When MS Windows NT 3.5 was introduced, the hot new topic was the ability to implement Group Policies for users and groups. Then along came MS Windows NT4 and a few sites started to adopt this capability. How do we know that? By the number of “boo-boos” (or mistakes) administrators made and then requested help to resolve.

By the time that MS Windows 2000 and Active Directory was released, administrators got the message: Group Policies are a good thing! They can help reduce administrative costs and actually make happier users. But adoption of the true potential of MS Windows 200x Active Directory and Group Policy Objects (GPOs) for users and machines were picked up on rather slowly. This was obvious from the Samba mailing list back in 2000 and 2001 when there were few postings regarding GPOs and how to replicate them in a Samba environment.

Judging by the traffic volume since mid 2002, GPOs have become a standard part of the deployment in many sites. This chapter reviews techniques and methods that can be used to exploit opportunities for automation of control over user desktops and network client workstations.