Using IntelliMirror to Manage User Data and Settings

Desktop computers are an integral component of most businesses. Consider the increasing dependence on the desktop platform and the value of the data that resides on your desktop machines, and ask yourself whether you need to reevaluate your desktop-management strategy. When one of your users suffers a hard disk failure, how quickly can you get that user back online? How will you recover the data, and how can you restore the operating environment so that the user can regain access to the tools that user needs to do his or her job? Using Windows 2000 Server's IntelliMirror features with Windows XP and Win2K clients, you can design and implement an effective strategy to manage user data and settings without breaking the bank or your back.

IntelliMirror is a technology for which you might receive five different descriptions from five different IT professionals. But in a nutshell, IntelliMirror is a set of tools that provides user data management, user settings management, computer settings management, and Group Policy–based software installation and maintenance. The enabling technologies for these components are Active Directory (AD) and Group Policy. Let's concentrate on user data management and user settings management—specifically the roaming user profiles, folder redirection, and offline files features.

Why and How
Data is typically the lifeblood of a user's job. You must protect this data and ensure that it remains highly available to the user. By redirecting the My Documents folder to a server share that's part of a regular backup routine, you can keep user data safe.

The offline files capability, also known as client-side caching, can store a local copy of the redirected files. This feature adds a level of redundancy for user data and makes that data available even when network connectivity is nonexistent or, with XP, slow (XP's Slow Link Threshold feature directs the system to use offline files when the connection speed is inadequate).

User profiles contain settings that users configure for applications and the UI to create a customized work environment. To maximize user productivity, this environment should follow users if they need to use another computer of if they receive a replacement machine. Roaming user profiles store copies of user profiles on a network share, so the profiles remain available regardless of where users log on.

By employing all three of these technologies—folder redirection, offline files, and roaming user profiles—you can deliver to the end user the best combination of data protection, performance, and availability. Theoretically, the order in which you apply these features doesn't matter, but when starting from scratch (i.e., none of these technologies are enabled), my preference is to employ folder redirection first to get the lion's share of the data out of the user profile before you enable roaming profiles and an offline files synchronization occurs.

Because of the reach of these tools and the importance of user data, I recommend that you try these techniques in a test environment first. Monitor the performance of client systems and server disk use in your test bed before you turn your user population into unwitting guinea pigs. You might determine that upgrades to storage or network infrastructure are required for a successful implementation.

Redirecting Folders
You can use Group Policy to specify which My Documents folders to redirect. If you're managing XP clients, see the Microsoft article "Upgrading Windows 2000 Group Policy for Windows XP" (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=307900) to learn how you can ensure that all XP Group Policy settings remain available to you in a Win2K Server environment. Keep in mind that the exact locations and names of Group Policy settings might vary between XP and Win2K; the settings I refer to pertain to XP.

Create a new Group Policy Object (GPO), then expand the User Configuration, Windows Settings, Folder Redirection objects. You'll see the four folders that you can redirect: Application Data, Desktop, My Documents, and Start Menu. You also have the option of including or excluding the My Pictures folder, which is within My Documents. When configuring the properties for folder redirection, you can select Basic or Advanced settings (or, if you want to disable folder redirection, you can select No administrative policy). The Basic setting lets you redirect the folder for all users who process the policy to one share. The Advanced setting lets you assign redirected folders to different shares according to security group membership.

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