The profile archives share stores the personal settings for users as FlexEngine creates a subfolder for each user. The share contains User Environment Manager profile archives, which are ZIP files. FlexEngine reads personal user settings from the profile archives share when a user logs in to the environment or launches a DirectFlex-enabled application. FlexEngine writes the modified settings when the user logs out, or closes a DirectFlex-enabled application.

In a typical deployment, profile archive backups and log files are stored on the same share, but you can configure different locations in the FlexEngine GPO.

You should use a share that is dedicated to the profile archives. A dedicated share improves performance, simplifies configuring the User Environment Manager SyncTool, and makes it easier to configure permissions for the Helpdesk Support Tool.

Note: Do not use the Home drive share. Using this share can cause synchronization conflicts between Offline Files and the User Environment Manager SyncTool, and lets users delete their profile archives.

Folder Structure

The profile archives share has a one-on-one relation to the naming and folder structure of the User Environment Manager configuration share and the Management Console.

Requirements

Requirement Description
Networking requirements For best performance and to optimize login times, the computer where the end user logs in should have a 1-Gbps connection to the profile archives share. If an end user has limited bandwidth or has a laptop that is often offline, use the SyncTool. This tool improves connectivity to the profile archives share under these conditions.
Storage Storage requirements might vary based on the specific deployment. A general guideline is to have at least 100 MB per user.
NTFS security permissions Setting the following NTFS security permissions on the profile archives share automatically creates a folder for each user on first login and limits the user to their own folder.
  • For User Environment Manager administrators and help desk: Full control, applied to this folder, sub folders, and files.
  • For End users: Create folders and append data, applied to this folder only.
  • For Creator owner: Full control, applied to sub folders and files only.

The minimum share permissions for all users should be Change and Read.