Surface RT: metro interface file open & network names?

Picked up a Surface RT on the Black Friday sale, my first foray into Windows 8 world, which I've otherwise been trying very hard to ignore.

At any rate, I had a question. In the Metro "File Open" dialogue, when I select the "Network" option nothing is pre-populated and it expects me to type in the actual machine name, which gets quite annoying after the umpteenth time.

Is there any way to get this to display the list of detected computers like it does on the desktop's File Explorer? And yes, networking is working fine in Desktop and I can "see" all my network machines there, and it also works fine in Metro if I manually type in the name... I just want some way to present a friendly list.

I tried adding a server to the File Explorer's "Favorite" section but this doesn't appear to show up anywhere in Metro. I could probably map to a drive letter, but if Windows 8 behaves anything like 7, that may not be the most reliable method either due to the old "cannot reconnect all network drives" issue on bootup. I'd be happy just to browse like I can in File Explorer.

I'm not sure if you have enabled file and printer sharing on the Surface RT yet but perhaps the link will help. Seeing the other machines may be a different issue or require another app. but I'm not too sure with the RT version.

How To: Enable File & Printer Sharing Windows/Surface RT | Rashed Talukders Little Place on the Net

Yes, I enabled it... and guest services and all that. It's working perfectly fine on the desktop, exactly the way I'd expect it to, but in the Metro interface the Network file open dialogue continues to be stubbornly unhelpful.

Sunfox said:

Yes, I enabled it... and guest services and all that. It's working perfectly fine on the desktop, exactly the way I'd expect it to, but in the Metro interface the Network file open dialogue continues to be stubbornly unhelpful.

Click to expand...

Man that would drive me crazy so there must be an app for this.

Have you tried using the built in Office 2013 to access the classic windows explorer menu?

4 Things You Probably Don't Know About Microsoft's Surface RT - Forbes

chev65 said:

Man that would drive me crazy so there must be an app for this.

Have you tried using the built in Office 2013 to access the classic windows explorer menu?

4 Things You Probably Don't Know About Microsoft's Surface RT - Forbes

Click to expand...

Well, yes, as mentioned the desktop mode works perfectly normally on the Surface and shows all my networked computers when I click on "Network", and that includes Office which runs in desktop mode. The issue is with the rest of the Metro apps.

Sunfox said:

chev65 said:

Man that would drive me crazy so there must be an app for this.

Have you tried using the built in Office 2013 to access the classic windows explorer menu?

4 Things You Probably Don't Know About Microsoft's Surface RT - Forbes

Click to expand...

Well, yes, as mentioned the desktop mode works perfectly normally on the Surface and shows all my networked computers when I click on "Network", and that includes Office which runs in desktop mode. The issue is with the rest of the Metro apps.

Click to expand...

The only complaint I saw was that you were unable to browse other networked machines from the Surface.

Maybe a screen shot would help because I'm not running RT. I somehow completely misunderstood you but far as I know there are no metro style apps that can browse the network which is why they included office with the classic explorer menu.

chev65 said:

The only complaint I saw was that you were unable to browse other networked machines from the Surface.

Maybe a screen shot would help because I'm not running RT. I somehow completely misunderstood you but far as I know there are no metro style apps that can browse the network which is why they included office with the classic explorer menu.

Click to expand...

I imagine this part should "look" (although not necessarily work) the same on any version of Windows 8. The RT has a full desktop mode like any Windows, and Office RT is actually a desktop app... but all other apps are Metro only, necessitating the use of Metro's interface to open and save files. And it's THIS that doesn't work the same as the desktop.

So, the first screen is desktop mode, which automatically shows all my network devices as I would expect on any properly configured Windows system.

The second screen is Metro's "file open" dialog, when "network" is selected. Note how it's completely blank. Nothing has EVER pre-populated here.

The third is what I get if I manually type an address into the bar below, like \\sunfile, showing that network access IS working... it just expects every user to know the name of everything by heart.

Yes see I don't even have this window in 8.1 Pro.

I can't see anything that would save the machine name path here at all but it seems like it would be a good idea.

Yeah, every Metro app shares this same file dialog on the RT. I can't figure out why Microsoft wouldn't fill the first network screen with the full list of network computer names exactly like File Explorer does. I mean the system obviously knows what they are elsewhere!