Mandatory user profiles are roaming user profiles to which users cannot make permanent changes. Mandatory user profiles are available in Windows XP Professional, but not in Windows XP Home Edition. Mandatory user profiles are stored on a network server and are downloaded and applied each time a user logs on. The profile is not updated when the user logs off.
The advantage of using a mandatory profile is that you can make changes to the master mandatory profile and a user can access that profile on any shared computer that is connected to a the network. The potential disadvantage of mandatory profiles is that the shared computer must have network access for a user to log on. If the shared computer cannot access the network, mandatory user profiles are unavailable and users cannot log on.
To create a mandatory profile for multiple users
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Create a shared folder on a network server that will store mandatory profiles.
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Create a subfolder in that shared folder for each mandatory user profile you want to use.
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Click Start, and then click Control Panel. In Control Panel, double-click Administrative Tools, and then double-click Computer Management.
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In Computer Management, click Local Users and Groups, and then double-click Users.
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For each user account that will use the mandatory profile, right-click the account and then click Properties.
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In Properties, click Profile, and then, in Profile path, type the network path to the shared folder where the mandatory profile is saved (for example, \\server1\profiles\user1).
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Create, configure, and restrict a user profile and then copy that user profile to the appropriate network shared folder.
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In the network shared folder, in the profile folder, rename the Ntuser.dat file to Ntuser.man. This changes the user profile from a simple roaming profile to a mandatory profile.
For more information on how to create and use mandatory user profiles, see the following resources:
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For general information about roaming and mandatory profiles, see the User profiles overview section in the Windows XP Professional Product Documentation.
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For steps on how to assign a mandatory profile to a user account in Windows XP, see Microsoft Knowledge Base Article #307800.