Cohesively synergizing efficiency paradigms by leveraging group policies

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > Cohesively synergizing efficiency paradigms by leveraging group policies

«‹›31 »

capitalcomma: Sep 9, 2001; A grim bloody fable, with an unhappy bloody end.

We're researching centralizing printer setup at my organization, and I'm having a hard time determining how best to go about it. There's a printer folder in User Configuration, and two more in Computer configuration. And I'm not sure if I should be applying this policy on a per-user or per-machine basis.

Some users are mobile and move from site to site, some users in a given department have to print to other departments. I just can't figure out: what is best practice on printers in Group Policy?

# ? Dec 2, 2011 23:39

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? Jun 2, 2024 10:44

BangersInMyKnickers: Nov 3, 2004; I have a thing for courageous dongles

Printer settings under the computer have of the policy define locally installed printers or ones that print directly to the device over the network. Printers defined on user policies map to printers attached to a print server.

Doing it through a print server is going to give you the most flexibility and simplify things when it comes to firewall exceptions and security, especially if traffic is spanning subnets/buildings/whatever. Mapped printers will also be per-user and follow their roaming profile, and are easier for the user to customize if they desire. In my case, we only used policy to add one or two big central printers to the profiles of the users in each department and published instructions for them to add additional ones they want through the add printers dialog.

Loopback policies can also help you if you only want certain printers so show up when logged in to specific computers.

# ? Dec 2, 2011 23:50

evil_bunnY: Apr 2, 2003

So deploy a shortcut to a list of AD printers and let users choose?

E: look at bangers being all useful and thorough!

# ? Dec 2, 2011 23:52

capitalcomma: Sep 9, 2001; A grim bloody fable, with an unhappy bloody end.

BangersInMyKnickers posted:

Printer settings under the computer have of the policy define locally installed printers or ones that print directly to the device over the network. Printers defined on user policies map to printers attached to a print server.

Doing it through a print server is going to give you the most flexibility and simplify things when it comes to firewall exceptions and security, especially if traffic is spanning subnets/buildings/whatever. Mapped printers will also be per-user and follow their roaming profile, and are easier for the user to customize if they desire. In my case, we only used policy to add one or two big central printers to the profiles of the users in each department and published instructions for them to add additional ones they want through the add printers dialog.

Loopback policies can also help you if you only want certain printers so show up when logged in to specific computers.

Thanks for the information. What about drivers...it looks like Windows 7 requires administrative privileges to install them, at least when users are adding their own printers manually. Should I be installing printer drivers in system images?

# ? Dec 3, 2011 00:42

Swink: Apr 18, 2006; Left Side <--- Many Whelps

That requirement can be disabled in group policy.

# ? Dec 3, 2011 10:10

Thanks Ants: May 21, 2004; #essereFerrari

Yeah, look for Point and Print. You can define a trusted server that clients will install drivers from. It's a lifesaver.

# ? Dec 3, 2011 13:03

FISHMANPET: Mar 3, 2007; Sweet 'N Sour
Can't
Melt
Steel Beams

Yeah. You'll have to install some extra drivers on your print server probably (If you have a 32 bit print server and 64 bit clients or 64 bit server and 32 bit clients) you'll need to install extra drivers, which you can do in the printer sharing tab.

Then disable Point & Print restrictions, and you're good to go.

Caged posted:

Yeah, look for Point and Print. You can define a trusted server that clients will install drivers from. It's a lifesaver.

This didn't work for me the once I tried it, so I just disabled it and didn't think anything of it.

# ? Dec 3, 2011 21:32

LoKout: Apr 2, 2003; Professional Fetus Taster

FISHMANPET posted:

This didn't work for me the once I tried it, so I just disabled it and didn't think anything of it.

I just allowed the entire domain and followed someone else's suggestion on here: you have to put the settings on both the computer and user level for it to work. Some drivers (mainly HP's Universal driver) still have issues and prompt for admin access, but there's workarounds (HP needs you to install 32 bit drivers from a 32 bit machine, and 64 bit drivers from a 64 bit machine).

# ? Dec 4, 2011 01:13

Wicaeed: Feb 8, 2005

I'm in the middle of building a new print/file server for our small software development office to replace an aging Windows Server 2003 AD/DNS/DHCP/Print/File/CA server.

I've got all my printers installed on the new file server, but when I go to add the printers from a connected workstation, I get an error message "A policy is in effect on your computer which prevents you from connecting to this print queue"

All of the users at this location do not have Administrator privileges on their computer, hence do not have permissions to install drivers. Since I am building this new server (and taking the time to find the right drivers), what is going to be the best way for me to automate installing these printers for the users so that they do not run into any issues when it comes time to make the switch from our older server to our new one?

Is there any way for me to manually install the drivers on all the desktops here without having to go to each one?

edit: I should point out that this office has an equal split of Windows 7 and Windows XP desktops to support, and as such using pnputil to stage the drivers wouldn't only fix half the problem

Wicaeed fucked around with this message at 16:16 on Dec 14, 2011

# ? Dec 14, 2011 16:10

FISHMANPET: Mar 3, 2007; Sweet 'N Sour
Can't
Melt
Steel Beams

Wicaeed posted:

I'm in the middle of building a new print/file server for our small software development office to replace an aging Windows Server 2003 AD/DNS/DHCP/Print/File/CA server.

I've got all my printers installed on the new file server, but when I go to add the printers from a connected workstation, I get an error message "A policy is in effect on your computer which prevents you from connecting to this print queue"

All of the users at this location do not have Administrator privileges on their computer, hence do not have permissions to install drivers. Since I am building this new server (and taking the time to find the right drivers), what is going to be the best way for me to automate installing these printers for the users so that they do not run into any issues when it comes time to make the switch from our older server to our new one?

Is there any way for me to manually install the drivers on all the desktops here without having to go to each one?

Read this entire page, it should solve your problem.

# ? Dec 14, 2011 16:11

Wicaeed: Feb 8, 2005

FISHMANPET posted:

Read this entire page, it should solve your problem.

How'd I miss that

# ? Dec 14, 2011 16:17

capitalcomma: Sep 9, 2001; A grim bloody fable, with an unhappy bloody end.

Has anyone had any success defining Internet Explorer Compatibility Mode settings in GPO?

There's two places:

User Config -> Policies -> Admin. Templates -> Windows Components -> Internet Explorer -> Compatibility View | Use Policy List of Internet Explorer 7 sites

...and the same spot in Computer Config.

I can't get the loving list to apply. I've tried adding sites under User Config and Computer config; I've tried applying the GPO to the Computers OU, and the Users OU; I've tried forcing Compatibility View for ALL sites. And apparently I'm not the only one. God, I pray I don't have to do this manually for every user.

capitalcomma fucked around with this message at 21:30 on Dec 14, 2011

# ? Dec 14, 2011 21:28

Swink: Apr 18, 2006; Left Side <--- Many Whelps

I have an issue with some printers coming back from the dead.

I had a GPO that deployed some laserjet printers through Computer > Policies > Windows Settings > Deployed Printers

I have since deleted that GPO as well as the printers, but some workstations have the following error all through the event log:

quote:

The print spooler failed to reopen an existing printer connection because it could not read the configuration information from the registry key S-1-5-21-315623756-43523542-1544898942-6495\Printers\Connections\,,Server,PrinterName.
This can occur if the key name or values are malformed or missing.

There multiple entries for each of the printers that used to exist, occuring every minute or so.

I'm not sure if this by itself is causing problems, but it is making it difficult to diagnose a problem we're having with our current printers.

I've been through all our GPOs to see if one of them is still somehow referencing these non-existent printers and theres nothing. These are all freshly imaged machines and the printers were removed 3+ months ago.

# ? Dec 16, 2011 05:04

Ifan: Feb 21, 2006; The Nice Operator from Heaven

Maybe someone added those printer connections to the image/during deployment so to avoid download of the printdrivers when the user gets the computer?
I'd also check out which account the SID belongs to. Does the SID change between computers, or is it the same everywhere?
Check out the RSOP for the computer/user and see if you find anything else suspicious.

Try running "rundll32 printui.dll,PrintUIEntry /ge" (case sensitive) to check if there are any per-machine printer connections still listed there. If there are, they can be removed with the switch /gn /n\\foo\bar.
Check out the /s switch aswell. Might find some trace of the old drivers there?
If that's the case i'd start trying to figure out where those drivers came from. Printdrivers just doesn't install by itself

And since you tell me that the entries are recurring every minute, i'd also check out the task scheduler, and check if there are any scripts running in the background trying to do stuff.

Ifan fucked around with this message at 17:46 on Dec 17, 2011

# ? Dec 17, 2011 17:41

Swink: Apr 18, 2006; Left Side <--- Many Whelps

Thanks mate that is some good info. I do suspect that the image i'm deploying may be to blame.

# ? Dec 18, 2011 00:21

FISHMANPET: Mar 3, 2007; Sweet 'N Sour
Can't
Melt
Steel Beams

Question about applying some drive mappings:
I'm in the process of migrating from one fileserver/domain to a new server/domain, so I've got some shares on the old domain being mapped using a logon script that uses a user local to the old server, because the domains can't trust each other.
Once I migrate the files to the new server, I deactivate that policy, and make a new one using GPP drive mappings to point to the new path on the new server.

For some reason when I do this switch, when the users first logon, they don't have either policy, and after another logon they show up. My guess is that it isn't doing a gpupdate to pull the new policies until it's too late, but is there a way to fix that?

Also can a drive mapping preference apply itself any time other than logon?

# ? Dec 18, 2011 04:52

evil_bunnY: Apr 2, 2003

FISHMANPET posted:

Also can a drive mapping preference apply itself any time other than logon?

I'm going to go ahead and guess you can't mount a share without the user credentials you'll mount it with, so no? Or do you mean later?

# ? Dec 19, 2011 13:09

FISHMANPET: Mar 3, 2007; Sweet 'N Sour
Can't
Melt
Steel Beams

evil_bunnY posted:

I'm going to go ahead and guess you can't mount a share without the user credentials you'll mount it with, so no? Or do you mean later?

Later. I know with printers after login you can run gpupdate and it will map any printers in the policy, but I'm wondering if the same works with drive mappings. I haven't been able to do it myself, but GP is GP and who knows what it's supposed to do vs what it actually does.

# ? Dec 19, 2011 15:16

mungtor: May 3, 2005; Yeah, I hate me too.; Nap Ghost

I've skimmed this thread from time to time and I'm trying to help the windows guys out, so if this has been covered please feel free to link me to it. I'm not a Windows admin, but they don't read SA.

We used to map drives based on a logon script run through group policy, but this has suddenly broken and the best we can figure is because the drives get mapped at an admin level and then the explorer shell drops to filtered access. This is obvious when "net use" shows no mappings in a normal command shell, but in one that is Run as Administrator we can see the mappings.

We're trying to move that out of a logon script into group policy, but we have actual scripting in our logon script to map a user home drive. Basic logic is

code:

if \\server1\%username% exists map H: to \\server1\%username%; exit
if \\server2\%username% exists map H: to \\server2\%username%; exit

Is there any way to implement that in group policy without an external script, or do we call it somewhere else (ie, not in a logon setting)?

# ? Dec 30, 2011 21:29

Armourking: Dec 16, 2004; Step off!
Step off!

mungtor posted:

I've skimmed this thread from time to time and I'm trying to help the windows guys out, so if this has been covered please feel free to link me to it. I'm not a Windows admin, but they don't read SA.

We used to map drives based on a logon script run through group policy, but this has suddenly broken and the best we can figure is because the drives get mapped at an admin level and then the explorer shell drops to filtered access. This is obvious when "net use" shows no mappings in a normal command shell, but in one that is Run as Administrator we can see the mappings.

If you're running 2008+ domain controllers, make sure you select "Run in logged-on user's security context" in the mapping policy.

# ? Dec 30, 2011 22:22

FISHMANPET: Mar 3, 2007; Sweet 'N Sour
Can't
Melt
Steel Beams

mungtor posted:

I've skimmed this thread from time to time and I'm trying to help the windows guys out, so if this has been covered please feel free to link me to it. I'm not a Windows admin, but they don't read SA.

We used to map drives based on a logon script run through group policy, but this has suddenly broken and the best we can figure is because the drives get mapped at an admin level and then the explorer shell drops to filtered access. This is obvious when "net use" shows no mappings in a normal command shell, but in one that is Run as Administrator we can see the mappings.

We're trying to move that out of a logon script into group policy, but we have actual scripting in our logon script to map a user home drive. Basic logic is
code:
if \\server1\%username% exists map H: to \\server1\%username%; exit
if \\server2\%username% exists map H: to \\server2\%username%; exit
Is there any way to implement that in group policy without an external script, or do we call it somewhere else (ie, not in a logon setting)?

I'm not entirely sure, but you might be able to implement that with a DFS namespace. You can point everyone's home directory to \\domainname\homes\%username% and DFS will figure it out, though I'm not 100% sure about that. It seems like a thing it should be able to do.

# ? Dec 31, 2011 18:06

ddiddles: Oct 21, 2008; Roses are red, violets are blue, I'm a schizophrenic and so am I

I know this is probably a retarded question and doesn't fit in this thread, but I can't find another one more suited for it.

Is there a way through System Center Essentials to find out of the computer is running a 32b or 64b version of Windows.

I'm trying to inventory all the IT poo poo at my work, and don't feel like walking to every computer and checking.

# ? Jan 3, 2012 21:46

gallop w/a boner: Aug 16, 2002; Hell Gem

mungtor posted:

I've skimmed this thread from time to time and I'm trying to help the windows guys out, so if this has been covered please feel free to link me to it. I'm not a Windows admin, but they don't read SA.

We used to map drives based on a logon script run through group policy, but this has suddenly broken and the best we can figure is because the drives get mapped at an admin level and then the explorer shell drops to filtered access. This is obvious when "net use" shows no mappings in a normal command shell, but in one that is Run as Administrator we can see the mappings.

We're trying to move that out of a logon script into group policy, but we have actual scripting in our logon script to map a user home drive. Basic logic is
code:
if \\server1\%username% exists map H: to \\server1\%username%; exit
if \\server2\%username% exists map H: to \\server2\%username%; exit
Is there any way to implement that in group policy without an external script, or do we call it somewhere else (ie, not in a logon setting)?

This doesn't answer your question; but under what circumstances do people map a home drive using a method like this, rather than by just filling in the home drive field for the user object in ADUC? I have always just used the home drive setting in there and found that it mapped happily without my specifying anything anywhere else.

# ? Jan 3, 2012 22:59

Megiddo: Apr 27, 2004; Unicorns bite, but their bites feel GOOD.

Maybe you could use something like this:

code:

wmic os get osarchitecture /format:list

Or see:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1413409/how-to-determine-os-platform-with-wmi

http://forums.techguy.org/dos-other/996282-solved-wmic-os-architecture-batch.html

# ? Jan 3, 2012 23:00

Megiddo: Apr 27, 2004; Unicorns bite, but their bites feel GOOD.

edit: first ever quote is not edit :smith:

# ? Jan 3, 2012 23:00

Moey: Oct 22, 2010; I LIKE TO MOVE IT

Edit: Beaten.

blackmanjew posted:

Is there a way through System Center Essentials to find out of the computer is running a 32b or 64b version of Windows.

You like powershell?

code:

get-wmiobject -class win32_operatingsystem | foreach-object{$_.osarchitecture}

If you are interested let me know, I have a nice script that I found that will loop through subnets pinging and then pulling WMI info.

# ? Jan 3, 2012 23:11

ddiddles: Oct 21, 2008; Roses are red, violets are blue, I'm a schizophrenic and so am I

Moey posted:

Edit: Beaten.

You like powershell?
code:
get-wmiobject -class win32_operatingsystem | foreach-object{$_.osarchitecture}
If you are interested let me know, I have a nice script that I found that will loop through subnets pinging and then pulling WMI info.

I haven't had too much experience with powershell, would love to check that script out though.

# ? Jan 4, 2012 16:04

evil_bunnY: Apr 2, 2003

gallop w/a boner posted:

This doesn't answer your question; but under what circumstances do people map a home drive using a method like this, rather than by just filling in the home drive field for the user object in ADUC? I have always just used the home drive setting in there and found that it mapped happily without my specifying anything anywhere else.

Doing it that way means you can move the folders without a care in the world, as opposed to your method where you have to adjust the drive path on top of moving the actual data.

Moey posted:

If you are interested let me know, I have a nice script that I found that will loop through subnets pinging and then pulling WMI info.

Post it anyway!

# ? Jan 5, 2012 10:32

capitalcomma: Sep 9, 2001; A grim bloody fable, with an unhappy bloody end.

evil_bunnY posted:

Doing it that way means you can move the folders without a care in the world, as opposed to your method where you have to adjust the drive path on top of moving the actual data.

Couldn't you get the same results if the profiles were stored in a DFS tree? That way you can move the folders around and all you'd need to do is update the path on the DFS namespace server.

# ? Jan 10, 2012 03:05

Moey: Oct 22, 2010; I LIKE TO MOVE IT

blackmanjew posted:

I haven't had too much experience with powershell, would love to check that script out though.

I somehow missed this, will post tomorrow when I get to work. I think I actually got the base code from the Powershell thread, so I will have to look and give credit to whoever actually wrote it.

# ? Jan 10, 2012 03:08

Drumstick: Jun 20, 2006; Lord of cacti

Is there a way to drop files in specific folders using gpo? Its testing time and the software pulls the questions from the local machine, but those questions are not included in the install.

# ? Jan 10, 2012 14:24

FISHMANPET: Mar 3, 2007; Sweet 'N Sour
Can't
Melt
Steel Beams

Drumstick posted:

Is there a way to drop files in specific folders using gpo? Its testing time and the software pulls the questions from the local machine, but those questions are not included in the install.

Computer > Prefrences > Windows Settings > Files

# ? Jan 10, 2012 15:08

alanthecat: Dec 19, 2005

I've messed up somewhere on the permissions for a new Folder Redirection GPO.

Users can create files but can't open them ("Access Denied). Traversing folders is fine. The folders are being redirected to a DFS share and users can create, and read/write files elsewhere on the share. Inside the "profiles" folder, users can list/traverse folders to get to their own. But get Access Denied when opening their own files.

E.g., on Desktop, I've changed owner to Administrators, given Full Control to Administrators and the user, then given ownership back to the user (applying to subfolders/files). "Include inheritable permissions from this object's parent" is not selected.

I don't know where I copied the "do it this way" list of permissions, but I'm worried this is going to be a big Xcacls scripting job to remove everything that's there and give the correct permissions to already created folders (that have "grant users exclusive rights..." on them).

I spent a few hours at this today. What am I missing?!

edit: I've noticed that I can access everything fine if I go \\server1\profiles\me\desktop (or \\server2) but get Access Denied when going through \\dfs\profiles.

edit2: Access Denied on \\dfs\profiles... when in Windows 7, but not on 2k8r2. Administrator account.

edit3: This is something to do with offline-files. If I browse to a folder in a network share, I can access the files fine, if I hit "make available offline", files in that folder start to give Access Denied.

alanthecat fucked around with this message at 15:05 on Jan 11, 2012

# ? Jan 10, 2012 18:41

Moey: Oct 22, 2010; I LIKE TO MOVE IT

Credit goes to Spudman on this, I just took the script he posted and began adding in whatever WMI information I needed. I have never tried the event log thing that he added, not worried about that on our workstations.

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3286440&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=2#post378652364

code:

$erroractionpreference = "SilentlyContinue"
$domainuser = Read-Host "Enter authorized domain\username for scan"
$pass = Read-Host "Enter password" -AsSecureString
$creds = New-Object -Typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -argumentlist $domainuser,$pass
$network = Read-Host "Enter the first 3 octets of the IP range with periods, e.g. xxx.xxx.xx."
$filename = Read-Host "Enter the filename to output results to"
$errorReports = Read-Host "Do you also want to get error events from the last 24 hours?(y/n)" 
Write-Host " "
Write-Host "Basic results will be written to $filename" -ForegroundColor "Green"
if(($errorReports -eq 'Y') -or ($errorReports -eq 'y'))
{
 Write-Host "Error reports will be written to hostname.Errors.txt. (This takes longer.)" -ForegroundColor "Green"
 $systemsWithErrors = 0
}
Write-Host "Scanning $network 1 to $network 255..." -ForegroundColor "Green"
Write-Host " "
function ping-ip 
{
 param( $ip )
 trap
 {
  $false; continue
 }
 $object = New-Object system.Net.NetworkInformation.Ping
 (($object.Send($ip, 1000)).Status -eq 'Success') # 1000ms is the ping timeout
}

Get-Date | Out-File -FilePath $filename -Encoding "ASCII" | Wait-Job
echo "Domain\User: $domainuser" | Out-File -FilePath $filename -Encoding "ASCII" -Append | Wait-Job

1..255 | % { $ip = "$network$_"; "$ip = $(ping-ip $ip)" 
 if($(ping-ip $ip) -eq "True")
 {
  $name = Get-WmiObject -query "SELECT Name FROM Win32_ComputerSystem" -Computer $ip -Credential $creds -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | ForEach-Object{$_.Name}
  $model = Get-WmiObject -query "SELECT Model FROM Win32_ComputerSystem" -Computer $ip -Credential $creds -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | ForEach-Object{$_.Model}
  Wait-Job -State "Running"
  if($name -and $model)
  {
   echo "$ip $name $model" | Out-File -FilePath $filename -Encoding "ASCII" -Append | Wait-Job
   if(($errorReports -eq 'Y') -or ($errorReports -eq 'y'))
   {
    $time = [System.Management.ManagementDateTimeConverter]::ToDmtfDateTime((Get-Date).AddHours(-24))
    $errorWmi = Get-WmiObject win32_NTLogEvent -computerName $ip -Credential $creds -Filter "EventType=1 AND TimeGenerated>='$time'"
    if($errorWmi)
    {
     echo "Error events from $name within the last 24 hours:" | Out-File -FilePath "$name.Errors.txt" | Wait-Job
     Out-File -FilePath "$name.Errors.txt" -InputObject $errorWmi -Append | Wait-Job
     $systemsWithErrors = $systemsWithErrors + 1
    }
   }
  }
 }
}
Write-Host " "
Write-Host "All Done." -ForegroundColor "Green"
if(($errorReports -eq 'Y') -or ($errorReports -eq 'y'))
{
 Write-Host "Number of systems with errors: $systemsWithErrors" -ForegroundColor "Green"
}

# ? Jan 10, 2012 18:44

ddiddles: Oct 21, 2008; Roses are red, violets are blue, I'm a schizophrenic and so am I

Moey posted:

code:

$erroractionpreference = "SilentlyContinue"
$domainuser = Read-Host "Enter authorized domain\username for scan"
$pass = Read-Host "Enter password" -AsSecureString
$creds = New-Object -Typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -argumentlist $domainuser,$pass
$network = Read-Host "Enter the first 3 octets of the IP range with periods, e.g. xxx.xxx.xx."
$filename = Read-Host "Enter the filename to output results to"
$errorReports = Read-Host "Do you also want to get error events from the last 24 hours?(y/n)" 
Write-Host " "
Write-Host "Basic results will be written to $filename" -ForegroundColor "Green"
if(($errorReports -eq 'Y') -or ($errorReports -eq 'y'))
{
 Write-Host "Error reports will be written to hostname.Errors.txt. (This takes longer.)" -ForegroundColor "Green"
 $systemsWithErrors = 0
}
Write-Host "Scanning $network 1 to $network 255..." -ForegroundColor "Green"
Write-Host " "
function ping-ip 
{
 param( $ip )
 trap
 {
  $false; continue
 }
 $object = New-Object system.Net.NetworkInformation.Ping
 (($object.Send($ip, 1000)).Status -eq 'Success') # 1000ms is the ping timeout
}

Get-Date | Out-File -FilePath $filename -Encoding "ASCII" | Wait-Job
echo "Domain\User: $domainuser" | Out-File -FilePath $filename -Encoding "ASCII" -Append | Wait-Job

1..255 | % { $ip = "$network$_"; "$ip = $(ping-ip $ip)" 
 if($(ping-ip $ip) -eq "True")
 {
  $name = Get-WmiObject -query "SELECT Name FROM Win32_ComputerSystem" -Computer $ip -Credential $creds -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | ForEach-Object{$_.Name}
  $model = Get-WmiObject -query "SELECT Model FROM Win32_ComputerSystem" -Computer $ip -Credential $creds -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | ForEach-Object{$_.Model}
  Wait-Job -State "Running"
  if($name -and $model)
  {
   echo "$ip $name $model" | Out-File -FilePath $filename -Encoding "ASCII" -Append | Wait-Job
   if(($errorReports -eq 'Y') -or ($errorReports -eq 'y'))
   {
    $time = [System.Management.ManagementDateTimeConverter]::ToDmtfDateTime((Get-Date).AddHours(-24))
    $errorWmi = Get-WmiObject win32_NTLogEvent -computerName $ip -Credential $creds -Filter "EventType=1 AND TimeGenerated>='$time'"
    if($errorWmi)
    {
     echo "Error events from $name within the last 24 hours:" | Out-File -FilePath "$name.Errors.txt" | Wait-Job
     Out-File -FilePath "$name.Errors.txt" -InputObject $errorWmi -Append | Wait-Job
     $systemsWithErrors = $systemsWithErrors + 1
    }
   }
  }
 }
}
Write-Host " "
Write-Host "All Done." -ForegroundColor "Green"
if(($errorReports -eq 'Y') -or ($errorReports -eq 'y'))
{
 Write-Host "Number of systems with errors: $systemsWithErrors" -ForegroundColor "Green"
}

Thanks Moey!

That all looks like a bunch of gibberish to me, but PS looks awesome, and I should learn it.

Running that script right now, we'll see how it goes.

Edit: Any good books/online resources you recommend for learning Powershell?

# ? Jan 11, 2012 00:06

vty: Nov 8, 2007; oh dott, oh dott!

I learned POSH via this book; http://www.amazon.com/Windows-PowerShell-Action-Second-Payette/dp/1935182137/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1326237061&sr=8-2

It's by one of the main guys who wrote it and provides a very low level understanding of why he did what he did, etc. I also downloaded PrimalScript (awesome) and hacked a bunch of their template scripts up to achieve my desired results. Learned more from that, honestly, but I'm a do-er not a reader.

# ? Jan 11, 2012 00:11

Nebulis01: Dec 30, 2003; Technical Support Ninny

vty posted:

I learned POSH via this book; http://www.amazon.com/Windows-PowerShell-Action-Second-Payette/dp/1935182137/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1326237061&sr=8-2

It's by one of the main guys who wrote it and provides a very low level understanding of why he did what he did, etc. I also downloaded PrimalScript (awesome) and hacked a bunch of their template scripts up to achieve my desired results. Learned more from that, honestly, but I'm a do-er not a reader.

Another great beginners guide to PowerShell is http://www.amazon.com/Learn-Windows-PowerShell-Month-Lunches/dp/1617290211/ref=pd_sim_b_2

# ? Jan 11, 2012 00:23

Moey: Oct 22, 2010; I LIKE TO MOVE IT

vty posted:

I learned POSH via this book; http://www.amazon.com/Windows-PowerShell-Action-Second-Payette/dp/1935182137/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1326237061&sr=8-2

It's by one of the main guys who wrote it and provides a very low level understanding of why he did what he did, etc. I also downloaded PrimalScript (awesome) and hacked a bunch of their template scripts up to achieve my desired results. Learned more from that, honestly, but I'm a do-er not a reader.

This is what I am working my way through, really good read.

# ? Jan 11, 2012 00:50

Wiggly: Aug 26, 2000; Number one on the ice, number one in my heart; Fun Shoe

Any advice on moving GPO software package locations? I am getting rid of the server that holds the software that is deployed (just Java and Acrobat) via GPO so I need to point the GPO's to a different server. I looks like I can go in with an AD editor like Apache Studio and edit the GPO directly or I can delete and re-create them but that seems like more of a pain that just editing them. Thoughts?

# ? Jan 11, 2012 23:15

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? Jun 2, 2024 10:44

Drumstick: Jun 20, 2006; Lord of cacti

Im trying to deploy a shortcut through GPO. Im under Computer> Preferences > Shourtcuts

I have target type File System
Shortcut Path: %CommonDesktopDir%\<filename>
Target Path: \\server\folder\<file>.lnk

The targeted file is accessible to everyone, but it is not appearing on the users desktops. The GPO is getting applied to the pcs.

# ? Jan 12, 2012 15:01

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > Cohesively synergizing efficiency paradigms by leveraging group policies

«‹›31 »