CONFIGURING USER HOME FOLDERS – WINDOW 2008 R2

This how to will show you the steps to set up user profile redirection. User Folders (Documents,
Favourites, Desktop etc.) can all be relocated to a folder on a sever (or DFS share) to make backups and
moving users to different computers easier.
I have tested and configures this using both server 2008 R2 and Sever 2012 R2. The screenshots are all
from my production implementation on Sever 2012 R2.

STEP 1: Create Folder for Redirect Profiles

*Create a new folder on your target sever. Set the permissions to Apply to: This folder only (disable
inheritance) Authenticated Users to match the following: Traverse Folder/ Execute File Folder/ Read Date
Read Attributes Read Permission.
Note- by default, the everyone object is given permission to the folder. I always remove this group and
replace with Authenticated Users.

STEP 2: CONFIGURE SHARING FOR REDIRECTED PROFILES FOLDER

*Open the properties for the folder created on step 1, and select Sharing Tab and check the Share this
Folder Box. By default, the share name will be the same as the folder name, you can change this if desired.
Click the Permission button, and again remove the everyone group and add Authenticated User and Grant
Full Control, Change the Read Permission.

STEP 3: CONFIGURE USER PROFILES TO REDIRECT TO SHARE FOLDER

*User Profile Redirection is configured in Active Directory Users and Computers. Launch AD and navigate
to the OU that contains the user(s) you wish to redirect.
Right click the user account and select Properties and navigate to the Profile tab. In the Home Folder
section, click the Connect radio button, select the drive letter you want to assign and add the UNC path to
the share folder, followed by the %username% variable, which will auto-populate the username.
The UNC path should look like this: \[sever name] [share name]\%username%
CLICK APPLY
STEP 4: BONUS: CONFIGURE HOME DRIVES FOR MULTIPLE AD USERS!
*If you are setting up Home Drives for multiple users, you can edit multiple user’s at once.
Select the user you wish to apply the policy to (Ctrl+Click or Shift+Click), then right click and select
properties, open the Profile tab, check the Home Folder box and set the driver letter and path (\[sever
name][share]\%username%).

STEP 5: CONFIGURE GPO TO REDIRECT DOCUMENTS FOLDER

*Open Group Policy Management and create a new Group Policy Object (or edit an exiting one if the suits
you better).
In the GPO, configure folder redirection under the following: User Configuration-> Policies-> Windows
Settings-> Folder Redirection.
Choose the Documents fold, right click and select Properties.
Change the Setting: field to Basic-redirect everyone’s folder to the some location and set the Target folder
location to Redirect to the user’s home directory.

STEP 6: CONFIGURE SETTINGS FOR STEP 4

*Select the Settings tab in the Documents Properties wind and set according to the requirements your
environment.
I check all 3 boxes and left the folder in the new location when the policy is removed, but this will vary
based on your specific requirements.

STEP 7: CONFIGURE REDIRECTION FOR ADDITIONAL FOLDERS

*To redirect a user’s Music, Pictures and Video folder, right click each of these folders in the GPO Editor
and select properties.
Under the Setting: field select Follow the Documents folder to the use’s now redirect the folder to the user’s
now redirected Documents folder.

STEP 8: APPLY CHANGES FOR USERS

*These changes will automatically go into effect the next time that a user log in to their PC. I have seen it
take one or two new home folder, so be sure to check and make sure all of the document have moved.
For my VIP and special users, I manually ran update / force and rebooted their PC, then had them log back
in and checked that the had them log back in and checked that the redirection worked.
To my VIP that the redirection is functioning, opening My Computer and look at the Home drive to see if it
matches the contents of My Documents.

Enabling folders redirection will allow you to more easily back up user profiles, and allows users
to move around between matches without having to move manually copy over their data, and
offers protection from failing or corrupted local drives.

REFFERENCE:
*Configuring folders redirection.
*How to configure folder redirection
*Permissions required for user home folder
*Prevent all folders from being named “Documents”
*Video: How to set up user profile redirection.