Help! I’m having problems with GPOs. I’ve setup two GPOs applied at the domain level. On both of them, I’ve enabled hide all icons, which is under user configuration, administrative templates, desktop.

Now it’s my understanding that GPOs are applied from bottom to top, with the GPOs at the bottom of the list being applied and processed before the GPOs above. However, the precedence of GPOs in a list is just the opposite, the GPOs higher up the list take priority over the GPOs lower.

Now the first thing I did was enable the higher policy and disable the lower policy. Remember, I only have two policies in my list, both configured to hide all icons. I logged off and logged back on, and the desktop icons were hidden. Great, that’s what was supposed to happen, since the lower policy was disabled and the higher policy up was enabled. The higher policy was processed and applied.

Next, I left the GPO lower on the list disabled, like it was before, but also configured it to No Override. The GPO higher on the list remained enabled as it was previously configured. I logged off and logged backed on. The desktop icons were hidden. Not good! My book said the desktop icons should be visible, since the No Override should have prevented inheritance and blocked the GPO configured higher from being processed and applied.

Next, I reconfigured the GPO lower on the list with the hide all icons not configured. The GPO higher on the list remained enabled as it was previously configured. I logged off and logged back on. The desktop icons were hidden. Fine, if I understand the process correctly, that’s what was supposed to happen, since the lower GPO was processed first, but the higher GPO took precedence when it was processed and since it was higher up the list, it had priority.

Next, I reconfigured the GPO lower on the list with the No Override and left it at the hide all icons not configured. The GPO higher on the list remained enabled as it was previously configured. I logged on and logged off. The desktop icons were still hidden! Not what I expected, since the GPO lower on the list was processed first with the No Override enabled, which should have prevented inheritance and blocked the higher GPO from being processed and applied.

Next, I switched the positions of the two GPOs. I moved the GPO that was higher to the lower position and left it configured at hide all icons. I moved the GPO that was lower to the higher position and left it at hide all icons not configured. I logged on and logged off. The desktop icons remained hidden. Again, not what I expected, since it was my understanding that although the GPO lower on the list was processed first, the GPO higher on the list, the one with the hide icons not configured, was suppose to have priority and take precedence.

Next I configured everything identically to the way it was immediately above, but added the No Override to the lower GPO set to hide all icons not configured. I logged off and logged on. The desktop icons remained hidden again! Now I’m thoroughly confused!

In the end, disabling the GPO configured to hide all icons was the only way I could get the desktop icons to show up.

Can anyone please tell me what I’m missing? I don’t know if I’m screwing up or my system is screwing up. I’m running Windows 2000 Advance Server with DNS, DHCP, WINS, one Domain still in mixed mode, and several clients. Everything was going just smooth till I hit this snag. Maybe I need to switch to Native Mode? Thanks in advance, and I’m sorry for the length of this post.

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An AD container can have multiple GPOs linked to it. You can set the precedence by moving the GPOs up and down within the link. This relationship that GPOs have to one another is seperate from the relationship they have in terms of how a user or computer has policy applied based on the user or computer existing within various places in AD to which policies can be applied.
A computer can have local policies applied. The same computer can have policies applied to it by virtue of its existence within an AD site. The very same PC can also receive policies linked to the domain in which it resides. That very same box may also be part of an OU, or even child OUs within an OU. From these conatiners it can likewise receive and process polies. The "NO Override" option deals with preventing GPOs linked to containers lower on the pecking order from overriding settings contained in GPOs higher up. For example: At the domain we set a policy. The default behavior is that conflicting policies at the OU level will override the domain settings. To change this default behavior we set "No Override" at the domain level. No Override and Block Policy Inheritance have nothing to do with the relationship that multiple GPOs linked to the same container have to each other. That is determined by position in the list.

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I can't believe it, just as I finished typing that long monstrosity above, I remembered that you had to convert to native mode to gain full Group Policy functionality. Well I made the switch and GPOs are doing what they are supposed to now. Wonderful! Thanks for the response Tech Ranger.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Turbodog
I can't believe it, just as I finished typing that long monstrosity above, I remembered that you had to convert to native mode to gain full Group Policy functionality. Well I made the switch and GPOs are doing what they are supposed to now. Wonderful! Thanks for the response Tech Ranger.

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