Network Share Files

Read a single file or a whole folder from a Windows network share or a NAS over SMB. A Bookmark can read only the files no successful run has read.

Category

Input

Connection

Network Share (SMB)

Also known as

smb, cifs, unc, network drive, mapped drive, windows share, file share, file server, nas, samba

What it does

Reads files from a Windows network share or a NAS over SMB through a saved Connection: a single file, or every file in a folder (with an optional name pattern) combined into one run. Decodes with one chosen format (CSV, JSON, Parquet, Excel, XML). With Bookmark on, it reads only files no successful run has read. To move, copy or delete the files after the run, wire its Files anchor to a File Action.

Inputs and outputs

When to use it

• Load the files a team or an application saves to a shared drive
• Pick up the exports a Windows system writes to a file share every night
• Process only the new files each run and leave everything else alone (Bookmark)

Examples

folder: exports/daily   pattern: *.csv

path: \\fileserver\finance\exports\2026-01.csv

folder: exports/${date-1}

Bookmark: on

Tips

• The format settings are the same as on the CSV Files, JSON Files, Excel Files and XML Files inputs: the delimiter, the encoding and the rows to skip, which sheet to read, and the record element.
• Turn on “Add source file name as column” to keep each row's file path (finance/exports/2026-09-01/orders.csv), so you can tell which folder it came from. The run's Messages name a file by its full path too.
• The Connection signs in with a user name and password, the way a computer that is not joined to the domain connects to a share. Fill in Domain for a domain account (CORP) and leave it blank for an account that belongs to the file server itself. Every request is signed.
• It speaks SMB 2 and 3 on port 445. A share that requires encryption refuses Trinium for now, and the Test button names that as a possible cause.
• Paths are relative to the Connection's root folder, with forward or back slashes. A path that climbs out of its folder with .. is refused.
• Tokens filled in at run time, in the folder and the file path: ${date} (today in the instance timezone, 2026-08-26), ${date-1} / ${date+7} (a day offset), ${date:%Y%m%d} (a layout) and ${datetime} (UTC, filename-safe). A ${run_id} is refused here: a run's id is new on every run, so it names a run's own output, never a folder to read. A misspelled token fails the run by name before anything is downloaded; a pipeline parameter (${region}) works in the same path.
• To mix formats (e.g. CSV and Excel) in one flow, use two Network Share nodes into a Union.
• Bookmark records the files only after a full, successful Staging or Production run, never a Test run, so a run that fails reads them again next time.
• A Staging or Production run reads a file only once its size and modified time have stayed the same for 30 seconds, so a file someone is still copying onto the share is not read half-written. It waits up to 'Wait for files still arriving' (5 minutes unless set; 0 turns it off); a file still changing then is left in place for the next run and named as a warning. The check cannot tell a finished file from a copy that stopped half way: only a sender that writes under a temporary name, or writes a marker file, proves a file complete.
• Bookmark leaves the share untouched. Staging and Production each keep their own list of processed files, and so does each value of a text parameter the pipeline uses, so testing in Staging never makes Production skip a file and region = US never skips a file region = EU read. Reset a list to reprocess everything; after a text parameter is removed or renamed, runs stop until Reset, which also offers to carry on with new files only.
• Turn on 'Run each file separately' to process every file as its own run, handy when one bad file shouldn't fail the rest, named by its full path. Every start does this: Run Now, a schedule, a file watch, a flow step and the Run API. With Bookmark on, only the files no successful run has read get a run, up to 500 a start; the rest are read by the next start. When there is nothing new to read, the start makes one run that reads nothing. The runs take turns, one at a time.
• A schedule can watch this folder and fire only when something new lands, instead of polling on a clock.
• Compressed files: a .csv, .tsv, .json, .ndjson or .xml file ending in .gz, .bz2 or .xz is read automatically. An archive (.zip, .tar, .tar.gz or .tgz, .tar.bz2, .tar.xz) is opened when Name pattern names it (*.zip, *.tgz) or the path points at one: every file of the chosen format inside is read and the rest are ignored.

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