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BobFlag for United States of America

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My DOcs showing up instead of user home folder on Servers when using Windows 7 on network

We have several locations with Windows 2003 and 2008 servers. We typically setup the users to home a home user directory on the server usually  under a mapped drive say  F:\users\username

When the user sees the drives thier home directory is  H:\username

We have their My Documents saved to the F drive unders users and their user name.  They also see it as thier  H:\username   folder on the server.

We often allow most users to see each others user folders in the  F:\users  folder on the server.  THe probelm now is that with Windows 7  it appears taht the My Dcouments fodler is saved differetnnly on the workstation with WIndows 7.  Now when redirected the user sees his or her My Documents on thier home directory  H:\username   but whenthey want to look at the F:\users   folder they see a bunch of   "my Documents" folders under   F:\users

they still see the F:\users\username  folders for those peiople who appear to stillbe on WIndows XP

I know there must be some work around for this.  THe bosses who need to see all F:\users\username  folders are confused as am I since there are now multiple  F:\users\My Documents   folders !

ANy help or ideas for a simpel fix !

thanks
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viralypatel
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I think all you need to do is rename the "Users" folder (which u use to store home directories) to something like "Members" and remap the network drives on the user machines. (You may just ask them to do it themselves with instructions over email if there are too many users)
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ASKER

Doyou meansomwting like

F:\members  is where they remap their My DOcs to?  I don't see how that is differetn from calling it F:\users?
this might help because since windows 7 also uses <drivename>:\Users to store the user files, a directory with the same name may be causing the issues.
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oBdA

That happens only in Explorer; you'll still get the real names in a command prompt ("dir").
In the root of these folders, there's a file "desktop.ini" (with Hidden and System attributes set).
Delete these "desktop.ini" files, and Explorer will display the real names again (and, accordingly, the user will lose any customized display settings for this folder).
A batch script to do that quickly (currently in test mode; remove the capitalized ECHOs to run it for real):
@echo off
set HomeRoot=F:\Users
for /d %%a in ("%HomeRoot%\*.*") do (
  echo Processing %%~nxa ...
  if exist "%%a\desktop.ini" (
    ECHO attrib -h -s "%%a\desktop.ini"
    ECHO del "%%a\desktop.ini"
  )
)

Open in new window

More information:
How to modify your folder view settings or to customize a folder
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/812003

Customizing Folders with Desktop.ini
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms906608.aspx
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ASKER

SO this is done on each Windows 7 workstation?

also this means it is nothingto do with the loctaion of the My Documents in Windows 7 versus XP?  Someone told me that it was because of where the My DOcumetns are in Windows 7,  under users not under Documents and setings?
You have to edit the  existing Folder Redirection Policy
1.      Log on to a domain computer running Windows Vista with domain administrator credentials. Open the Run command by pressing the Windows logo key + R. Type GPMC.MSC, and then click OK.
2.      Right-click a Group Policy object that has a previously enabled Folder Redirection policy, and then click Edit. For example, in the Contoso.com domain, there is a policy named XP Folder Redirection Policy.
3.      Under User Configuration, double-click to expand Windows Settings and Folder Redirection. Right-click the Documents folder, and then click Properties.
4.      Click the Settings tab in the Documents Properties dialog box and verify the Also apply redirection policy to Windows 2000, Windows 2000 Server, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003 operating systems setting is selected. Click OK.
Figure 7 Folder Redirection management snap-in viewed from the Group Policy Object Editor
 

5.      Right-click the Pictures folder, and then click Edit. The default Folder Redirection setting should be set to Follow the Documents folder. Repeat this procedure for the Music and Videos folders. Close the Group Policy Object Editor to complete this step.
Figure 8 Pictures properties viewed from the Folder Redirection management snap-in
 
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73760
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ASKER

ok now i am confused.  firs these are Windows 7 Pro not Vista and Windows 2008r2 Server not 2000 or 2003.

are you both saying to do bboth of these things?

Wereh is the desktop.ini file you are talking about so i can try to manually just delete one to see if that helps on one of the workstations running Windows7.

Ii also thought that this has something to do with the Doucments\My Documents   being where the My Docuemtns are in WIn 7 and Win 2008 server.  This is what casues GOP redirectiionissues when there are mixed XP and WIn 7 workstations  i think?

there has got to be some easier way to handle this one would think. i spent hour with Dell OS tech and he ended up settting up GPO for the MY documents and them renaming the  F:\users\my documents to the appropriate  user name as in chanigng it to   F:\users\username

this is a painif you have lots of users.   It really seems taht here and Dell and googling gets all kinds of mixed ideas on what is going on and what to do??

Vista and above use the same structure for the users folder



windows 2003 and lower i.e. xp/w2k use the documents and settings folder

it is not difficult as long as you use the correct gpo first.
the desktop.ini is located as a hidden file in the root of the affected item
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ASKER

i understand that Visat and above ie Win7 are the same and different from XP etc.

Do you mean i have to log onto each Windows 7 computer onthe network and dothe above?

i just cant' stand typing questinos. It is so hard tomake surue my silly brainis on the same page symantically etc wtih others. I realy prefere voice to voice. its faster too :) but i gues sthis is best we can do inthe world we live in.  I just hae too amnhy holes  inknowledge i guess or else not ezplaing self right.

thanks
no on the server you enable the group policy and set it properly as I referred to in the microsoft kb article http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73760
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ASKER

ok i will try this

i was confused though by this you said

ve3ofa:
 
You have to edit the  existing Folder Redirection Policy
1.      Log on to a domain computer running Windows Vista with domain administrator credentials. Open the Run command by pressing the Windows logo key + R. Type GPMC.MSC, and then click OK.
2.      Right-click a Group Policy object that has a previously enabled Folder Redirection policy, and then click Edit. For example, in the Contoso.com domain, there is a policy named XP Folder Redirection Policy


it appears you say log on to domaiun which i took tomean the server running 2008r2 but it hten says running Windows Vista

see why i get confused :)

i actually just went onto server and figured out what user was  what

F:\users\my documents

and chagne the folder name from  my documents   to the users name   ie  jsmith

see i still think this is more compplicated as i can see all the users correctly when logged onto the server Win 2003  ie

F:\users\jsmith

it is the Windows 7 computers that dont' see the user name but see their My Documents and all other Windows 7  users My Documetns theyare allowed to see as several

F:\users\my documents

folders each with one of the Windows 7 users files in one of them



Avatar of Bob

ASKER

ok now file not found

GPMC.MSC

when enter in runand type ok

this just flat out sucks
When you redirect the Documents folder on a Windows Vista-based or Windows 7-based computer to a network share, the folder name unexpectedly changes back to Documents
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;947222

Hopefully this can clarify what the Experts are trying to convey.....
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Bob
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ASKER

none of the answrs were clear enough. THe tech docs they referred to were condusing and or wrng or typiclka Microsoft BS.

Obcvviously i stated it wrong or some other issue ax the solutions were somewhat different.

is ther a psell checker onthis thing?? :)