Announcing a new Group Policy Common Scenarios whitepaper (using GPMC)

[Mark Williams [MSFT]]

I am pleased to announce availability of a new version of the "Group Policy
Common Scenarios" whitepaper (the first major update since Windows XP). This
is now available at:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...45-8AA6-4775-9208-C681A7043292&displaylang=en.
Unlike previous versions, this one heavily leverages GPMC for the import of
GPOs we package with the download.

The "common scenarios" are implemented by a series of GPOs packaged with the
downloadable installer. Scenarios include Lightly Managed, Mobile, Kiosk,
etc and are an excellent way for you to investigate the scope and value of
Group Policy. The GPOs are intended to be illustrative of the types of
policy settings that might be relevant for different type of user and
computers. While we do not expect customers will deploy these GPOs as-is (a
degree if customization is generally required), we believe they will be a
great starting point for understanding policy settings that might be
appropriate to each scenario.

As well as the whitepaper itself, the installer packages the scenario GPOs,
a reference spreadsheet listing all the policy settings and also Group
Policy Reports for each GPO. These are all placed in the "Group Policy
Common Scenarios" submenu on the Start menu.

This new version also highlights some great features of GPMC. Earlier
versions of the whitepaper (released around the time we launched Windows
2000 and Windows XP) included a series of "custom" scripts that allowed the
customer to import GPO's into their environment. No more (thankfully)!
Thanks to the Import feature of GPMC, we are now able to simply package
backed-up GPO's with the whitepaper.

A few notes on the installer. Running the installer is "non destructive" -
it simply puts bits (the whitepaper, GPOs, etc) on your machine! An included
script (CreateCommonScenarios.cmd) can be run to actually import the GPOs to
your environment. Even then the GPOs remain "passive" until you actually
link the GPOs to (typically) OUs.

Finally, the GPOs have been "normalized". For example, the Highly Managed
GPOs (one each for users and computers) includes a large number of policy
settings that are shared across various scenarios (such as AppStation,
TaskStation and Kiosk). By leveraging Group Policy inheritance, the
whitepaper uses the Highly Managed GPOs in such a way as to better reflect
how Group Policy targeting can be used to share common policy settings
across a OU hierarchy (perhaps a little more "real world" than previous
versions of the whitepaper). This concept is fully described in the
whitepaper.

If you have any questions on this please let us know. We hope you find value
in this new download.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Peter]

Hi Group,
has anyone run the script createcomminscenarios.cmd successfullly?
in my case, I can't find the CreateEnvirommentFromXML.wsf so the script
couldn't finish as it supposed to do ???
any fix?

Peter

 

[Mark Williams [MSFT]]

Hi Peter,

Can you tell me a little more about the precise steps you are using. Are you
getting to the scripts directory by using the "Common Scenarios Scripts
Command Prompt" menu option? I assume that the machine on which you are
running this has GPMC installed (a requirement if you wish to install the
GPOs). This should be in the scripts sub-directory under the GPMC
installation point (typically c:\program files\gpmc). Please let me know and
I'll investigate.

Thanks.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Peter]

Hi Mark,
pls see comments inline

Hi Peter,

Can you tell me a little more about the precise steps you are using. Are you
getting to the scripts directory by using the "Common Scenarios Scripts
Command Prompt" menu option?
yes

I assume that the machine on which you are
running this has GPMC installed (a requirement if you wish to install the
GPOs)

gpmc was installed (both gpmc and the whitepaper were installed through
remote desktop)

. This should be in the scripts sub-directory under the GPMC
installation point (typically c:\program files\gpmc)

in my case, it is in c:\program files\microfts\group policy common
scenarios\ (when i installed the whitepaper, i just clicked next to accept
the default settings)

 

[Mark Williams [MSFT]]

Peter,

Sorry - I should have been more clear on the question about the scripts
directory. There are two at play here. First, the script directory for the
common scenarios package (which sounds like it is where it should be in your
case - c:\program files\microsoft\group policy common scenarios\scripts).
This includes the CreateCommonScenarios.cmd file you are calling. That
command file leverages GPMC (and, in particular,
CreateEnvironmentFromXML.wsf), which is where the other scripts directory
comes in and is the GPMC scripts directory. For a typical installation this
will be at c:\program files\gpmc\scripts. Please confirm that both
directories exist.

The file that you referenced as missing (CreateEnvirommentFromXML.wsf) is
part of GPMC (as opposed to the common scenarios package). It should be in
the c:\program files\gpmc\scripts directory. Can you confirm that (perhaps
search across your machine to make sure its not installed in an unexpected
location for some reason).

Thanks for the prompt feedback. We'll get to the bottom of this.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Hi Mark,
pls see comments inline

Hi Peter,

Can you tell me a little more about the precise steps you are using. Are you
getting to the scripts directory by using the "Common Scenarios Scripts
Command Prompt" menu option?
yes

I assume that the machine on which you are
running this has GPMC installed (a requirement if you wish to install the
GPOs)

gpmc was installed (both gpmc and the whitepaper were installed through
remote desktop)

. This should be in the scripts sub-directory under the GPMC
installation point (typically c:\program files\gpmc)

in my case, it is in c:\program files\microfts\group policy common
scenarios\ (when i installed the whitepaper, i just clicked next to accept
the default settings)

 

[Mark Williams [MSFT]]

Hi Peter,

Were my previous comments of value? A luck in tracking this issue down?
Also, since this issue has been raised by Peter I would be interested to
learn of any other folks who have downloaded the package and how its
performed (good or bad). Obviously we tested this and are not aware of any
problems but getting a sense of installer success/failure in a general sense
(outside of Microsoft, so to speak) would be most welcome.

Thanks in advance.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Peter,

Sorry - I should have been more clear on the question about the scripts
directory. There are two at play here. First, the script directory for the
common scenarios package (which sounds like it is where it should be in your
case - c:\program files\microsoft\group policy common scenarios\scripts).
This includes the CreateCommonScenarios.cmd file you are calling. That
command file leverages GPMC (and, in particular,
CreateEnvironmentFromXML.wsf), which is where the other scripts directory
comes in and is the GPMC scripts directory. For a typical installation this
will be at c:\program files\gpmc\scripts. Please confirm that both
directories exist.

The file that you referenced as missing (CreateEnvirommentFromXML.wsf) is
part of GPMC (as opposed to the common scenarios package). It should be in
the c:\program files\gpmc\scripts directory. Can you confirm that (perhaps

search across your machine to make sure its not installed in an unexpected
location for some reason).

Thanks for the prompt feedback. We'll get to the bottom of this.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Peter]

Hi Mark,
Sorry for the late reply as the time zone is diffirent.
you are right about two scripts folders. when I run from gpmc\scripts,
everything is great.

Thanks alot. I haven't finish the whole whitepaper but from what I read so
far, I think it provides very valuable info about managing group policy and
using the new tool gpmc, i like the idea of separating user and computer
gpo.

thanks

Peter

Peter,

Sorry - I should have been more clear on the question about the scripts
directory. There are two at play here. First, the script directory for the
common scenarios package (which sounds like it is where it should be in your
case - c:\program files\microsoft\group policy common scenarios\scripts).
This includes the CreateCommonScenarios.cmd file you are calling. That
command file leverages GPMC (and, in particular,
CreateEnvironmentFromXML.wsf), which is where the other scripts directory
comes in and is the GPMC scripts directory. For a typical installation this
will be at c:\program files\gpmc\scripts. Please confirm that both
directories exist.

The file that you referenced as missing (CreateEnvirommentFromXML.wsf) is
part of GPMC (as opposed to the common scenarios package). It should be in
the c:\program files\gpmc\scripts directory. Can you confirm that (perhaps
search across your machine to make sure its not installed in an unexpected
location for some reason).

Thanks for the prompt feedback. We'll get to the bottom of this.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Mark Williams [MSFT]]

Thanks Peter. I would like to follow up on one aspect of this. You should be
able to select the "Common Scenarios Command Prompt" menu option and invoke
CreateCommonScenarios.cmd directly (which in turn calls
CreateEnvironmentFromXML.wsf). Does that not work for you? There should be
no need to switch into the GPMC scripts directory directly.

Thank you again.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Peter]

well, contradict to what I got from previous post, when I installed gpmc and
the common scenarios.msi to different server and activated the
createCommonScenaarios.cmd, it worked as expected.
Sorry for the earlier confusion.

Thanks
Peter

 

[Mark Williams [MSFT]]

Cool! Thank you for the follow up, Peter. Much appreciated.

--
Mark Williams
Microsoft

Group Policy Troubleshooting
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=14949
Group Policy Settings Reference Spreadsheet
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=15165

=====================================================
When responding to posts, please "Reply to Group" via
your newsreader so that others may learn and benefit
from your issue.
=====================================================
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.