I have a NAS running on my local network that houses my personal files. I can open the files application and navigate to the NAS and then locate and search for files.
What I'd like to do is to type in the menu search or the files search and have it search that network drive/folder. I can seem to figure out how to do this.
I have both NFS and SMB shares setup on the NAS and can access it from Zorin via either method.
Thoughts or tips? I'm just using the out of the box Files application and would prefer to use either that or Nemo which I also have installed.
I'm running Zorin OS 17.2 Core using Wayland.
Brave A.I. search engine via Mojeek search gives:
"NAS Files in GNOME Search
To include NAS (Network-Attached Storage) files in Gnome search, you’ll need to:
- Mount the NAS share: Use a tool like
smbclient or cifs to mount the NAS share to a local directory on your system. For example, if your NAS share is afp://MyBookLive.local/Public, you can create a mount point /mnt/NAS and mount the share using the following command:
sudo mount -t cifs //MyBookLive.local/Public /mnt/NAS -o username=your_username,password=your_password
Replace your_username and your_password with your actual NAS credentials.
- Create a symbolic link: Create a symbolic link to the mounted NAS share in a directory that’s indexed by Tracker, GNOME’s search engine. The default indexed directories are
~/Documents, ~/Music, ~/Pictures, and ~/Videos. For example, you can create a symbolic link in ~/Documents:
ln -s /mnt/NAS /home/your_username/Documents/NAS
- Configure Tracker to index the NAS share: Open the GNOME Control Center, navigate to “Search” settings, and click on the “Other” tab. Click the “+” button to add a new folder to be indexed. Select the symbolic link you created in step 2 (e.g.,
~/Documents/NAS).
- Restart Tracker: Restart the Tracker service to update the index:
sudo service tracker restart
- Verify the NAS files are indexed: Open the GNOME search bar and type a query. The NAS files should now be searchable and appear in the search results.
Note: Make sure your NAS share is accessible and the mount point is stable. If you encounter issues, you may need to adjust the mount options or use a more robust mounting solution like autofs.
Additionally, if you’re using a Linux distribution that ships with GNOME, you might need to install additional packages or configure the system to enable SMB/CIFS support. Consult your distribution’s documentation for more information."
Additionally, good tutorial on Nautilus (Files) here with additional useful links to other tutorials:
This is interesting, but GNOME Control Center doesn't exist in Zorin and I don't see any way to access the "tracker" that the AI mentions in Zorin. All I see in Zorin are for search settings are Search Locations. There is also no tracker installed with Zorin that I can find.
Okay, I did figure it out. Here is what I did.
Steps 1 and 2 from above. (I used my existing NFS mount)
- Mount the NAS share: Use a tool like
smbclient or cifs to mount the NAS share to a local directory on your system. For example, if your NAS share is afp://MyBookLive.local/Public, you can create a mount point /mnt/NAS and mount the share using the following command:
sudo mount -t cifs //MyBookLive.local/Public /mnt/NAS -o username=your_username,password=your_password
Replace your_username and your_password with your actual NAS credentials.
- Create a symbolic link: Create a symbolic link to the mounted NAS share in a directory that’s indexed by Tracker, GNOME’s search engine. The default indexed directories are
~/Documents, ~/Music, ~/Pictures, and ~/Videos. For example, you can create a symbolic link in ~/Documents:
ln -s /mnt/NAS /home/your_username/Documents/NAS
-
Zorin Settings: Open Zorin Settings and navigate to Search and click on Search Locations.
-
Click on Other: Add the symbolic link created in Step 2
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This would be good to be in Tutorials and Guides. @moderators. 
Well done.
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