Policies

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sam Hobbs
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Sam Hobbs

How do I use policies?

I know about gpedit.msc. I can find the policies in there I want to modify;
I just don't see how to specify a policy for a specific user. In particular,
I am interested in the program to use to modify the values for a specific
user in the following registry key:

\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer

KB article 198771 describes how to modify the values in the registry
directly. I cannot find a Windows utility for modifying those values; I
assume there is one.
 
Thank you, but unfortunately that does not help much. I still don't see
where and/or how to apply (store in the registry) a policy. I don't see
where and/or how to specify a specific user. I tried to enable and set a
value, but there is not a way to specify that the value applies to a
specific user.

I get the impression that the Group Policy editor is for creating but not
applying policies. The term "template" is consistent with that theory. I
have looked at a lot of marterial about policies but none of it (that I have
seen) mentions anything about how to apply the policy. There is probably a
one or two sentence comment somwhere that is enough to tell me where to
look. If there is not, then there probably should be.
 
No, the Group Policy Editor is for editing Policies that exist on the machine (turn this on, turn this off). Making a change in the Group Policy Editor applies the changes to the Registry, so that they affect the machine, user from that point on. However, in a non-domain environment, the Group Policy Editor applies all changes to all users. There is no provision for applying them to specific users/groups.

See www.dougknox.com, Win XP Utilities, Windows XP Security Console for a utility that will allow you to apply a large number of Per-user restrictions on a Per-user basis.
 
Thank you. That answers my question.

So at least I did not miss something in the Microsoft documentation.

I have downloaded your xp_secconsole.zip. I had already written a script
that updates one of the values and it will probably be easy to develop it
further to allow modification of more. Your utility of course is already
developed and I probably do not need to write another one but I want to let
you know that I have already developed something similar.

I see what you say about the Group Policy Editor working but for all users.
I made a policy (restriction) using it but I was unable to see the change in
the registry. I now see that the policy is effective, so obviously it was
put somewhere.

The following is the relevant portion of the message I am replying to, but
for some (stupid?) reason Outlook Express sometimes refuses to add the
indentation text (such as ">") that indicates a reply.


No, the Group Policy Editor is for editing Policies that exist on the
machine (turn this on, turn this off). Making a change in the Group Policy
Editor applies the changes to the Registry, so that they affect the machine,
user from that point on. However, in a non-domain environment, the Group
Policy Editor applies all changes to all users. There is no provision for
applying them to specific users/groups.

See www.dougknox.com, Win XP Utilities, Windows XP Security Console for a
utility that will allow you to apply a large number of Per-user restrictions
on a Per-user basis.
 
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