Microsoft Group Policy Analyzer: Analyze Group Policy Objects

Group Policy Analyzer is a new tool from Microsoft TechNet that lets you analyze, view and compare sets of Group Policy Objects (GPOs) in Windows. The freeware, launched by Microsoft last week is a good tool to find if a gear up of Group Policies has redundant settings or internal inconsistencies. With Policy Analyzer yous can likewise highlight the differences between versions or sets of Grouping Policies.

Grouping Policy Analyzer from Microsoft TechNet

For those looking to manage GPO'south finer, Policy Analyzer lets you treat a ready of GPOs equally a single unit thus making it easier to determine whether particular settings are duplicated across the GPOs or are gear up to conflicting values. It also lets yous capture a baseline and then compare it to a snapshot taken at a later time to identify changes anywhere across the set.

The finding of the Policy Analyzer are displayed in a table where highlighted areas in Yellow shows "Conflict", while Gray cells betoken absent settings. The finding can also exist exported to an Excel spreadsheet for farther employ.

Analyze, view, compare Grouping Policy Objects

Microsoft Policy Analyzer is a lightweight standalone application and information technology doesn't require any installation. To kickoff using the application follow the beneath steps.

Step i

Download "Run PolicyAnalyzer.exe" (less than 2MB) and extract the files. The extracted files contain PolicyAnalyzer.exe and 2 helper program files – PolicyRulesFileBuilder.exe and PolicyAnalyzer_GetLocalPolicy.exe, documentation .pdf file and sample GPO sets taken from the Microsoft security configuration baselines.

Step 2

Click "PolicyAnalyzer.exe" and you volition run into the Main window pop up on your screen as shown below.

The listing box shows the name of the directory where Policy Rule sets in. Yous can change the location of the directory by clicking on this box and choose you ain preferred directory name.

Initially, as shown higher up, the directory volition be empty.

Step three

To add a Policy Dominion set to the Policy Analyzer drove, click the Add button as shown above in the Main window. Here, I added the sample GPO sets taken from the Microsoft security configuration baselines supplied as part of the Download file earlier.

You lot can choose to add files using the Policy File Importer, shown in the screenshot below.

Policy Analyzer tin can ingest three types of GPO files: registry policy files, security templates, and audit policy fill-in files. Refer screenshot beneath,

If you add files using Add files from GPO(s, Policy Analyzer identifies GPO names from files in the GPO fill-in or backups. If you selection files using the other options, Policy Analyzer sets the file's policy proper noun to a placeholder value.

Pace four

After you take added the files, utilize the Main window to select the files you want to compare. In the above screenshot, I selected all.

At present click "View/Compare" to open the Policy Viewer

Equally shown above, the Policy Viewer lists all the settings configured by the policy sets and the values configured by each policy prepare in its own cavalcade. Here the cells are highlighted with different colors each representing a different meaning as listed below.

• The prison cell background is yellow if any two policy sets configure the value differently.
• A grayness background with no text indicates that the policy set in that column does non configure the setting.
• A white background indicates that the policy set configures the setting and that no other policy fix configures that setting to a different value.
• A calorie-free grey background in a cell indicates that the policy set defines the same setting multiple times, typically in different GPOs.

So with the Policy Viewer windows, you can analyze, view, and compare sets of Group Policy Objects.

Boosted Features

Click View > Show Details Pane (may have been already enabled)

The Details Pane resides in the lower section of the window identifies the path (or paths) in the Group Policy Object editor that can configure the selected setting, the GPO option or options associated with the selected values, the underlying data blazon, and any other available information.

Click Export > Export Tabular array to Excel or Consign All Information to Excel

This is a useful function to import the information for your further apply and analysis.

• Export table to Excel exports only the data in the table view, while,
• Export all data to Excel exports data as shown in the Details Pane, including GPO paths, selection names, and data types.

Policy Analyzer is a helpful tool to analyze and compare sets of Group Policy Objects (GPOs) in Windows. Equally of today, the tool is useful to find if a set of GPOs contains contradictory settings. Yet, it doesn't advise you lot on which of them will win and maybe, that's something which may come in after versions.

Go here to download it from TechNet blog.

Source: https://www.thewindowsclub.com/analyze-group-policy-objects-policy-analyzer

Posted by: sheddjehing.blogspot.com

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