By Michael Cherry [bio]
Posted: Jul. 31, 2006

The following is an illustration accompanying an article published by Directions on Microsoft, an independent research firm focused exclusively on Microsoft strategy & technology. More samples of our content, as well as a list of upcoming articles and reports are also available.

The Network and Sharing Center provides users with a centralized location to manage network connections and resources.

The main pane of the Network and Sharing Center displays a compressed view of the network map, information about any existing network connections, and information about any resources that the user can discover or is sharing on the network. In this example, Network Discovery and Password Protection are turned on, while the Public Folder, Printer Sharing, and Media Library sharing features are currently disabled. Links at the bottom of the center can show all the files and folders that are currently being shared.

The task pane at the left provides access to common networking tasks, such as connecting to a network or adding a wireless device. However, longtime Windows users may find it hard to locate the menu entry for mapping a network drive.