title: Read remote file beginning with "smb://" using R
body: <p>To read a file in <code>R</code>, I'd normally do something like the following:</p>
  
  <pre><code>read.csv('/Users/myusername/myfilename.csv')
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But, I'm trying to read a file located on a remote server (Windows SMB/CIFS share) which I access on my Mac via the <em>Finder</em> &rarr; <em>Go</em> &rarr; <em>Connect to Server</em> menu item.</p>
  
  <p>When I view <em>that</em> file's properties, the file path is different than what I'm used to. Instead of beginning with: <code>/Users/myusername/...</code>, it is <code>smb://server.msu.edu/.../myfilename.csv</code>.</p>
  
  <p>Trying to read the file, I tried the following:</p>
  
  <pre><code>read.csv('smb://server.msu.edu/.../myfilename.csv')
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But, this didn't work.</p>
  
  <p>Instead of the usual <em>"No such file or directory"</em> error, this returned: </p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>smb://server.msu.edu/.../myfilename.csv does not exist in current working directory</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>I imagine the file path needs a different format, but I can't figure what. </p>
  
  <p>How can you read this type of file in <code>R</code>?</p>