Hello All,
Hope I'm posting this in the right group.
We have been trying to set up mandatory profiles and folder redirection via
Group Policy for all of our users, but have had considerable problems getting
it to work with the latest version of Office and Outlook. The biggest problem
we are having is in redirecting the appropriate customization files for
Outlook. Basically, we've attempted to re-direct all office settings for
users to an Applicaton Data share on the network. However, when using
mandatory profiles, users are finding that if they customize Outlook, those
customizations are lost once they log off and back on. Can anyone tell me how
and where Outlook stores user customization and how we can best re-direct
those settings using Group Policy folder redirection in conjuction with
mandatory profiles? Hope I've provided enough information. Many thanks,
Adam

Personalization and Mandatory profiles don't mix. If you want to allow
personalization why are you setting up mandatory profiles in the first
place?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Hello All,
Hope I'm posting this in the right group.
We have been trying to set up mandatory profiles and folder redirection
via
Group Policy for all of our users, but have had considerable problems
getting
it to work with the latest version of Office and Outlook. The biggest
problem
we are having is in redirecting the appropriate customization files for
Outlook. Basically, we've attempted to re-direct all office settings for
users to an Applicaton Data share on the network. However, when using
mandatory profiles, users are finding that if they customize Outlook,
those
customizations are lost once they log off and back on. Can anyone tell me
how
and where Outlook stores user customization and how we can best re-direct
those settings using Group Policy folder redirection in conjuction with
mandatory profiles? Hope I've provided enough information. Many thanks,
Adam

Personalization can work with mandatory profiles. With a clever enough
combination of logon scripts, GPOs, and folder redirection, this is
definitely possible (as we've found with other Office apps like Word, i.e.
copying QAT files to the users application data share). We want to set up
mandatory profiles because roaming profiles do not always clean off the
client machine when the user logs off. So we wind up with loads of "orphaned"
profiles on all of our client PCs. Not to mention how big roaming profiles
can become over a short period of time.

"Roady [MVP]" wrote:

Personalization and Mandatory profiles don't mix. If you want to allow
personalization why are you setting up mandatory profiles in the first
place?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Hello All,
Hope I'm posting this in the right group.
We have been trying to set up mandatory profiles and folder redirection
via
Group Policy for all of our users, but have had considerable problems
getting
it to work with the latest version of Office and Outlook. The biggest
problem
we are having is in redirecting the appropriate customization files for
Outlook. Basically, we've attempted to re-direct all office settings for
users to an Applicaton Data share on the network. However, when using
mandatory profiles, users are finding that if they customize Outlook,
those
customizations are lost once they log off and back on. Can anyone tell me
how
and where Outlook stores user customization and how we can best re-direct
those settings using Group Policy folder redirection in conjuction with
mandatory profiles? Hope I've provided enough information. Many thanks,
Adam

Settings for Outlook are stored in a combination of files, registry and in
the mailbox itself. Which setting are you after?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Personalization can work with mandatory profiles. With a clever enough
combination of logon scripts, GPOs, and folder redirection, this is
definitely possible (as we've found with other Office apps like Word, i.e.
copying QAT files to the users application data share). We want to set up
mandatory profiles because roaming profiles do not always clean off the
client machine when the user logs off. So we wind up with loads of
"orphaned"
profiles on all of our client PCs. Not to mention how big roaming profiles
can become over a short period of time.

"Roady [MVP]" wrote:

Personalization and Mandatory profiles don't mix. If you want to allow
personalization why are you setting up mandatory profiles in the first
place?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Hello All,
Hope I'm posting this in the right group.
We have been trying to set up mandatory profiles and folder redirection
via
Group Policy for all of our users, but have had considerable problems
getting
it to work with the latest version of Office and Outlook. The biggest
problem
we are having is in redirecting the appropriate customization files for
Outlook. Basically, we've attempted to re-direct all office settings
for
users to an Applicaton Data share on the network. However, when using
mandatory profiles, users are finding that if they customize Outlook,
those
customizations are lost once they log off and back on. Can anyone tell
me
how
and where Outlook stores user customization and how we can best
re-direct
those settings using Group Policy folder redirection in conjuction with
mandatory profiles? Hope I've provided enough information. Many thanks,
Adam

Thanks Roady,
The major complaints we've had from users who've been put on mandatory
profile are that their signature files, the reading pane preferences, and
customized settings to the folder list view (buttons added/removed) all
disappear after logoff/logon. If we could find these settings, we could add a
line to the logon VB script to copy them to the application data share. It
may or may not work, but we'd certainly like to give it a shot if it will get
us away from roaming profile hell! Regards,
Adam

"Roady [MVP]" wrote:

Settings for Outlook are stored in a combination of files, registry and in
the mailbox itself. Which setting are you after?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Personalization can work with mandatory profiles. With a clever enough
combination of logon scripts, GPOs, and folder redirection, this is
definitely possible (as we've found with other Office apps like Word, i.e.
copying QAT files to the users application data share). We want to set up
mandatory profiles because roaming profiles do not always clean off the
client machine when the user logs off. So we wind up with loads of
"orphaned"
profiles on all of our client PCs. Not to mention how big roaming profiles
can become over a short period of time.

"Roady [MVP]" wrote:

Personalization and Mandatory profiles don't mix. If you want to allow
personalization why are you setting up mandatory profiles in the first
place?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Hello All,
Hope I'm posting this in the right group.
We have been trying to set up mandatory profiles and folder redirection
via
Group Policy for all of our users, but have had considerable problems
getting
it to work with the latest version of Office and Outlook. The biggest
problem
we are having is in redirecting the appropriate customization files for
Outlook. Basically, we've attempted to re-direct all office settings
for
users to an Applicaton Data share on the network. However, when using
mandatory profiles, users are finding that if they customize Outlook,
those
customizations are lost once they log off and back on. Can anyone tell
me
how
and where Outlook stores user customization and how we can best
re-direct
those settings using Group Policy folder redirection in conjuction with
mandatory profiles? Hope I've provided enough information. Many thanks,
Adam

Instead of going this way I would still recommend to use roaming profiles.
With all the GPOs, scripts, redirections and other customized things you are
creating an (in my view) unmanageable situation which will be difficult to
maintain and troubleshoot. Even when you solve this you are bound to break
something else or find something else that is missing.

Why not create a simple startup script that checks how many roaming profiles
are stored on the machine and when they've been used last. Then set a
condition for it to delete some when there are for instance more than 10
roaming profiles on it, the profiles hasn't been used for over a month or
when the combined total of folders are larger than 10GB.

This way you wouldn't bug your users, you'd still have a clean PC and a very
easy to manage script and environment.

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Thanks Roady,
The major complaints we've had from users who've been put on mandatory
profile are that their signature files, the reading pane preferences, and
customized settings to the folder list view (buttons added/removed) all
disappear after logoff/logon. If we could find these settings, we could
add a
line to the logon VB script to copy them to the application data share. It
may or may not work, but we'd certainly like to give it a shot if it will
get
us away from roaming profile hell! Regards,
Adam

"Roady [MVP]" wrote:

Settings for Outlook are stored in a combination of files, registry and
in
the mailbox itself. Which setting are you after?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Personalization can work with mandatory profiles. With a clever enough
combination of logon scripts, GPOs, and folder redirection, this is
definitely possible (as we've found with other Office apps like Word,
i.e.
copying QAT files to the users application data share). We want to set
up
mandatory profiles because roaming profiles do not always clean off the
client machine when the user logs off. So we wind up with loads of
"orphaned"
profiles on all of our client PCs. Not to mention how big roaming
profiles
can become over a short period of time.

"Roady [MVP]" wrote:

Personalization and Mandatory profiles don't mix. If you want to allow
personalization why are you setting up mandatory profiles in the first
place?

--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more

http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers

-----

"Adam" wrote in message
...
Hello All,
Hope I'm posting this in the right group.
We have been trying to set up mandatory profiles and folder
redirection
via
Group Policy for all of our users, but have had considerable
problems
getting
it to work with the latest version of Office and Outlook. The
biggest
problem
we are having is in redirecting the appropriate customization files
for
Outlook. Basically, we've attempted to re-direct all office settings
for
users to an Applicaton Data share on the network. However, when
using
mandatory profiles, users are finding that if they customize
Outlook,
those
customizations are lost once they log off and back on. Can anyone
tell
me
how
and where Outlook stores user customization and how we can best
re-direct
those settings using Group Policy folder redirection in conjuction
with
mandatory profiles? Hope I've provided enough information. Many
thanks,
Adam