Network drives and printers

In Windows environment we often need to use drives located on other computers on the network. These network drives, of course, should be shared (allowed to use remotely). To use a shared drive we need to map it. We can map a network share to a drive letter by using some methods of the WshNetwork object. The same object WshNetwork allows us to work with network printers as well.

WshNetwork object

To create an instance of the WshNetwork object we need to do something very similar to what we were doing when we were creating an instance of the WshShell object. Namely, we need to use the CreateObject method of the WScript object with parameter "WScript.Network". 
var nwobj = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network");
Once an instance of the object created we can use its properties and methods.
WshNetwork properties and methods
Property Description
ComputerName Returns the name of the computer system.
UserDomain Returns a user's domain name.
UserName Returns the name of a user.
Method Description
AddWindowsPrinterConnection Adds a Windows-based printer connection to your computer system.
AddPrinterConnection Adds a remote MS-DOS-based printer connection to your computer system.
EnumNetworkDrives Returns the current network drive mapping information.
EnumPrinterConnection Returns the current network printer mapping information.
MapNetworkDrive Adds a shared network drive to your computer system.
RemoveNetworkDrive Removes a shared network drive from your computer system.
RemovePrinterConnection Removes a shared network printer connection from your computer system.
SetDefaultPrinter Assigns a remote printer the role Default Printer.

Working with network shares

There are three methods of the WshNetwork object that work with network shares: Let's take a closer look at these methods.

MapNetworkDrive()

The general syntax of the method is 
MapNetworkDrive(LocalName, RemoteName, [UpdateProfile], [User], [Password])
where
LocalName RemoteName UpdateProfile User Password For example, to map a network share myshare located on the computer remote_comp to the letter "Y" and make this mapping persistent (that is, restored when the same user logs on again) we need to execute code like this 
var nwobj = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network");
nwobj.MapNetworkDrive("X:", "\\\\remote_comp\\myshare", true);

RemoveNetworkDrive()

The general syntax of the method is 
RemoveNetworkDrive(Name, [Force], [UpdateProfile])
where
Name Force UpdateProfile For example, to disconnect the drive mapped in the previous example even if it is currently using, but leave this connection persistent we need to execute 
fsobj.RemoveNetworkDrive("X:", true);

EnumNetworkDrives()

This method takes no arguments and returns the collection containing the current network drive mapping information. This collection is an array that associates pairs of items — network drive local names and their associated UNC names. Even-numbered items in the collection represent local names of logical drives. Odd-numbered items represent the associated UNC share names. The first item in the collection is at index zero (0).
We can treat this collection exactly the way we did before with collections of Files and Folders, or we can use a shorter version by accessing the collection elements through method item() or just using parenthesis with the element index inside after the collection name: 
var nw = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network");
var nwDrives = nw.EnumNetworkDrives();
var msg = "Network drives:\n";
for(i=0;i<nwDrives.length;i+=2){
  msg += nwDrives(i) + " = " + nwDrives.item(i+1) + "\n";
}
WScript.Echo(msg);

Network printers

The WshNetwork object has several methods to work with network printers. These methods are ...

EnumPrinterConnections()

This method takes no arguments and returns the current network printer mapping information. Like the EnumNetworkDrives, this method returns a collection. This collection is an array that associates pairs of items — network printer local names and their associated UNC names. Even-numbered items in the collection represent printer ports. Odd-numbered items represent the networked printer UNC names. The first item in the collection is at index zero (0). We can use this method exactly the same way we used method EnumNetworkDrives (see example above).

AddPrinterConnection

This methods adds a remote MS-DOS-based printer connection to your computer system. The general syntax is 
AddPrinterConnection(LocalName, RemoteName [,UpdateProfile][,User][,Password])
where
LocalName RemoteName UpdateProfile User Password

The AddPrinterConnection method adds a network printer to an MS-DOS printer port, such as LPT1. You cannot use this method to add a remote Windows-based printer connection. To add a remote Windows-based printer connection, use the AddWindowsPrinterConnection method.

To map a MS-DOS based printer to the local LPT1 port we need to use code like this 

var nw = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network");
nw.AddPrinterConnection ("LPT1", "\\\\Server\\Print1");

AddWindowsPrinterConnection

Adds a Windows-based printer connection to your computer system. Using this method is similar to using the Printer option on Control Panel to add a printer connection. Unlike the AddPrinterConnection method, this method allows you to create a printer connection without directing it to a specific port, such as LPT1. If the connection fails, an error is thrown. In Windows 9x/Me, the printer driver must already be installed on the machine for the AddWindowsPrinterConnection method to work. If the driver is not installed, Windows returns an error message. The general syntax of the method is 
AddWindowsPrinterConnection(PrinterPath)
where PrinterPath is a String value indicating the path to the printer connection.
The following example shows how to connect a Windows printer \\printserv\DefaultPrinter 
var nw = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network");
var PrinterPath = "\\\\printserv\\DefaultPrinter";
nw.AddWindowsPrinterConnection(PrinterPath);

RemovePrinterConnection

This method removes a shared network printer connection from your computer system. The RemovePrinterConnection method removes both Windows and MS-DOS based printer connections. If the printer was connected using the method AddPrinterConnection, you need to provide the printer's local name as an argument. If the printer was connected using the AddWindowsPrinterConnection method or was added manually (using the Add Printer wizard), then we need to pass the printer's UNC name. The general syntax of the method is 
RemovePrinterConnection(Name, [Force], [UpdateProfile])
where Name Force UpdateProfile This code disconnects the printers connected in the two previous examples 
var nw = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network");
var PrinterPath = "\\\\PRN-CORP1\\B41-4523-A";
nw.RemovePrinterConnection(PrinterPath, true, true);
nw.RemovePrinterConnection("LPT1");

SetDefaultPrinter()

This method assigns a remote printer the role Default Printer. 
SetDefaultPrinter(PrinterName)
where PrinterName is a string value indicating the remote printer's UNC name. The SetDefaultPrinter method fails when using a DOS-based printer connection. We cannot use the SetDefaultPrinter method to determine the name of the current default printer
The following example connects a Windows-based printer and makes it the Default Printer 
var nw = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network");
var PrinterPath = "\\\\research\\library1";
nw.AddWindowsPrinterConnection(PrinterPath);
nw.SetDefaultPrinter(PrinterPath);

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