Windows 2000 Administration For Dummies - Step-by-step instructions on how to take advantage of all the Windows 2000 management tools. Discover how to administer users and groups, partition files and make backups, manage clients, make the most of Active Directory, build in ironclad security, troubleshoot problems, and more. Softcover

User Profiles

User Profiles let different users maintain their own individual setings and preferences. They make it possible for different users to share the same computer while each keeps his own settings; profiles can also enable a user to log on to different computers and still see the their usual desktop environment. If a configuration option is a personal preference, it is most likely a part of the user profile. Configuration options that relate to the computer itself are not a part of the user profile. For example, the mouse driver is not a part of a user profile. However, the properties of the mouse configuration - such as its speed, the pointer, and the mouse button setings - reflect the user's personal preferences and are a part of a user profile.

Following are some of the settings saved in user profiles:
Settings Preferences stored in User Profile
Windows Explorer View of Windows Explorer, mapped network drives, types of files that are displayed
Control Panel Screen appearance, accessibility options, mouse and keyboard preferences
Printer Settings Network printer connections
Taskbar All settings, including program items and their properties
Accessories Preferences for programs such as Calculator, Command Prompt, and Notepad
Online Help Bookmarks Any bookmarks that the user has set in the Windows 2000 help program
Windows 2000 Applications User configuration setings for applications that support such settings

You can think of a user profile as containing two big categories of information: Registry stuff and non-registry stuff.

Note: You should see an "All Users" folder in the main profile folder of you machine. The contents of this folder combine with the contents of a user's individual profile folders to create the actual user profile. So, for example, the actual Start menu that you see is rally the sum of all the shortcuts in C:\Documents and Settings\\Start Menu plus all the "community" shortcuts in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu. Only administrators can add, change, or delete contents of the All Users folder.



LOCAL PROFILES

Local profiles are user profiles that live on a particular PC, as opposed to a network location. A local profile stays on the local hard drive of a single PC. The drawback of local user profiles is that they are available only on the computer where they were created.

For users to be able to access their user profile from any computer they log onto, you need to use roaming profiles.

With Windows 2000, unlike Win 9x, you don't ahve to take a separate step to activate user profiles; the feature is already "on". Also unlike Win 9x, you can't just log on with a new user name and hae Win 2000 create and account for you automatically. You have to create the account ahead of time and then log on.

To create a local profile on a machine that is not on a network domain you can:

To create a local profile on a machine that is is on a network domain and you want to add a user who's already defined on the domain you can:

On a machine that is on a network domain where you want to add a lcoal (non-domain) user, run the Users and Passwords control panel and user the Advanced tab.


ROAMING PROFILES

A roaming profile is stored on a network server and allows users to access their user profile, regardless of the client computer they're logged on to. The procedure for creating a roaming profile is to create a folder on the server for profile data => point the user's account to that folder => load that folder with customized profile information that Win2000 will download the next time the user logs on at any PC.

On a networked PC with roaming profiles enabled, Win 2000 maintains a user-specific copy of NTUSER.DAT under C:\Documents and Settings\ just as it does with locl profiles, but Windows 2000 keeps a copy on the network also. Here's what happens on the network:

  1. When you log on, Win 2000 checks for an NTUSER.DAT file on your local hard drive. It also checks for an NTUSER.DAT file in the user's profile directory on the server.
  2. If either copy of the NTUSER.DAT file is newer than the other, Win 2000 updates the older version and then starts up. (It also does this for the USRCLASS.DAT file.)
When you log off, Win2000 copies any changed profile settings back to your profile folder on the network, so the latest settings and documents are avilable next time you log on - wherever you log on.

By default, the folders History, Local Settings, Temp, and Temporary Internet Files do no "roam" with the user. You can specify additional files that you'd like to exclude from the roaming profile. Run the Group Policy utility and modify the Exclude Directories in Roaming Profile policy. You can find it under User Configuration \Administrative Templates\System\Logon-Logoff. This policy modifies the text file C:\Documents and Settings\\NTUSER.INI

MANDATORY PROFILES

A Mandatory Profile is a profile that can't be modified by the user.
Only the members of the Administrators group can manage mandatory profiles.
You can create mandatory profiles for a single user or a group of users.
The mandatory profile is stored in a file named NTUSER.MAN.
A user with a mandatory profile can set different Desktop preferences while logged on, but those settings

You can replace the NTUSER.DAT file that resides in the user's network directory with an NTUSER.DAT file that you want to make mandatory and unchangeable.

  1. Create a roaming profile folder as you would normally.
  2. Copy the NTUSER.DAT file you want to use into that folder.
  3. Rename it NTUSER.MAN and you've created a mandatory user profile.

If you want point a whole group of users to the same mandatory profile, point every user in the group to the same roaming profile folder.


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