Windows 7 Start Menu Redirection

[frognet1970]

Hi everyone,

 

Am looking to test some Windows 7 machines on our network, we have windows 2008 r2 domain controllers and windows xp clients.

 

The windows xp clients all point to a shared startmenu and everything works well. We would like to share the same startmenu for Windows 7 clients . Can anyone help me with the best practise for my GPO's to make this work, as I tried creating a new GPO and redirecting the starmenu but it comes up as 'empty' when you click on All Programs on Windows 7.

 

Any help in making this work will be well received.

 

Thanks

 

 

Kevin

[simpsonj]

One thing that I can think of is to make sure you have your program shortcuts in a folder called programs. For example, I have the redirect pointing to a share called ExamSMenu, within that share is a folder called Programs, then I have the shortcuts for Office etc.

 

HTH

[mtdmitchell]

as long as you created a new policy from a 2008 server or win 7 machine, then it shoud work, just make sure you tick the option also apply redirection to xp, 2000 etc.... Also do not tick the grant user exclusive use.

 

this was is the gpo for a site which i had this working on recently

 

Setting: Basic (Redirect everyone's folder to the same location)

Path: \\xxxx\SYSVOL\xxx\Policies\curriculum\start menu

Options

Grant user exclusive rights to Start Menu Disabled

Move the contents of Start Menu to the new location Disabled

Also apply redirection policy to Windows 2000, Windows 2000 server, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003 operating systems Enabled

Policy Removal Behavior Leave contents

 

this policy was applied to xp and Win 7

[frognet1970]

Hi thanks have implmented the above but now get the shared start menu open as seperate windows on the desktop. On Windows Xp we get the Start Menu but on Windows 7 no Start Menu but it opens on the desktop !

 

Thanks

[mtdmitchell]

Hi thanks have implmented the above but now get the shared start menu open as seperate windows on the desktop. On Windows Xp we get the Start Menu but on Windows 7 no Start Menu but it opens on the desktop !

 

Thanks

 

can you paste here your policy settigs for desktop and start menu

[wiggum123]

Hi all

I am having the same problem, the start menu is on each machine in separate folders for different users (e.g staff, students, exams etc...).

We have this applied for XP and it has worked perfectly. As soon as we apply it to 7 the start menu just appears blank.

There is a system event logged on the machine saying the start menu has been successfully remapped to the new location, and if I copy out the location and navigate to it, it works fine.

Perhaps there is a permission issue?

Ive now made a GPO for our 7 machine so we can play with the settings, this is what I have configured at the moment;

 

Basic - Redirect everyone's folder to the same location

 

Redirect to the following location

 

C:\Start Menu\Students

 

Grant exclusive - NO

Move contents - NO

Also apply to XP - NO

 

Leave folder when removed

[wiggum123]

Just seen this from another member, I will give it a go after lunch and let you know!

Windows 7 Updates which break things... - Blogs - EduGeek.net

[wiggum123]

So yeh, that didnt work....

Has anybody got any ideas?

I have done alot of searching around now but I still cant find a way of fixing this!

[wiggum123]

Right,

I've managed to get this working, if anyone is still reading this....

Windows 7 ( and probably Vista etc...) dosent like the Programs folder. As soon as I redirected the start menu to C:\location\programs it all worked fine. The problem with this is that XP requires the Programs folder. If you point to a location without the programs menu base menu fills up with all your programs, not very good.

 

What I have done is create a Windows 7 GPO, given this a higher link order than our other GPO that sets where the start menu is redirected.

In the original GPO the start menu is redirected using specific groups, so staff goes to the staff menu and the students goes to the students menu. In the settings tab of the start menu redirection I have;

Exclusive rights : NO

Move contents : NO

Also apply to XP : YES

 

In the Windows 7 GPO, which has a higher link order so will overwrite the settings in the default GPO, I have set the Start menu redirection to include the Programs folder. So the XP location is C:\start menu\staff (which includes a programs folder). Windows 7 GPO maps to C:\start menu\staff\programs. On the settings page I have set;

Exclusive rights : NO

Move contents : NO

Also apply to XP : NO

 

I have only tested this on a few machines but its looking good!

[mbrunt]

im struggling with this too, this is the last thing thats stopping me from deploying windows 7 in a test lab. You say you've made a gpo that is for Windows 7 that contains the start menu in the correct place...

 

how do your clients know which gpo to process though?

[wiggum123]

At the moment its just applied to all, its the Start Menu object that defines which location to go to based on the User group. So the Staff group redirects to the staff location etc.

The settings tab on that has a really useful tick box that, if left unticked, will only apply the policy to Vista and above. If this tick box is ticked it will apply to all.

The link order, which controls the order the policies are applied is crucial.

I have set out Default User GPO with a lower link order in group policy management, this has our standard start menu location in it which points to the programs folder. Importantly it has the all important tick box ticked.

I then have created a Windows 7 GPO which is applied to all authenticated users, but the link order is higher than the default user GPO. The Windows 7 GPO is set to look inside the Programs folder and DOES NOT have the apply to xp tick box ticked.

Default Policy

http://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/default.jpghttp://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/default-settings.jpg

 

Windows 7 Policy

http://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/Windows7.jpghttp://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/Windows7settings.jpg

[gshaw]

Could you do it by WMI filters or something along those lines to decide which policy to apply depending on the OS returned by the query?

 

Glad someone has cracked it though, redirection on 7 has seemed a bit icky at times judging by some of the threads on it!

[wiggum123]

Having never really set up WMI filters I can't comment on that. If you, or anyone else knows how to do it I would be very interested to see how!

[mbrunt]

wow. amazing. i'd totally forgot about wmi filters, its perfect! i can have a group policy for xp, and a totally seperate one for windows 7. THANK YOU!!!!

[pcguywilson]

At the moment its just applied to all, its the Start Menu object that defines which location to go to based on the User group. So the Staff group redirects to the staff location etc.

The settings tab on that has a really useful tick box that, if left unticked, will only apply the policy to Vista and above. If this tick box is ticked it will apply to all.

The link order, which controls the order the policies are applied is crucial.

I have set out Default User GPO with a lower link order in group policy management, this has our standard start menu location in it which points to the programs folder. Importantly it has the all important tick box ticked.

I then have created a Windows 7 GPO which is applied to all authenticated users, but the link order is higher than the default user GPO. The Windows 7 GPO is set to look inside the Programs folder and DOES NOT have the apply to xp tick box ticked.

Default Policy

http://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/default.jpghttp://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/default-settings.jpg

 

Windows 7 Policy

http://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/Windows7.jpghttp://www.beaufortcs.com/images/GPO/Windows7settings.jpg

 

Ok Heres what I have done

I created a user in test user in AD on the 03 Server. "win7user"

I created a test group "win7group"

I created a Test Gpo titled "folderredirection" it's only goal is to redirect folders. I redirected the menu to

\\server\subfolder\start$\

within start$ there is a programs folder

My test group(test user is in that group) has full permission for these folders.

 

Thats what I started with. I have gone into both 03 server and created local GPO on Win 7 using MMC that disables both "Remove Users folders from the Start Menu." and "Force classic start menu"

 

I see that you are able to redirect using win7 gpo. Whenever I access the GPO policies(MMC) on my local box under folder redirection I dont have the options you have shown. HELP! Also Thanks

[Dan_ATR]

We are having issues with this too here at Oakmead.

 

Im trying to Pin items to the Start Menu and also remove the Accessors>.....> Internet Explorer No-Addons. etc..

 

some of the things I have found are the following.

 

This hides the programs left over.

 

cd %userprofile%\Start Menu\Programs
attrib +h Accessories
attrib +h Startup
exit

 

This was some other stuff I found which adds the .lnk to pinned items on the start menu. Will test this tomorrow..

 

The first script removes the left over start menu items... but need to also test. This is supposed to be fired off before the script below this.

 

I need to modify it a bit more too...

 

del /F /Q "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup"
del /F /Q "C:\Users\%USERNAME%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\*.*"

 

Removing the folders will not work. Hiding the files maybe the next best thing. But apparently when logging on the start up script gets denied access to do this :/ If deleting thru windows explorer, works fine. But using vb script, comes up with access denied...

 

Was in the middle of modifying this lol.

Set objShell = createobject("Shell.application")
Set objFolder = objShell.Namespace("C:\Users\%USERNAME%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch\User Pinned\StartMenu\*.lnk")

REM INTERNET EXPLORER -------------------------------------------------------------
set objFolderItem = objFolder.ParseName("*.lnk")
for Each objVerb in objFolderItem.Verbs
'wscript.echo objVerb
if objVerb.name = "Pin to Start Men&u" Then objVerb.DoIt
REM	if objVerb.name = "Pin to Tas&kBar" then objVerb.DoIt
next

REM Microsoft Outlook -----------------------------------------------------------------------
REMset objFolderItem = objFolder.ParseName("Microsoft Outlook.lnk")
REMfor Each objVerb in objFolderItem.Verbs
REM	'wscript.echo objVerb
REM	if objVerb.name = "Pin to Start Men&u" Then objVerb.DoIt
REM	if objVerb.name = "Pin to Tas&kBar" then objVerb.DoIt
REMnext

REM Windows Media Player -------------------------------------------------------------------------
REMset objFolderItem = objFolder.ParseName("Windows Media Player.lnk")
REMfor Each objVerb in objFolderItem.Verbs
REM	'wscript.echo objVerb
REM	if objVerb.name = "Pin to Start Men&u" Then objVerb.DoIt
REM	if objVerb.name = "Pin to Tas&kBar" then objVerb.DoIt
REMnext

Edited July 31, 2012 by Dan_ATR