Outlook & Group Policy

Baz · 16 Jul 2007 at 09:50

Is there any way of sending the outlook settings through a group policy with Windows server 2003 instead of having to go to each computer or asking users to set it up?

Ian · 16 Jul 2007 at 10:10

I managed to do it using a custom installation script. Have never tried using an existing installation though

I've always wondered why MS has never added outlook settings to the group policy. Seems such an obvious thing to do

oddjob62 · 16 Jul 2007 at 10:43

Yeah, a custom install of Office, or an Outlook profile (PRF) File are the only ways to go afaik

teaboy5 · 16 Jul 2007 at 11:22

Try the Office 2003 resource kit. It should do what you want, there is also a book available to help.

Baz · 16 Jul 2007 at 11:49

Cool, found the packager for Office 2007 which is fine and dandy for new installs.

My problem is that if I changed the Exhcange server and therefore it had a new name, I don't really want to go round 150 PC's and reconfigure the Outlook settings, and there are 4 versions of Office kicking about, 2000, XP, 2003 & 2007.....

TheKnat · 16 Jul 2007 at 15:12

If you get the group policy .adm file for Office 2007 theres an option you can enable for:

Automatically configure profile based on Active Directory Primary SMTP address

By default, if a user is joined to a domain in an Active Directory environment and does not have an e-mail account configured, Outlook populates the e-mail address field of the New Account Wizard with the primary SMTP address of the user currently logged on to Active Directory . The user can change the address and configure a different account, or click Next to configure the populated settings. By enabling this setting, you can change this behavior so that the user does not have the option to configure a different account. The account is automatically configured using their primary SMTP address without showing the New Account Wizard.

Only appeards for Office 2007 thought. Setting is under User Configuration/Microsoft Office Outlook 2007/Tools | Account Settings/Exchange

Baz · 16 Jul 2007 at 15:13

I know 2007 already did a search for Exchange and usually found it, BUT it also enables the caching mode, which I don't always want to use, especially on remote sites, as it takes ages to do on large mailboxes...

oddjob62 · 16 Jul 2007 at 15:20

Baz said:
Cool, found the packager for Office 2007 which is fine and dandy for new installs.

My problem is that if I changed the Exhcange server and therefore it had a new name, I don't really want to go round 150 PC's and reconfigure the Outlook settings

Just create a CName pointing to the exhcange server called exchange.yourdomain.local. Then you can just change that if needbe.