choose: 40 random letters and numbers in groups of five, after a part that names your company and the key. Make one for each computer. It is shown once, your computer saves it (Keychain on a Mac, Credential Manager on Windows), and we keep only a fingerprint of it (a SHA-256 hash), so nobody can read it back. A drive key works only for the Network Drive: never to sign in to the workspace, the API, or an AI agent connection.

Set up on This Computer

Open Account, then Network Drive (or select Set Up the Network Drive on Your Sign-In), and select Set Up on This Computer. It makes a drive key for this computer, named for the computer and browser (change the name first if you like), and shows the address, your user name, and the key, each with Copy. Then follow the steps for your computer, which the page shows for a Mac or Windows; Show the Steps for Windows (or Mac) shows the other.

Making a key is action core.drive.create. It is for a person on their own screen only.

On a Mac

1. In Finder, choose Go, then Connect to Server.
2. Paste the address and click Connect.
3. Choose Registered User. Paste your email as the name and your drive key as the password, check Remember this password in my keychain, and click Connect.
4. Your files open in a Finder window. The drive stays in the sidebar under Locations; to open it later, repeat step 1 and pick it from Recent Servers.

There is no shortcut file for Mac: Connect to Server is the reliable way.

On Windows: The Setup File

Select Download the Setup File. It is a small file made for you, Connect Network Drive.cmd, holding the address and your user name, never your key. Open it from your Downloads; if Windows says it protected your PC, choose More info, then Run anyway. It:

1. starts WebClient, the part of Windows that opens web folders, and sets it to start with Windows;
2. raises the largest file WebClient opens from about 50 MB to 4 GB, which needs Windows to ask you for permission once;
3. asks for your drive key and saves it in Windows Credential Manager;
4. connects the drive with the next free letter, keeps it after a restart, and opens it.

On Windows: By Hand

1. Open File Explorer, right-click This PC, and choose Map network drive (on Windows 11, choose Show more options first).
2. Paste the address as the Folder. Check Reconnect at sign-in and Connect using different credentials, then click Finish.
3. Paste your email as the user name and your drive key as the password, check Remember my credentials, and click OK.
4. For files over about 50 MB, make a one-time change: open Command Prompt as administrator (search for cmd, then Run as administrator), paste the command your Network Drive page shows, press Enter, and restart the computer. The command is:

reg add "HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\WebClient\Parameters" /v FileSizeLimitInBytes /t REG_DWORD /d 4294967295 /f

Limits

• Opening on Windows: Windows opens files of up to about 50 MB from a web folder until the change above raises it to 4 GB, Windows' own largest.
• Uploading: a file larger than 100 MB is uploaded on the Files page instead, which sends large files in pieces. Finder and File Explorer send each file in one piece, and the drive takes up to 100 MB in one piece. When your computer tries to save a larger file to the drive, the drive refuses it before any of it is sent on, and you get a notification in your workspace (Your Notifications and Needs You Today), named Too Large for the Network Drive, with the file's name and size and a link to the folder on the Files page where you can upload it. You are told once an hour for each file, however many times your computer tries again.
• Phones and tablets: use Files in the workspace.

Your Drive Keys and Sign-Ins

Your Network Drive page lists your keys: each key's name, the last five characters of the key, when it was made, and when and where it was last used, with Revoke, which stops it at once (action core.drive.revoke). Recent Sign-Ins lists each time a key opened the drive after a quiet half hour or from a new address: the time, the address, and the place (city, region, and country). The page is action core.drive.mine.

A key never expires on its own. It is revoked, kept on the list, and never deleted, when:

• you or an owner revoke it, or you select Revoke This Drive Key in one of its emails;
• your access to the workspace is turned off, paused, or removed;
• your role or permission group no longer allows the Network Drive, or the Network Drive is turned off;
• you get back into your account with Lost Your Device, which ends every drive key made before;
• your Cascadia account sign-in no longer includes the company. The drive asks the account sign-in about this at most once a minute while a key is in use.

Security Alerts

You get an email, at any hour, when:

• a key is made for your account, with where it was made;
• a key is first used from a new place (a country and region it was not used from before).

Each has a one-click Revoke This Drive Key button, which works without signing in and only revokes that one key. Every email says why it was sent.

Wrong Keys

Five wrong tries on one key within 15 minutes lock it, so it no longer opens the drive. You and every owner get an email, and owners see it in Needs You Today. Revoke a locked key and make a new one. Wrong keys from one address that name no key at all are limited to 30 an hour, then that address waits an hour.

Who May Use It (Owners)

Owners choose who may use the Network Drive in Settings, Permissions, Network Drive (action core.drive.settings; the page is core.drive.team):

• On or off for the whole company. It is on to start.
• Owners and admins may use it whenever it is on.
• Members may use it only with a Files role an owner checked. To start, no role is checked, so members wait until an owner allows their role. A role for contractors can stay unchecked.

Unchecking a role, or turning the drive off, revokes the keys of everyone it leaves out at once. The same tab lists everyone's keys, with Revoke, and the latest sign-ins. It is the same for every company.

Nothing Is Ever Deleted

• Deleting a file or folder from the drive puts it in Trash, as on the Files page (Trash and Versions). Deleting a file that is only attached to a record's folder in Organized for You takes it off that record; the file stays where it is kept.
• Saving over a file keeps its earlier version, which you can restore from the file's More, Versions.

Files Your Computer Keeps for Itself

Macs and Windows keep small files of their own in every folder they open: a Mac's .DS_Store and ._ files, Windows' desktop.ini and Thumbs.db, and Office's ~$ files while a document is open. The drive keeps these apart for each person, encrypted like any file, and they never show in Files or for anyone else.

Your computer asks for these files next to everything it shows. The drive answers those questions straight from your own set of them, without looking through your folders, so browsing stays quick in workspaces with hundreds of thousands of files.

Locks

When an app opens a file to edit it, it can lock it, so someone else's app does not save over it at the same time. A lock lasts up to an hour unless the app renews it, and ends when the app closes the file.

How It Works

The drive speaks WebDAV, the standard Finder and File Explorer use for web folders, over HTTPS only. Your computer sends your email and drive key with each request; your company's own workspace checks them and answers, through the same checks as the Files page. To keep browsing quick, the workspace remembers a key it has checked for up to a minute, and the folders you may see for a few seconds; a revoked key, a change to your access, and any change to your folders take effect on the very next request. Your files stay in your workspace's data region, encrypted with your company's own key (How Your Files Are Encrypted).