Folder Redirection Problem

[edsa131]

Hi - hopefully someone can advise me on a folder redirection issue that we are having.

 

I am busy testing out windows 7 and server 2008 R2 in a test environment and hoping to implement this upgrade during the summer. I have chosen to go with mandatory profiles and folder redirection via GPO. All is fine apart from a weird problem we are having with folder redirection. The redirection fails intermittently.

 

If I log on with a test user account everything works fine and "Documents Library Locations" window displays the Default save location to the home folder path on the server. I log off and then back on with the same test user account and the folder redirection fails and the "Documents Library Locations" window displays the default save location to C:\Users\12teststudent\Documents.

 

I have the test home folder stored in the following location on the server:

 

D:\Users\Students\2012Intake

 

In the user account properties I have the home folder path set to:

 

\\Server-01\12teststudent

 

In the GPO I have set the folder redirection on the Documents folder as:

 

Basic - Redirect everyone's folder to the same directory

Redirect to the users home directory

 

I have attached a screenshot of the Documents Library Locations window when the redirection fails.

 

I would appreciate any advise on this.

 

Eddie

[Miscbrah]

Hi - am I right in thinking the problem is you'd like Libraries to redirect to the home area?

 

This is a well-documented PITA and has people tearing their hair out BUT here on Edugeek we've nailed the procedure, and I've written a mega-basic guide to doing so (with the help of themightymrp and MANY other giants with shoulders I stood on...)

 

Wanna try it out??

 

(Attached if so )

Redirecting Libraries for Win 7.doc

Edited June 13, 2012 by Miscbrah

[edsa131]

Thanks a lot I will give this a try and let you know how I get on

[edsa131]

Hi - I gave this a try, but the "Documents Libraries Locations" window has the default save path for documents as C:\Users\TEMP\Documents as default and C:\Users\PUBLIC\documents as a second location. I am using mandatory profiles not roaming would this make a difference?

 

cheers

 

Ed

[Miscbrah]

In my guide (such as it is!) the outcome is that each Library location just maps to whatever drive you set it as. For example, if your user/users with the mandatory profile have a home drive mapped as H: when they log on, but each user has their own H: drive, then it'll just go there when opened in a file explorer/save/open context.

 

Rather than in my last stage where I use Group Policy to copy the library.ms files to the profile that's logging on at the time, you could just add those into your mandatory profile using the xcopy command. I should think that'd work...

[fiza]

Hi - am I right in thinking the problem is you'd like Libraries to redirect to the home area?

 

This is a well-documented PITA and has people tearing their hair out BUT here on Edugeek we've nailed the procedure, and I've written a mega-basic guide to doing so (with the help of themightymrp and MANY other giants with shoulders I stood on...)

 

Wanna try it out??

 

(Attached if so )

 

Will give this a go when the time comes - which is very sooon!!!

[edsa131]

I have copied the changed libraries into the mandatory profile and still not luck Im afraid. The default save path for documents is C:\Users\TEMP\Documents as default and C:\Users\Public\documents as the second location. Is there a certain way that you need to set up mapping to the home folder? In the user properties in Active Directory Users and Computers I have the network drive set to N: and the path as \\Server-01\%username%. I have the path to the mandatory profile and a students logon script pointing to a resources folder. I have tried various combinations of storage location structures for the home folders including:

 

Users

>Students

>>2009Intake

>>>09bloggsj

>>2010Intake

>>>09bloggsj

>Staff

 

StudentData

>2009Intake

>>09bloggsj

 

StudentData

>09bloggsj

 

I just cant seem to get this to work and I am trying to nail this so that I can get everywhere upgraded during the summer. Is there something else you think that I should be trying here? Would it be worth trying romaing profiles instead of mandatory?

 

many thanks again

 

Ed

[Miscbrah]

Hi! No not sure you need move to roaming profiles especially. In reference the guide you should just be deleting the original locations for the pesty libraries in the utility, then setting the location as N:, then building the 4x library-ms files, then (using the command line only) copy them to the mandatory profile's library location - where you should probably beforehand delete the library-ms files already there, by using a command to delete *.library-ms...

 

Hmmm... Noticed a few unclear bits in that guide. Quick re-write. Would love to get this going for mandatory profiles too, so we'll see how we nail this.

 

EDIT - UPDATED VERSION HERE! Please DO point out any mistakes/crap bits/bits that didn't work right as I want it to be BLACK AND WHITE simple. Ta folks

Redirecting Libraries for Win 7.doc

Edited June 14, 2012 by Miscbrah

[edsa131]

Cheers again

 

I have gone back and tried normal folder redirection. I created a normal ad user account, set the home drive letter to N: and the location to \\Server\data. I have folder on the server named data to hold the home folders (no structure, year groups etc). I have set up the folder redirection settings to "Basic - Redirect everyones folder to the same location", "Create a folder for each user under the root path", "Root path - \\Server-01\data"

 

It works with these straight forward settings, but I obviously require the mandatory profile and a more structured folder structure for data storage.

 

I will have another try with your updated guide, which is great by the way and I will also see how I get on with where I am so far.

 

Again - thanks ver much for your help I really appreciate it.

 

Ed

[apeo]

Do you want/need libraries? Here we've stripped it out all together and most of our redirections are actually in the profile itself i.e. all folders redirected in ntuser except appdata (best to do this in gpo if you need it). The reg hacks are done in:

 

\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders

[adhutton]

We are having this same issue, but a more sinister problem seems to have developed....

 

Folder re-direction was working ok for us until recently and now the Documents Library includes 2 locations for some unknown reason....

 

When a user clicks the 2 locations link they get a pop-up window which allows them to Add a new library location (see attached pictures).

 

That allows them to add the C:\ drive and hence they can browse to the C drive, despite it being restricted to them everywhere else!!!! Very bad....Does anyone know how to prevent this or at very least remove the Add button?

 

Cheers_ Andrew

 

Edited June 14, 2012 by adhutton

[apeo]

Try this policy?

 

User Configuration/Administrative Templates/Windows Components/Windows Explorer/Prevent users from adding files to the root of their Users Files folder

[adhutton]

Try this policy?

 

User Configuration/Administrative Templates/Windows Components/Windows Explorer/Prevent users from adding files to the root of their Users Files folder

 

We've already tried that and it doesn't make any difference to this particular problem, but thanks anyway

 

I am still searching for a solution!

 

Cheers - Andrew

[Miscbrah]

Cheers again

 

I have gone back and tried normal folder redirection. I created a normal ad user account, set the home drive letter to N: and the location to \\Server\data. I have folder on the server named data to hold the home folders (no structure, year groups etc). I have set up the folder redirection settings to "Basic - Redirect everyones folder to the same location", "Create a folder for each user under the root path", "Root path - \\Server-01\data"

 

It works with these straight forward settings, but I obviously require the mandatory profile and a more structured folder structure for data storage.

 

I will have another try with your updated guide, which is great by the way and I will also see how I get on with where I am so far.

 

Again - thanks ver much for your help I really appreciate it.

 

Ed

 

No worries. Could try the variable "%homeshare%" rather than "N:" (omit the "" naturally) see how that works?

 

Meh I had this sinking feeling that if I disabled Libraries completely it might bite me in the butt one day when %program% uses Libraries and breaks if they're not at least there. Otherwise I'd have shooed them right off.

[Jamo]

Hi! No not sure you need move to roaming profiles especially. In reference the guide you should just be deleting the original locations for the pesty libraries in the utility, then setting the location as N:, then building the 4x library-ms files, then (using the command line only) copy them to the mandatory profile's library location - where you should probably beforehand delete the library-ms files already there, by using a command to delete *.library-ms...

 

Hmmm... Noticed a few unclear bits in that guide. Quick re-write. Would love to get this going for mandatory profiles too, so we'll see how we nail this.

 

EDIT - UPDATED VERSION HERE! Please DO point out any mistakes/crap bits/bits that didn't work right as I want it to be BLACK AND WHITE simple. Ta folks

 

This is how I did my libraries as well, although I edited with Notepad++

 

I think its probably the best way of configuring libraries at the moment, I tried the VBS scripts to remove some of the libraries folders at first logon but the script was quite slow compared to doing the copy method!

 

One thing I am looking at is profile speed, and was going to look into mandatory profiles. However I have just noticed that now in W7 active setup runs for each mandatory profile, since that seems to be causing most of my logon delays it no longer seems like such a good idea :s

[apeo]

We use mandatory profiles here and most of our Folder redirection are in ntuser because GPO folder redirection causes a delay for each redirection. Libraries ripped out here and we haven't found a problem.

[edsa131]

Apeo - I am going to try this by disabling or taking out the libraries as you have done. Can you possibly explain in more detail how to go about this? Shall I delete the main libraries folder from the mandatory profile and also do the registry hack.

 

cheers

 

Ed

[KK20]

I stumbled on this post by accident. I changed next to no GPOs when I started rolling out W7 clients. Folder redirection simply worked for us. Libraries worked and some extra folders came up with the cannot open due to restrictions blah blah which was perfect. Student could save happily in their "my documents" (libraries/documents) etc. We use mandatory profiles though and I think this is possibly the key.

[apeo]

Well what you can do is strip your mandatory profile right down i.e. delete all the folders in there; here we only have AppData (to set some default settings) and ntuser files. In the AppData we don’t have a Libraries folder at all and we've removed all links in explorer i.e. it’s not in the nav pane or on the desktop. To remove it out the nav pane you will need a reg hack by deleting the following key:

 

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Desktop\NameSpace\{031E4825-7B94-4dc3-B131-E946B44C8DD5}

 

This will strip it out completely so yes it will affect all users.

 

Note: If you want to restore Libraries then you will need to rebuild the above key and what’s contained therein.

 

Note: If you do this, users won’t have a link to their My Documents folder (AKA Documents in Win 7) so you need to add shortcuts in and if users are used to navigating to their My Documents via the nav pane then they will need to be informed how they can now access their Documents/Home Directory.

 

Note: If you redirect your AppData then it is possible that they may still have a Libraries folder so you might want to delete it (probably by script) or you can disable it: http://www.edugeek.net/forums/windows-7/46809-windows-7-removing-libraries.html

 

EDIT: Make sure you've reg hack your ntuser profile to redirect all the folders you want to redirect e.g. My Documents (reg key in ntuser in User Shell Folder is Personal, i think), My Pictures, My Music etc.

Edited June 19, 2012 by apeo