Windows group policy problem

[Czar]

running a Win2003 server

What I'm trying to do is put a single department automaticly on a printer, so if I log on with a roaming profile on a computer there I automaticly get the correct printer.

I have created a script that adds the printer and that works if I just logon and run it or if I add the policy on the username, if I add the policy to the computer nothing happens. Anyone know how to do this?

 

[Shadow07]

What does your OU structure look like, and what OU do your user accounts reside in? Then, what OU are you applying the GPO to?

 

[Czar]

its like this

department
-users
-computers
department2
-users
-computers

I apply the rule to computers, I read that there is some loopback policy in the administrative templates which is supposed to do this, but it only applies to computer settings but not user settings, though I have yet to try it out better

also when I have the policy set so the login script runs in user settings on the computer OU and then use the whatnot tool I cant remember the name of to see what policies are running it shows the policy running using the dos version and in the windows version it doesnt show any script being run in user settings

 

[Shadow07]

I'm not sure as to what tool you are talking about (possible GPRESULT?), but in order for your users to recieve the GPO that is being applied to the COMPUTERS OU, you will need to do the following:

Computer Configuration
|
->Administrative Templates
|
-> System
|
-> Group Policy
There is a setting "User Group Policy Loopback Processing Mode". You would enable this and then specify "Replace". You could also set it to merge, but this might reproduce undesired results. This would force the user to recieve the User Configuration from the GPO that is set at the COMPUTERS OU.

 

[Czar]

the tool is rsop.msc and then gpresult

It seems to work right now, going to run more test though

 

[Czar]

do you know if its possible to have it so that the printer is added to the computer, but not the roaming profile

so lets say, I have a department with a printer, user logs on the printer gets added, gets set as a default printer, then he goes to another computer outside of the department to fill in for someone else, there right now the printer settings from the other place would be in his roaming profile along with default printer settings. Would it be possible to have a roaming profile but still have the printer settings localy set up?

 

[Sideswipe001]

Isn't that why you'd have the printer assigned to the computer, and not to the user?

If you didn't wany anyone outside department x to use that printer, why not just assign the printer to the computers in department x and not to the users at all?

 

[Czar]

that is what I'm trying to do, but because of roaming profiles the printer settings go with the profile

 

[Shadow07]

Well, RSOP will only work against Windows XP/2003 machines.

What you can do is have a logon script process that creates the printer object, and then have a logoff script that deletes the printer(s). With Romaing profiles enabled, that gets a little tricky. BTW, what are you using to create the printer objects on the computer?

 

[Czar]

thats ok, we have a win2003 server and nearly all if not all workstations are winxp machines

I have a bat file that runs a vbscript, something I just copy pasted from microsoft's page, not using the premade vbscript that comes with windows.

What I'v thought about doing is having the script run on all computers and so in the end users have alot of printers in their profile, that is ok, except that possibly certain programs which dont use the default printer automaticly will have to manualy be set on the right printer each time.

I'm now realy starting to think that this will create more bother than less