[vox-tech] windows question (samba related)

[vox-tech@lists.lugod.org]

On Sat, 19 January 2002, Ken Bloom wrote:

> 
> > ---- ORIGINAL MESSAGE ----
> > From: Peter Jay Salzman <p@dirac.org>
> > when a win98 machine has 2 users on it, where do the different desktops
> > reside on disk?

> > do different desktops have different file locations?  is there a way to
> > specify to smbclient which one i want?
> 
> THE SYSTEMS I HAVE EXPERIENCE WITH:
> 
> Under Windows 95, and Windows 98, you can find the per-user desktops in 
> c:\windows\profiles\username\desktop. The desktop that you get when you hit cancel instead of 
> logging in locally to a windows machine is at c:\windows\desktop
> 
> Under Windows 2000, the per-user desktops are in "c:\documents and 
> settings\username\desktop\". There is a default user in "c:\documents and settings\default 
> user\desktop" but I believe this may just be the user who is a template for any new users 
> created, considering that Windows 2000 is far more keen on usernames than Windows 98 or 95.
> 
> THE SYSTEMS I DO NOT HAVE EXPERIENCE WITH:
> I believe that Windows NT 4.0 uses the same style as Windows 95 and 98.
> I suspect that Windows XP uses the same style as Windows 2000.
> I have no idea about Windows ME, so look for yourself.
> 
> I just told you where the locations are, your milage may vary - on upgraded systems 
> (particularly XP) if you don't find it in one place, you may find it in the other.

More specifically.  If you do not have profiles enabled on Win95/98, then all of the settings are in the root c:\windows directory.  There will be a \desktop a \Start Menu etc.

If you have enabled Profiles (Control Panel\Users), then it creates a Profiles directory and copies the 'default' for new users from the origianl c:\windows\desktop and the c:\windows\start menu directories.

You probably will need to specify the full path to get the one you want with smbclient.  Win98 series profiles behavior is actually an attempt to implement standard NT behavioer in this and it does so badly.

WinME is derived from win9x series and uses that method.  

'c:\documents and settings\default user' is in fact where the user profile is generated in w2k and wXP systems and there are a lot of tricks and customizations you can do with new user logons, but not on this list.  :)

-sp