Roaming profiles

[Sparky]

At my current job, I have been tasked to improve some of the departments IT infrastructure. One thing I am looking at currently is the user profiles of the staff, and the way they save there files, documents and emails.

We have a Windows 2000 server, and about 20 client machines, all running 2k/xp. People log into the machines, and use the profiles stored on the local machines. They all save there files in one jumble of a shared folder on the server. This obviously results in all user settings and emails being unable to someone as soon as they log into another machine,

I have set a folder called ‘Profiles’ on the server, for peoples profiles to be stored on. I have also set another older in the same root called ‘Home folder’ for everyone to have a home folder. I am also redirecting peoples ‘My documents’ folder to the home folder.

Now, for the questions. Are roaming profiles really a good idea? Would it be an idea to move the Outlook personal files (or any other folders/files in a user’s profile) out from the profiles and either into the Home folders, or some other kind of directory? I was thinking along the lines of it being a good idea to keep the roaming profile size as small as possible to decrease login/logoff times and network traffic – other than the My Documents folder, I was thinking that the outlook personal files would be the largest in the users profile.

Also, will I have many programs (or even users!) getting confused as to the whereabouts of the ‘My Documents’ folder, and saving or moving files to somewhere in the documents and settings file of the local machine, as opposed to the assigned network space?

Finally, if I wanted to create some folders for which certain groups would be granted access for (a fair bit of work people do is relevant too more than one member of staff), would it be a good idea to include these folders in the ‘Home Folder’ folder, or create another folder in the same root as the profiles and home folder? (hope that makes sense)

Thanks in advance for the help, and please speak up if you think I have something seriously wrong, not really done the best way it could be done.

[Celtboy]

Here's my feeling about profiles-

If you have the space on the server and delayed logins aren't an issue, use the Roaming variety.

If your users have an "assigned computer" that they typically use, then I'd go with local profiles.

At work, only IT Staff members have Roaming Profiles, because we're the only people (atm) who constantly jump from computer to computer. (The students do it as well, but they don't as of yet each have their own account)


As for Outlook, if you are going to use Roaming, stick Outlook pst in there with it. Otherwise, leave local. Outlook is one of those funky apps that I make an exception for.

No. I'd force all users to automatically have a drive letter mapped to whatever your server is called. Let's call your server "Server1" (i know, creative).

I'd autmoatically map say, the "S" drive letter on every user to their home folder. Put a shortcut on the desktop to "My Documents," and place a "My Documents" folder inside the home folder on S:.

Your programs should be fine, and the local->server move should be transparent to your users. I would probably tell them, but that's up to you. Reasons...

For:
Server goes down, they can't work on their files. They should know this.
Workstation network connection goes down, they can't work on their files. They should know this.
They'll learn to trust more in the server.
They'll think more about what they're storing (movie files from Kazaa, eh?)

Against:
Server goes down, they can't work on their files....this could make them angry.
Trust more in server....and the backups. Individual users tend to forget to back up their own data when they thing the magical server takes care of that for them.


I'd consider making their home folder not necessarily the same thing as their "My Documents" folder.

As for shared stuff....i'd map a new drive for that. Maybe put a shortcut in their My Docs folder to the new drive letter, but I like to use Group Policy whenever possible, and it is perfectly suited for just such an idea!

IT Infrastrucure improvements? ooh....I love that. Got any other places that you see need, but don't know how to change?

ps. A *GREAT* resource, is LabMice.net (http://www.labmice.net/) - read their stuff. IT's WONDERFUL!!!! WinNetMag (http://www.winnetmag.com) is good too.

[scroots]

at college we have roaming profiles, and it works well over our campus. All your work is backed up nightly by the server so you don't have to do it.

Last year the college had 31,000 full and part time students, but i don't think everyone had a profile on a pc.

scroots