Removing 'Desktop' from 'Look In' drop down boxes

  • Thread starter Thread starter Scott Bunting
  • Start date Start date
S

Scott Bunting

Is there anyway to remove 'Desktop' from the 'Look In' box that shows up
when you do a File-Open in Word? I would like to see 'My Computer' and all
drive mappings. I have the 'hide all icons on desktop' policy enabled.

I would like to implement this (if it's possible) on our terminal servers.

The reason I'm asking is even though the desktop icons are hid, and default
file locations point to network directories, some users still get confused
when they see 'Desktop' in the file-open dialog box as to whether it's there
local desktop or not.

Thanks,
Scott
 
There may be something here:

143164 INF: How to Protect Windows NT Desktops in Public Areas
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=143164

282087 HOW TO: Customize the My Places Bar in the "Open" and "Save As"
Dialog
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=282087



Buz Brodin
MCSE NT4 / Win2K
Microsoft Enterprise Domain Support

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.

Please do not send e-mail directly to this alias. This alias is for
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Scott,
I have been struggling with a similar issue. Have you a solution, yet?

Doug
 
Thanks for responding!

Two things - this fix works for the buttons along the left hand side of the
File-Open dialog box, which is cool, but the Desktop still gets displayed
when you click the drop down arrow at the top of the window.

1. Do you know if there is anyway to hide what's in the drop-down list?

2. I couldn't get the fix to work unless I applied the registry changes to
a user after their profile was created.
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=282087 says to make changes to the HKCU
key, when I did it in that location it had no effect.

Thanks again,
Scott Bunting
 
The following information should assist you :

If the Group Policy Objects "Prevent access to drives from My
Computer" and "Hide and disable all items on the desktop" are applied, some
applications do not behave as expected.


If users with these settings try to save MS OFFICE FILES files to the
DESKTOP
folder (by selecting in the drop down of the SAVE dialog). They get a
message
saying "you are restricted....". This is desired behavior. The GPO policy
that
causes this message (I think) is
Prevent access to drives from My Computer - Enabled C:\
We also have the following set Hide and disable all items on the desktop.

However, when they save files using PAINT/NOTEPAD applications to the
DESKTOP
folder (by selecting in the drop down of the SAVE dialog), they do not get
any
message. They are able to save to desktop, but cannot see those files on the
desktop. BTW, PAINT and NOTEPAD are the ones I have seen this so far. There
may be
others. Another tester reported the OLW - Outlook for the Web also exhibits
this
behavior while saving file attachments.



In a standard configuration, the desktop folder is part of the user's
profile.
Because a user can write to their own profile, the shell could theoretically
(but
it doesn't) disable all UI controls for updating the deskop, but the
underlying
access is still there.

To really lock this down, the desktop folder must point to a location where
the
user has no write access. You could achieve this with Folder Redirection by
setting the desktop folder to a server share with no user write control.


Buz Brodin
MCSE NT4 / Win2K
Microsoft Enterprise Domain Support

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.

Please do not send e-mail directly to this alias. This alias is for
newsgroup purposes only.
 
Scott, I was not able to find a way to lock, hide, or control that
particular setting. And according to the people I have spoken with this
cannot be done. Perhaps a 3rd party program of some sort?


Buz Brodin
MCSE NT4 / Win2K
Microsoft Enterprise Domain Support

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.

Please do not send e-mail directly to this alias. This alias is for
newsgroup purposes only.
 
ok, thanks for checking.


Buz said:
Scott, I was not able to find a way to lock, hide, or control that
particular setting. And according to the people I have spoken with this
cannot be done. Perhaps a 3rd party program of some sort?


Buz Brodin
MCSE NT4 / Win2K
Microsoft Enterprise Domain Support

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.

Please do not send e-mail directly to this alias. This alias is for
newsgroup purposes only.



shows
 
No luck on this, your best bet to lock down the desktop is to redirect the
desktop folder to a network share where users do not have full control.

Buz Brodin
MCSE NT4 / Win2K
Microsoft Enterprise Domain Support

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.

Please do not send e-mail directly to this alias. This alias is for
newsgroup purposes only.
 
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