Offline files in a 2000 AD

From: barnski (barnski_123_at_yahoo.co.uk)
Date: 11/27/03 

Date: Thu, 27 Nov 2003 05:34:27 -0800

I have some Windows XP laptop users who log into a Windows
2000 AD domain. My customer wants the XP laptop users to
use offline files to make their home drive available when
they are away from the office. Fair enough.

The real problem is that the customer has recently
introduced a new premises, which is in its own AD site,
with its own DC. The link between the sites is slow (1MB,
but quite well used), so they want laptop users visiting
the new site to use their cached copies of their homedrives
rather than hitting the WAN with file requests. Again, not
an unreasonable request.

My issue is that I cannot find any simple way of doing
this. In a lab, the home drive is always mapped, no matter
at which site the laptop is connected. I am aware that:

1 - There is a "slow link" detection process that *should*
detect a slow link and not connect offline folders to the
server, but this doesn't work properly
(http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;811525)

2 - There is no Group Policy item in Windows 2000 AD that
addresses this "slow link" parameter (although I believe it
may exist in 2003), so I can't administer it from the AD
even if it did work properly.

3 - There is a cmscmd command-line utility to force offline
files to go offline, but this is only in XP (2000 Pro
doesn't have it).

My current plan is to use Group Policy applied at AD site
level to run a login script that will call the cmscmd
utility. I will use group policy filtering (modify the
"Apply" rights on the GPO) so that only the appropriate
users get it.

I can't believe that this is such a complex issue - does
anyone have a straightforward solution? Am I missing
something obvious? Surely people must have wanted to do
this before Windows 2003/XP?

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

Barnski.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Offline files in a 2000 AD
    ... My customer wants the XP laptop users ... >> detect a slow link and not connect offline folders to ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.security_admin)
  • =?Windows-1252?Q?Re:_Missing_=93Make_Available_Offline=94_option?=
    ... Uninstall IE7 and see if the behavior persists: ... IE and Windows XP Service Pack 3 ... The only referene to offline file is "Offline Favorites--Offline ... The ability to restore Active Desktop if software or the operating system ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: Working offline on laptop - slow logon
    ... We have Windows XP clients, ... We let them log on to their laptops offline with AD's cached ... This can be fed to clients via a group policy from a Windows 2000 ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Offline Files and Folders - MADNESS!
    ... I am having two issues with Offline Files and Folders. ... The workstation is a Windows XP SP2 notebook which is not a domain member. ... of the mapped drives connect to shares on the domain controller. ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: VBA and API
    ... >> the print queue. ... > Error Box whenver a printer is offline, ... It's not a pretty API to call, but that's what Windows offers. ... Earlier versions of Windows, 9x and 3.x, allowed direct port I/O. ...
    (microsoft.public.office.developer.vba)
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