Group Policy Central

This year Microsoft are now making available for everyone the videos screen cast from the TechEd USA conference on the TechEd web site. So if you attended TechEd USA this year but didn’t get to see all the sessions or if you just missed out on going all together you can now check out all the session at http://www.msteched.com

For your convince I have embedded the Group Policy specific video’s below.

How to Save Money, Time, and Headaches with Group Policy in Windows 7 / Windows Server 2008 R2

MDOP: Advanced Group Policy Management 4.0

AppLocker: Your Solution for True Application Smackdown

This weeks setting of the week is called “Set up a work schedule to limit the maximum network bandwidth used for BITS background transfers”… Phew…. This policy is used to configure the bandwidth allocation of BITS network transfers in your environment. This is obviously very handy setting manage your bandwidth if you are working in a bandwidth constrained environment such as a remote branch office. Some of the more likely application you have installed in your environment that use BITS are Windows Server Update Services or Branch Cache however third-party application can also use the BITS to transfer information.

This setting is used to control 3 of the 4 levels (see below) of BITS transfer priority that can be used by applications.

• FOREGROUND
• HIGH
• NORMAL
• LOW

The foreground transfer is always meant to be performed in real time so there is no option to control what amount of bandwidth this transfer method uses. For more info on BITS transfer priority see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa362805(VS.85).aspx.

This setting can be found under Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Network > Background Intelligent Transfer Services (BITS) and will only apply to Windows 7 or computers with BITS 3.5 installed.

If you are considering this setting then also look at the other setting called “Set up a maintenance schedule to limit the maximum network bandwidth used for BITS background transfers” which will take precedence over the work schedule rule. You may want to use this maintenance schedule to allow the use of more bandwidth after hours when the network is not as busy.

The Microsoft Australia Press Shop is currently having a MASIVE sale with 50% OFF ALL BOOKS before the end of financial year (June 30th). To claim you discount for this incredible deal simply use the checkout code EOFYS10 and the discount will automatically be applied to your cart.

If you do live in Australia remember that even after this great deal is over the Microsoft Press Shop will always price match any book you can buy from Amazon (with conversion and shipping) with their Amazon Price Match Promise. I have always found their service to be excellent and the delivery has always been within two days as their warehouse is based locally in Sydney.

If you are having trouble what title you are after then I highly recommend the Configuring Windows 7 Self-Paced Training Kit for MCTS Exam 70-680 by fellow Australia MVP Orin Thomas & Ian McLean. Even if you are not planning to do the exam that this book is written for it is still a great guide for anyone who wants to brush up on what is new in Windows 7.

The other great think I love about MS Press books is they come with a PDF version which you can now copy to your iPad or iPhone and read in iBook’s which recently enabled native PDF support (see below).

Microsoft have just released a web site that allows you to search for any group policy setting.  You can either do a key word search or just browse particular setting. Using a web site like this is a lot easier than having to crack open an existing Group Policy Object to see what policy settings there are available.

The URL for the site is http://gps.cloudapp.net/

I STRONGLY recommend that if you have anything to do with Group Policy then add this site to your favourites. Even better click on “Add Search Connector” from the settings menu option and add it as a search provider for you to use straight from Windows 7… AWESOME!!!

I really like the “Registry View” (see below) you can select from the Tree menu option which allows you to browse all the group policy settings based on the registry key of the policy.

Note: This search tool also has all the Microsoft Office 2007 and 2010 group policy settings included.

For a full run through of the product check out Announcing the Group Policy Search service – Ask the Directory Services Team – Site Home – TechNet Blogs

Update: Group Policy Blog has now posted about this search engine as well at Cross post: AskDS Group Policy Search Settings in the cloud

The group policy setting for the week this week is a new policy setting for Windows 7/2008 R2. This setting is called “Prevent changing mouse pointers” and can be found under User Configuration > Policies > Administrative Templates > Control Panel > Personalization. This setting is handy if you want to tightly control the user environment such as public access computers in a library or a common shared computer.

Below you can see how the “pointers” tab is removed when the policy is enabled.

Not Configured/Disabled	Enabled

 Be careful however when you apply this setting however as it will locks the use into whatever mouse pointer scheme they had active at the time the policy is applied.

P.S. I jumped #30 and #31 because I recently discovered that I had two other setting of the week post’s with the same number. So as to not rename all the other setting of the weeks I have decided to just correct the numbering from this article going forward.