UNC links

The Universal Naming Convention, or UNC, specifies a common syntax to describe the location of a network resource, such as a shared file, directory, or printer. The UNC syntax for Windows systems is as follows: \\ComputerName\Shared Folder\Resource Name

UNCs differ from URLs in that they do not have a protocol: prefix and that they can contain embedded spaces. In corporate use of MediaWiki, it is often useful to paste a UNC from Windows Explorer directly into a wiki page.

Installation
Install the ParserFunctions and StringFunctions extensions.

Add the following to LocalSettings.php: array_push($wgUrlProtocols, "file://");

Create a template called Template:Unc (search for  and click Create this page), and paste this text into the page content:

Browser compatibility

 * With Internet Explorer on Windows UNC Links work without exception.
 * A recent patch applied to both IE8 and IE9 now requires the Wiki site to be in the Intranet Sites list for this to work correctly.
 * With Firefox file:/// links are disabled by default when appearing in non-local webpages. See: Manual:$wgUrlProtocols and this mozillaZine article for how to enable them.
 * For Google Chrome file:/// links are also disabled. They can be enabled using the LocalLinks extension.