Migrating users from NAS to SAN & Restructuring Folder Redirection

[scottpowers82]

Ok, so here is what I want to do. I currently have all of my staff mapped to a share (using their Home Drive setting in AD) on our old NAS called \\wyom-data\staff\%USERNAME%. We recently purchased a SAN over the Summer and most of the student files reside there. However, I would like to begin moving teachers over to the SAN. But here lies the problem: I want to change the structure of their folders for redirection purposes.

 

Currently, Folder Redirection is set as follows:

 

Desktop: Assigned by group using the Advanced settings with the path being \\wyom-data\staff\%USERNAME%\Desktop

 

Documents: Assigned by group as well, but all paths are %HOMESHARE%%HOMEPATH%

 

Downloads: Assigned by groups using the Advanced settings with the path being \\wyom-data\staff\%USERNAME%\Downloads

 

Favorites: Assigned by groups using the Advanced settings with the path being \\wyom-data\staff\%USERNAME%\Favorites

 

Links: Assigned by groups using the Advanced settings with the path being \\wyom-data\staff\%USERNAME%\Links

 

Music: Follows the Documents Folder

 

Pictures: Follows the Documents Folder

 

Searches: Assigned by groups using the Advanced settings with the path being \\wyom-data\staff\%USERNAME%\Searches

 

Start Menu: Assigned by groups using the Advanced settings with the path being \\wyom-data\staff\%USERNAME%\Start Menu

 

Videos: Follows the Documents Folder

 

Now, what I would like to do is to change it so that the Documents folder no longer points to %HOMESHARE%%HOMEPATH% and instead point it to an actual My Documents folder within their profile. This would have two purposes: 1) To hide their Desktop.ini file so that I stop seeing an entire folder of just Documents when browsing the staff folder and 2)So that teachers don’t see so much clutter in their Documents folder (since, at the moment, they see their actual Searches, Start Menu, and all other redirected folders in there). The main problem I see here is that if I make the change to the redirection, how will Windows know what to move from their current HomeDrive into the new My Documents folder? Or would it transfer anything at all? Would I be stuck pretty much manually moving over everyone’s folders to reflect the new structure?

 

Further, I would like to actually cut down on some of the things that we are redirecting as they have not really been useful and, at times, a bit annoying (if not problem causing). I would like to get rid of the Searches, Contacts, and Start Menu redirection and use the local folders instead, but I’m not sure what exactly is going to happen when I change that since we use Offline Files and all the teachers have a copy of their Start Menu in their profile. Will that screw things up if I change that setting to point it locally instead?

 

Lastly, and this may be better for another thread, but what exactly does everyone use for settings up their user permissions in relation to folder redirection? I thought I had everything setup perfectly for our Students (who are on the SAN) and I setup a Staff folder the same as theirs. However, I just learned today that a student can actually get into another’s folder and make changes without really that much work. They can’t just type in the path in Windows Explorer (which is how I had always tested their access in the past), but, apparently, they can create a shortcut to their volume and access other user’s files. So, I was just wondering what everyone uses for their file permissions (both NTFS and Share) as I seemed to have screwed mine up despite reading a decent amount of documentation online before I set it up.

 

Sorry if this has been such a long winded question (longest post on Edugeek for me!). Had trouble putting on paper what I wanted it to say (it’s a bit complicated as you can see if you have read this far…) and it’s been a long week! It may be a little early, but I can’t wait for Summer

 

Thanks in advance for any suggestions or help…

 

Scott

[plexer]

This is the guide I'm following for setting up home folders and profile folders:

 

Best Practice: Roaming Profiles and Folder Redirection (a.k.a. User State Virtualization)

 

Ben