Managing Vista within Group Policy
Discussion
Having a play with WSUS 3.0 and am trying to get it all working nicely, however (although I have a VPC XP setup) my machine is a Vista machine.
Now this is fine, however I was trying to work out why the WUAU.adm GPO was not enforcing on this machine...
Now I've just had a quick scout about and it seems that Vista Group Policy is run using ADMX files, and can ONLY be added to GPOs using a Vista machine (or I suppose a Longgorn Server if you had one) and can only be edited by said Vista machines.
Seems to be a bit of a balls ache - has anyone had any experience of ADMX files and the 800 new policy additions that the Vista admx files add?
Edited to add:
To all the Vista doomsday cynics, this is no reason NOT to have Vista at home, however its a bit of a pisser if you want to roll it out company wide - we've got to learn all this over again - and thats why your IT department has waved two fingers at the IT Director who's asked for Vista...
Now this is fine, however I was trying to work out why the WUAU.adm GPO was not enforcing on this machine...
Now I've just had a quick scout about and it seems that Vista Group Policy is run using ADMX files, and can ONLY be added to GPOs using a Vista machine (or I suppose a Longgorn Server if you had one) and can only be edited by said Vista machines.
Seems to be a bit of a balls ache - has anyone had any experience of ADMX files and the 800 new policy additions that the Vista admx files add?
Edited to add:
To all the Vista doomsday cynics, this is no reason NOT to have Vista at home, however its a bit of a pisser if you want to roll it out company wide - we've got to learn all this over again - and thats why your IT department has waved two fingers at the IT Director who's asked for Vista...
Edited by Neil_Bolton on Friday 23 February 10:58
I have to say though, from the toilet reading I've just been doing, and a bit of research, the improvements are very nice.
They include:
Group Policy is now run as a service meaning that instead of winlogin trying to figure out wether get a cut down GP or the full one based upon your connection (which we all know never worked properly), it is now connection aware, and uses NLA as soon as it knows a DC is available, and bungs the GP over...
Multiple Local GPO support, so you can have a local GPO for a user, and a less restrictive one for admins say.
ADMXs for Vista include lots of cool new stuff to control including the ability to control removeable storage devices - right down to whether the machine can write to the device, or just simply read it - finally! Also you have proper control over Power management so you can actually properly manage turning stuff off like monitors
I'm quite impressed, and based upon that, Vista has just gone up several more notches in my book...
They include:
Group Policy is now run as a service meaning that instead of winlogin trying to figure out wether get a cut down GP or the full one based upon your connection (which we all know never worked properly), it is now connection aware, and uses NLA as soon as it knows a DC is available, and bungs the GP over...
Multiple Local GPO support, so you can have a local GPO for a user, and a less restrictive one for admins say.
ADMXs for Vista include lots of cool new stuff to control including the ability to control removeable storage devices - right down to whether the machine can write to the device, or just simply read it - finally! Also you have proper control over Power management so you can actually properly manage turning stuff off like monitors
I'm quite impressed, and based upon that, Vista has just gone up several more notches in my book...
BliarOut said:
And this is why I'm advising most of my business customers to hold off for a year or so... So you can endure the pain and then they reap the rewards 
Are they wholley supported by you, or do they have in-house IT staff?
If they have an IT department, they really should have been testing Vista at least by now - at least they can properly do a feasibilty study for the business.
I know that ultimately XP is fine for my business, however I now understand its ins and outs, and can give an educated assessment of the OS, rather than the usual 'leave it for someone else to find out'...
Neil_Bolton said:
BliarOut said:
And this is why I'm advising most of my business customers to hold off for a year or so... So you can endure the pain and then they reap the rewards
Are they wholley supported by you, or do they have in-house IT staff?
If they have an IT department, they really should have been testing Vista at least by now - at least they can properly do a feasibilty study for the business.
I know that ultimately XP is fine for my business, however I now understand its ins and outs, and can give an educated assessment of the OS, rather than the usual 'leave it for someone else to find out'...
Bit of both. I used to recommend early adoption but over the years I've learned to wait until the service packs and updated drivers have come out and more importantly a good knowledge base of common gotcha's exists.
When viewed as a business decision for a SME it doesn't make sense to pay for me to act as a developer/tester on their behalf.
BliarOut said:
Neil_Bolton said:
BliarOut said:
And this is why I'm advising most of my business customers to hold off for a year or so... So you can endure the pain and then they reap the rewards
Are they wholley supported by you, or do they have in-house IT staff?
If they have an IT department, they really should have been testing Vista at least by now - at least they can properly do a feasibilty study for the business.
I know that ultimately XP is fine for my business, however I now understand its ins and outs, and can give an educated assessment of the OS, rather than the usual 'leave it for someone else to find out'...
Bit of both. I used to recommend early adoption but over the years I've learned to wait until the service packs and updated drivers have come out and more importantly a good knowledge base of common gotcha's exists.
When viewed as a business decision for a SME it doesn't make sense to pay for me to act as a developer/tester on their behalf.
Where do I send your invoice then?
Neil_Bolton said:
BliarOut said:
Neil_Bolton said:
BliarOut said:
And this is why I'm advising most of my business customers to hold off for a year or so... So you can endure the pain and then they reap the rewards
Are they wholley supported by you, or do they have in-house IT staff?
If they have an IT department, they really should have been testing Vista at least by now - at least they can properly do a feasibilty study for the business.
I know that ultimately XP is fine for my business, however I now understand its ins and outs, and can give an educated assessment of the OS, rather than the usual 'leave it for someone else to find out'...
Bit of both. I used to recommend early adoption but over the years I've learned to wait until the service packs and updated drivers have come out and more importantly a good knowledge base of common gotcha's exists.
When viewed as a business decision for a SME it doesn't make sense to pay for me to act as a developer/tester on their behalf.
Where do I send your invoice then?
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