RDP client on Win2K Pro - session setup

[Chris Cowles]

We have a vendor-provided Win2K Advanced server on which is installed a
database application. The client for the database runs only on the server.
They have enabled terminal services configured in a manner that everyone
logs in with the same user id and password.

The configuration allows access only to the database client application, for
which the user requires a personal userid/password. The client application
starts automatically and the setup allows the user to close the client,
which terminates the TS session. That's important because the vendor has
licensed terminal services access as a concurrent user license.

We initially installed the TS client generated at the server, but that
(apparently) requires the connection client connection to be configured for
each user account at each Win2K workstation. We have since installed the
WinXP RDP client available for download from Microsoft, which allows the
same session setup to be shared by all users of a given workstation.

Problems/Questions:

1. When set up by an administrator, the target ip, session configurations,
and user ID are saved, but the password isn't. If it was saved by the
administrator account, it's there when the administrator logs out/in of the
workstation again. If another user tries to save the TS session password, it
won't save. How can I get the password to be saved for all users. Is it
possible?

2. The session is set up so the connection bar at the top of the screen
doesn't show up. Unfortunately, it does. I understand that it will always
show up on initial connection, but should slide out of sight. We can make it
do that by unclicking the 'thumbtack', but we need for it to slide out of
sight automatically. That's important because if the user closes the session
but way of the connection bar, it keeps the session and client application
active. That decrements our license count for the client application. We
need users to exit the connection by closing the app, which terminates the
session automatically. How do I get the connection bar to default to hidden
for all users?

Note: for all users except admin, we've removed the TS applications from the
menu and restricted rights to it to only read and execute. Individual users
aren't intended to do anything except start the session from the icon on
their desktops.

Thanks in advance.

Chris Cowles,
Gainesville, FL

 

[Matthew Harris [MVP]]

Answers are inline.

-----Original Message-----

Problems/Questions:

1. When set up by an administrator, the target ip, session configurations,
and user ID are saved, but the password isn't. If it was saved by the
administrator account, it's there when the administrator logs out/in of the
workstation again. If another user tries to save the TS session password, it
won't save. How can I get the password to be saved for all users. Is it
possible?

Try editing the rdp file that you use to connect to the
terminal server. Alternatively, try creating another RDP
file using the account that is going to use it. Since all
your users use the same acount to access the terminal
server, this should be a pretty simple.

2. The session is set up so the connection bar at the top of the screen
doesn't show up. Unfortunately, it does. I understand that it will always
show up on initial connection, but should slide out of sight. We can make it
do that by unclicking the 'thumbtack', but we need for it to slide out of
sight automatically. That's important because if the user closes the session
but way of the connection bar, it keeps the session and client application
active. That decrements our license count for the client application. We
need users to exit the connection by closing the app, which terminates the
session automatically. How do I get the connection bar to default to hidden
for all users?

Two things...first of all, if you setup the rdp file (as I
suggested above) then you can automatically set that
thumbtack to be out to the bar slides out of the way.

Secondly, If you just configure your terminal server to
automatically reset disconnected sessions, then it won't
matter if the user logs out gracefully or just disconnects
from themselves from the server. Either way, the server
will reset the session.

-M

 

[Chris Cowles]

I was unclear that all users have individual network accounts, but the icons
to connect to the server all have the same TS logon account, which is
different from their network account. The server is not in our NT domain.
That's why it would be a lot of work to create the same RDP file for each
user.

Configuring the server is not within our control. It's vendor-managed. We
manage the workstations. I will ask the vendor if they can/will configure
the server as you describe.

 

[Matthew Harris [MVP]]

How did you originally let everyone know how to connect to
the terminal server using the same username? Did you give
them a file to run or did you set up each computer
individually?

-M

 

[Chris Cowles]

We haven't rolled it out yet. We're playing around with how to do that.
Whatever it works out to, our workstation support staff will install it
where required. I'm just trying to make it so they only have to install it
once, as administrators, and users don't have to do anything except
double-click the icon.