Map or mount a drive to your home directory space or a Geode-Project space

On this page:

Before you begin
About work with sensitive data
Instructions
- Windows
- macOS
- Linux

Before you begin

Important:

Before storing data on any of Indiana University's research computing or storage systems, make sure you understand the information in Types of sensitive institutional data appropriate for UITS Research Technologies services.

Make sure you do not include sensitive institutional data as part of a file's filename or pathname.

Home directory space for individuals and groups with accounts on the Indiana University research supercomputers is hosted on Geode, IU's disk-based, online storage service. If you have an account on an IU research supercomputer, then you already have home directory space on Geode; if you do not have an account on any of the IU research supercomputers, you may request an account.

To request an account on an Indiana University research system, see Get additional IU computing accounts. Account availability depends on your eligibility.

For more, see About home directory space on IU research supercomputers

An IU research supercomputer account is not required for simple access to an existing Geode-Project space. However, before you can map or mount a Geode-Project space as a drive on your personal workstation, you first must be granted access by the owner of the Geode-Project space. If you're not sure whom to contact, email the UITS Research Storage team (store-admin@iu.edu) for help (include the name of the Geode-Project space in question). Once your ADS account has been granted access to Geode, follow the instructions below for Windows, macOS, or Linux workstations. (To use these instructions on a workstation located off campus, you must connect to the IU VPN.)

About work with sensitive data

This UITS system or service meets certain requirements established in the HIPAA Security Rule thereby enabling its use for work involving data that contain protected health information (PHI). However, using this system or service does not fulfill your legal responsibilities for protecting the privacy and security of data that contain PHI. You may use this system or service for work involving data that contain PHI only if you institute additional administrative, physical, and technical safeguards that complement those UITS already has in place.

Although PHI is classified as Critical data, other types of institutional data classified as Critical are not permitted on Research Technologies systems. For help determining which institutional data elements classified as Critical are considered PHI, see About protected health information (PHI) data elements in the classifications of institutional data.

Note:

In accordance with standards for access control mandated by the HIPAA Security Rule, you are not permitted to access data containing protected health information (PHI) using a group (or departmental) account. To ensure accountability and maintain appropriate levels of access control, all users must use an individual login for all work involving PHI.

At Indiana University, never store files containing sensitive institutional data, especially protected health information (PHI) regulated by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), on your desktop workstation, laptop, USB flash drive, tablet, smartphone, or other mobile device unless the files are properly encrypted on the device, and your senior executive officer or the IU Institutional Review Board (IRB) has given prior written approval. Because PHI must remain encrypted at rest, make sure you are using full-disk encryption on any device that has research data containing PHI on it. If you are not sure, ask your department or school local UITS support person for help.

If you have questions about securing HIPAA-regulated research data at IU, email securemyresearch@iu.edu. SecureMyResearch provides self-service resources and one-on-one consulting to help IU researchers, faculty, and staff meet cybersecurity and compliance requirements for processing, storing, and sharing regulated and unregulated research data; for more, see About SecureMyResearch. To learn more about properly ensuring the safe handling of PHI on UITS systems, see the UITS IT Training video Securing HIPAA Workflows on UITS Systems. To learn about division of responsibilities for securing PHI, see Shared responsibility model for securing PHI on UITS systems.

For more, see Your legal responsibilities for protecting data containing protected health information (PHI) when using UITS Research Technologies systems and services.

Instructions

Follow the instructions below for your Windows, macOS, or Linux workstation. If your workstation is located off campus, you first must connect to the IU VPN.

Windows

Press Win-e, and then, in the left column of the resulting window, right-click Computer or This PC.
Select Map network drive.
In the "Path" or "Folder" field:
- Home directory space: To map a drive to your home directory space, enter the following path (replace username with your IU username; replace u and s with the first and second characters of your username, respectively):
```
\\gex.rs.iu.edu\homedirs\u\s\username
```
- Geode-Project: To map a drive to Geode-Project, enter the following path (replace project_name with the project name associated with the Geode-Project space you are accessing):
```
\\gex.rs.iu.edu\projects\iu\project_name
```
To configure the connection to use your IU credentials, make sure Connect using different credentials is selected, and then click OK or Finish.
When prompted, enter the appropriate IU username prepended with ads\ (for example, ads\username) and the corresponding passphrase.

macOS

In the Finder, from the Go menu, select Connect to Server, and then, in the "Server Address" field:
- Home directory space: To mount your home directory space, enter the following path (replace username with your IU username; replace u and s with the first and second characters of your username, respectively):
```
smb://gex.rs.iu.edu/homedirs/u/s/username
```
- Geode-Project: To mount a space on Geode-Project, enter the following path (replace project_name with the project name associated with the space on Geode-Project you are accessing):
```
smb://gex.rs.iu.edu/projects/iu/project_name
```
Click Connect.
In the window that appears, choose Registered user.
In the "User name" field, enter your IU username, prepended with ads\ (for example, ads\username) to indicate the IU ADS domain; in the "Password" field, enter your IU passphrase.

Linux

Log in as root, or use the su command to change to the root user, and then create an empty mountpoint directory (for example, /mount_point).
Mount the new directory:
- Home directory space: To mount your home directory space, use the following command (replace username with your IU username, u and s with the first and second characters of your username (respectively), my_dir with the name of the local mountpoint directory you created, and local_user with the name of the local user account that should be granted access to your home directory space):
```
mount.cifs //gex.rs.iu.edu/homedirs/u/s/username /my_dir -o user=username,uid=local_user,sec=ntlmv2,domain=ads
```
- Geode-Project: To mount a space on Geode-Project, use the following command (replace project_name with the project name associated with the space on Geode-Project you are accessing, my_dir with the name of the local mountpoint directory you created, username with your IU username, and local_user with the name of the local user account that should be granted access to the space on Geode-Project):
```
mount.cifs //gex.rs.iu.edu/projects/iu/project_name /my_dir -o user=username,uid=local_user,sec=ntlmv2,domain=ads
```
When prompted, enter your IU passphrase.

Note:

If you use a graphical user interface for your desktop environment, you can mount your IU research supercomputer home directory or Geode-Project space as you would any other remote drive; for path examples, see the macOS instructions above.