How NOT to Mount Network Folders when Opening Them?

I have a NAS and a Time Capsule drive on my LAN. Whenever I open a folder stored on those, it gets mounted as a drive and added to the Finder:



After a while it gets pretty crowded here and, at least in my case, serves no practical purpose. Is there a way to prevent network folders to get mounted as drives each time I open them?

Mac mini (M2 Pro, 2023)

Posted on Apr 26, 2023 9:30 AM

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Posted on Apr 26, 2023 10:12 AM

You could not open that directory. It exists exactly to show all mounted volumes.


You can remove drives from the Desktop and Sidebar.


I don’t know how, but you can set up automount to mount them to a different folder. You’d have to search for that, or someone may chime in here

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6 replies

Apr 26, 2023 11:11 AM in response to etresoft

I realize that I should rephrase my question. Please forgive my lack of clarity. While understanding the need for mounting in order to access folders or files on a shared volume, I see no need for the volume to remain mounted forever. Is there a way to automatically unmount the volume once I close the application that was accessing it?

Apr 26, 2023 11:30 AM in response to Jerry_D

Jerry_D wrote:

I realize that I should rephrase my question. Please forgive my lack of clarity. While understanding the need for mounting in order to access folders or files on a shared volume, I see no need for the volume to remain mounted forever. Is there a way to automatically unmount the volume once I close the application that was accessing it?

Not really. There is no way for the system to know that you are no longer using the data.


However, there is an old auto mount mechanism that is still available. Apple took down the documentation a few years ago, but you can still find. Do a Google search for "autofs white paper". There is a reason why Apple doesn't really support this anymore. It worked, more or less, circa 2016-2017, when bound to an Active Directory SMB network. For other types of networks, you'll have to reduce your security levels and raise your hassle levels. Technically, it may be possible, but it won't be easy.


That would be as good as it gets. The same caveats apply. It's just that the system will automatically unmount these shares after you haven't used them for 10 minutes or so. Maybe.

How NOT to Mount Network Folders when Opening Them?

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