Macs connected via OD/AD saving user files locally?

[andyturpie]

Morning all,

 

As the title suggests the hard drives on our Mac suite are filling up rapidly, and we have seen that there are copies being saved locally to each station (cache?). We somehow cannot delete the files and was wondering if there is a way to a) delete them and b) configure the macs not to save any user files locally or if there is a way to clear them at log off each time?

[ShaunHargreaves]

Hi Andyturple,

 

Assuming your users have home areas assigned to them on a separate file server or some sort of storage, you can configure your Macs to save to their home areas. This can be done by doing the following System Preferences > Users & Groups > Login Options > Edit (Network Account Server) > Select your AD Server > Open Directory Utility > Active Directory > Untick Force local home directory on startup disk. This should hopefully do what you are looking for.

 

Shaun

[andyturpie]

Thanks ShaunHargreaves - I take it this is a client setting as well. We checked and that box was ticked which we are now in the process of checking each client. The problem lies as to how can we flush the accrued data of the hard drives locally, it seems like it is registered under "other", but searching high and low we cannot find where this stuff actually is located?

[ShaunHargreaves]

From past experience for us on our Mac network the user folders lived in Macintosh HD > Users before we used the method mentioned in my last reply, we then just removed them from there. If you haven't already check there if they are not there have you tried using the Show all files command and checked in the folder? Terminal > defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE then enter after that type killall Finder this will enable hidden files to turn hidden files off just change TRUE to FALSE then use the killall Finder command again.

Hope this helps.

 

Shaun