Active Administrator 8.6 - User Guide

Reporting on Group Policy objects

Reporting on Group Policy objects

To report on Group Policy objects

1	Select Group Policy | GPO by Container.

2	Select a container with GPO Links.

3	Click Reports and select a report.

Table 81. GPO by container reports

Report	Description
Report Container GPO Links	Shows the Group Policy links and their settings for the selected container.
Selected GPO Settings	Shows the unique ID, number of revisions, created date, modified date, status of computer and user settings, Group Policy filters and Group Policy links for the selected Group Policy object in the selected domain.
Selected GPO Affected Registry Keys	Shows the registry keys affected by the selected Group Policy object in the selected domain.

Searching for GPO settings

Searching for GPO settings

To help you manage GPOs in your domains, you can search for specific GPO settings to verify the correctness of the setting or to check for changes that may have been made. You can search for settings in the Live GPO, in the repository, in GPO history, and in GPO backups.

To search for GPO settings

1	Select Group Policy | GPO Settings Search.

2	Select the GPO setting on which to search.

3	If available, select the specific parameter on which to search. Not every GPO setting has specific parameters.

4	Select the area in which to search. You can search for settings in the Live GPO, in the repository, in GPO history, and in GPO backups.

5	If you do not see the domain you need, click Add Domain, select the domain, and click OK.

6	Click Search.

Managing GPO history

Managing GPO history

History is kept for all Group Policy objects (GPOs) in your domains. The Group Policy history service automatically checks for changes and saves the changes to a file share on your network. The default folder created during installation is GPOHistory.

In GPO history, you can see exactly who made changes to the group policies and what they changed. If you do not like a change that someone made, you can roll back to a previous version of the GPO.

Topics 

•	Rolling back Group Policy

To manage GPO history

1	Select Group Policy | GPO History.

2	Select a domain controller.

3	Select a Group Policy.

The right pane displays the history versions, which are ordered by date of when the changes were made. You can view the revisions of the GPO, who made the changes, and on which domain controller the change was made.

4	Use the tool bar to manage the GPO history.

 

Table 82. GPO history tool bar

Option	Description
Refresh	Refresh the Group Policy History list.
Edit GPO	Open the Group Policy Management Editor for the linked GPO.
Edit Comments	View basic information about a GPO history item, and add or edit comments.
Remove	Remove the selected GPO history item.
Remove GPO	Remove the selected GPO.
Roll Back	Rollback the GPO to the selected GPO history item. See Rolling back Group Policy.
More | GPO Settings	View detailed settings of the selected GPO history item.
More | Show Changes	View changes made to a selected GPO history item. You can export the report to a PDF, HTML, MHT, RTF, Excel, CSV, Text, or Image file.

Rolling back Group Policy

Rolling back Group Policy

If you notice changes that were not supposed to occur, you can roll back to a previous version of the Group Policy object (GPO). Rolling back causes the GPO to be set back in time to the exact settings as they were at a previous date.

To roll back Group Policy

1	Click Group Policy | GPO History.

2	Select a domain controller.

3	Select the GPO to roll back.

▪	To filter the list, start typing in the Filter Group Policies box.

▪	To make changes to the GPO, click Edit GPO.

4	In the right pane, select a version to roll back to, and click Roll Back.

5	Select if you want to roll back the GPO Security Filters and/or GPO Links.

6	Type a reason and comment to explain the rollback for auditing purposes, and then click OK.

7	Click Yes.

NOTE: If the default domain policy is included in the version, a warning message displays. To overwrite the default, click Yes. Upon completion of the rollback, the list of GPO revisions increase by one to ensure that the GPO is applied the next time polices are refreshed.