- Have 300+ student accounts that need created.
- Write a text file to set all of the properties for each user (thanks be to Microsoft Excel).
- Create all 300+ folders and set shares and permissions using a batch file (Excel again a godsend).
- Print out account info for 300+ students – cut into thirds.
- Look up classroom students are in for 7th and 8th period (remember, 300+ students).
- Get stack of signed Acceptable Use Policies from office.
- Go through Excel file to mark which students have turned in signed Acceptable Use Policies.
- Pass out student accounts to 100+ students who have turned in paperwork.
- Wait for complaints that accounts aren’t working.
- Realize after complaints come in that you typed “//fileserver” instead of “\\fileserver” in text file back in step 1, thus making none of the home directories available to all student users.
- Swear with suitable 4-letter words.
Bleh – I can’t find any easy way to change the home directory for all of the students. I may have to delete all of the accounts and recreate them. Of course, then I’ll have to redo all of the permissions, too.
(If anyone knows WinNT4 server and how to change the home directory for multiple users, please let me know – I’d greatly appreciate it!)
Oh NO. I can’t do anything more than sympathise, but I’m surely doing that. How awful. Stupid slashes anyway.
Sympathy is good – I’m all for that. 🙂 The amaretto sour I had with the teachers tonight helped too. Stupid slashes, indeed! 🙂
Doing a search and replace on the text file won’t help?
Making a new text file is easy – but using “adduser.exe” to change the settings (rather than make accounts from scratch) doesn’t change the info to the new settings. 🙁 (I looked at switches for adduser and don’t see any for simply changing settings for users.) I tried another program for Win2K (cuserSomethingOrOther) hoping it would work on network accounts, but it seems to only work on local accounts.
OK… headache time… Manually, it’s possible to change the home directory on an NT4 Server; you’ll need access to the administrative tools. Mostly correct: On the Server console go to Start > Programs > Administrative Tools (Common) > User Manager For Domains. Open the account in question by double-clicking the username required, then go to ‘profile’. You can see where the user’s home drive is mapped to, and change it manually. (Assuming this is the ‘home directory’ you’re referring to.) CTRL+C and CTRL+V are your friends, as you can dump the \server part of the path into the clipboard and only have to type the user-specific part of the path as you mass-edit. If manually editing the accounts is long, boring, and annoying then just treat it as a reminder of why it’s a good idea to do it right first time. (Says someone who had to manually recover mistakes for around 14 hours once. Taught me well.) Otherwise: (ie, the server doesn’t have the admin tools and you’re not able to install them.) You’ll need to install the admin tools on a workstation after logging in as a domain admin. Then you can follow the above procedure, once you’ve identified the PDC. Otherwise, I’ve never had to make such a massive group correction, and am not sure if it’s even possible to it ‘en-masse’.
Otherwise, I’ve never had to make such a massive group correction, and am not sure if it’s even possible to it ‘en-masse’. I figured the same thing that you did. So I just scrapped the accounts, shares, and directories and just started over with my wonderful batch files and addusers.exe. Oh, and I actually tested one of the accounts too. 🙂 Thanks for the suggestions! (BTW, if you ever need an Excel program to help in making accounts and folders, let me know. I got it from another tech friend and modify it all the time – VisualBasic is your friend.)
*scritches*
Heh – this is the type of post that my sister reads, shakes her head, and says “You’re weird, Trina.”
actually, I believe my response would be, “huh?”
There’s that, too… 😉