The mapped drive Last updated: 23. Oct 2026
Every Docly instance serves your workspaces over WebDAV at /drive, so you can map them as a network drive and open the files in Explorer or an editor. Saving a file on the drive is publishing it: there is no review step and no write lock.
Connect the drive
The address is /drive on the Docly instance that hosts the workspace — https://docly.net/drive for workspaces on docly.net. (A CLI working copy shows the instance on the Server line of docly status.) The drive signs you in with your Docly e-mail address and password on every request; it keeps no session.
In Windows:
In Explorer, right-click This PC (or Network) and choose Map network drive.
Pick a drive letter and enter
https://docly.net/driveas the folder.Tick Connect using different credentials, and Reconnect at sign-in if you want the drive back after a restart.
Sign in with your Docly e-mail address and password.
From a terminal, the same mapping is:
net use L: \\docly.net@SSL\drive /user:you@example.com *
net use # the drive shows as "Web Client Network"The top level lists your workspaces and the folders and documents shared with you (shares you have accepted). A new workspace cannot be created from the drive — creating a folder at the top level is refused — and a workspace folder can only be deleted from the drive when it is empty. Any WebDAV client that supports HTTPS with Basic authentication can connect to the same address; the steps above are for Windows.
Problem | What to do |
|---|---|
Mapping fails, or the drive stops answering | The Windows WebClient service must be running. Restart it, and set its startup type to Automatic. |
«Working directory was deleted», or a path is «not found» for about a minute | Every file operation is an HTTP request, and Windows caches a failure for 60 seconds. Retry once, then wait. See The site drive is WebDAV not a disk. |
«Write verification failed: … is N bytes on disk, expected M» | A stale size from the WebDAV client's cache; the write succeeded. See False write-verification failures on the WebDAV drive. |
401 on every request, while the website works | Two-factor authentication — see the next chapter. |
Two-factor authentication and the drive
If your account — or your user group — requires two-factor authentication, the drive cannot ask for a code. It accepts your e-mail and password only from a network where you have signed in to the Docly website and completed 2FA:
Same network means the same /24 — the first three parts of your IPv4 address. Moving within it (a new DHCP lease, a NAT pool) keeps the drive working.
How long it lasts: until that website sign-in expires, plus a grace period of 96 hours by default (set per Docly installation). After that the drive answers 401 until you sign in on the website again.
When the drive refuses you for this reason, Docly sends you an e-mail, «2FA Authentication Required Prior to Signing in to Docly™ Drive» — at most once every 12 hours for the same address.
Windows reconnects a mapped drive at startup. On a new network, sign in to the website first, then open the drive.
A deleted account, or an account in a deleted user group, is refused.
What happens when you write a file
The drive decides what a write becomes from the file name and the content, not from what the document was before. The CLI's put and push go through exactly the same server code, so a file behaves the same either way.
You write | It becomes |
|---|---|
| An import that replaces the document: the envelope's |
| For a user with developer access: the document at that path is replaced by a Code File holding your text, under a new id. The editor offers to restore it as a form once the text is valid again — also with a new id. Without developer access the write is refused. Validate the JSON before you save. |
| A schemaless JSON document. Invalid JSON is stored as a Code File instead. |
Other text — | A Code File, up to about 2 MB. A larger file is stored as an uploaded file. |
Binary — images, PDF, fonts … | An uploaded file. |
| The folder's properties document. It must be valid JSON, it is never replaced or converted, and it cannot be renamed or moved from the drive. |
Reading is the same rule in reverse: a document bound to a schema appears as Name.docly, a schemaless JSON document as Name.json, and code and uploaded files under their own name.
Changing a document's type needs developer access. Without it you can update documents and write the file types the folder accepts, but a write that would turn a document into another type is refused.
Renaming keeps the id only within the same extension. Renaming a file to another extension — to
.doclyor.json, or to a type belonging to another schema — converts it into a new document with a new id. Shares, publications and links to the old id do not follow.Every save is live. Documents bound to a schema that keeps versions get a new version; code files have no history.
Writes in one workspace are handled one at a time, so a save can wait briefly behind another.
Do not run
git initon the drive — see Use a docly CLI working copy instead of git.
When to use the CLI instead
The drive is good for quick, interactive edits and for browsing a workspace in Explorer. For anything else, the docly CLI talks to the same server without a filesystem in between.
Aspect | Mapped drive | docly CLI |
|---|---|---|
Change goes live | On save | On |
Review before publishing | Not possible |
|
Write protection | None | Locked until one folder is unlocked |
Search a tree | Thousands of HTTP round trips | One server-side query ( |
Caches that can mislead you | WebDAV metadata and «not found» caches | None — it reports what the server stored |
Good for | Quick edits, browsing | Scripts, AI agents, batch work, anything you want to diff first |
AI agents in particular should use the CLI: project skills do not even load from the drive — see Agent skills do not load from the mapped drive and How an AI agent should use the docly CLI.
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