Schedule shutdown using GPO?

[Simon]

Hi all,

We running a Win 2000 domain with XP sp2 clients.

I have been asked to find a way to shutdown selected clients on a Friday
evening. Is there any way to schedule this through a GPO?

I am considering configuring a script to run shutdown.exe in a batch file
but obviously this offers no way to control the process centrally. Does
anyone know of a better way?

Ideally I would like to save any documents left open before the shutdown.

All advice is greatly appreciated. Simon.

 

[Simon Geary]

I don't think Group Policy is the correct tool to use to do this. You are on
the right lines by thinking about a script. Check out psshutdown.exe from
Sysinternals which will allow you to remotely shut down PCs in a centrally
controlled script that only needs to be run on the admin workstation.
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/psshutdown.shtml

 

[Ken B]

Also, keep in mind that Windows XP (and I think 2003) has "shutdown" built
in that you can use alternatively and script with that. For help with that
command, go to a command prompt and type "shutdown /?"

HTH

Ken