Windows 7 is great. But for some reason Microsoft disabled indexing for network drives. This is a real problem when you store all your documents on a central server or network drive. To work around this and put your network drive in your “libraries” follow the instructions below:

1. Create a folder on your hard drive for shares. i.e. c:\shares
2. Create another folder in the above share. i.e. c:\shares\documents
2. Link the Library to this folder.
3. Delete the folder.
4. Use the mklink in an elevated command prompt  (ie, run CMD with administrator privileges) to make a symbolic link between the local directory you linked earlier and the network share you are trying to link. Name the link the same as the folder you created above.
i.e – mklink /d c:\shares\documents \\server\mydocuments
5. Done. Now you have non-indexed UNC path as a library.

Now you have the folder listed, but you can’t search it. For this, you need to install a patch released by Microsoft:

windows7 desktop search – UNCFATPHInstaller (will not work on 64bit according to Microsoft…but I haven’t tried it)

Then you should be able to go to Control Panel > Indexing Options > Advanced Button > UNC Tab and add the path for indexing.