Using Offline Files

Offline files offer another way to manage user data. Think about how many of your users travel with their computers and may not be able to have a network connection to needed data. Using offline files in conjunction with folder redirection and synchronization, you ensure that user data will be available and consistent. To use offline files with folder redirection, you simply enable offline files on the shares created for redirection. By default, when you create shares, only the files and programs that users specify will be available for offline use. You can change this configuration so that all files and programs that users open from a share are automatically available offline. Or you can configure the share so that files and programs will not be available offline.

Offline files work by storing client data and documents in the file system cache on the client computer, making the data and documents available if there is no network connection. Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 provide two key enhancements to the way offline files are used:

• Change-only syncing: Windows Vista allows for faster synchronization by syncing only the changed blocks of files. Thus, unlike Windows XP where the entire contents of a changed file are written back to the server during synchronization, with Windows Vista only the changed blocks are written back to the server during synchronization.
• Unavailable file and folder ghosting: When partial contents of a folder are made available offline, Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 create ghosted entries of other files and folders to preserve the online context. Because of this, when you are not connected to a remote location, you'll see ghost entries for online items as well as normal entries for offline items.

Configuring Offline Files on File Servers

The quickest way to configure offline files is to use Computer Management. After you start Computer Management and connect to the computer you want to work with, expand System Tools and Shared Folders, and then select Shares to display the current shares on the system you are working with.

You can then configure offline settings for a shared folder by right-clicking the share in the details pane, and then selecting Properties. In the share's Properties dialog box, click Offline Settings on the General tab to display the Offline Settings dialog box. There are three settings:

• Only The Files And Programs That Users Specify Will Be Available Offline: This allows the user to decide which files will be available offline and is the default setting.
• All Files And Programs That Users Open From The Share Will Be Automatically Available Offline: If a user opens a file from a share, this setting makes it automatically available offline. The subsetting, Optimized For Performance, allows programs and application data to be available offline as well. Selecting this check box will help network performance when applications are run over the network. Clear this check box if you are not going to use folder redirection or offline files for application data.
• Files Or Programs From The Share Will Not Be Available Offline: This setting blocks users from storing files on the client computer for offline use.