Can you share starter GPOs?

Yes, you can port a starter GPO from one domain or forest to another relatively easily through the export/import procedure. Again, using the GPMC, highlight the Starter GPOs node in the navigation pane. In the details pane, click the Contents tab. You may then highlight one (and only one!) starter GPOs and export it with the button titled Save as Cabinet... In the ensuing dialog box, you can specify the folder where you want the .CAB file to be created, as well as the .CAB file's name.

After saving the cabinet file, you could easily move it to a different domain or even a different forest, and load it into the GPMC via the Load Cabinet... button on the Contents tab of the Starter GPOs details pane. Incidentally, the cabinet file contains the GPMC report on the GPO in a file named report.html, so you can look that over before you actually import the starter GPO - for example, to make sure you have the one you want. (The other files in the cabinet archive depend on what settings and comments you have made; there could be as many as six different files.)

You could even use the starter GPO sharing feature to post a starter GPO on the web for other people to read and respond to. This capability could encourage more sharing of group policy expertise. In fact, over the long term, the portability of starter GPOs may prove to be their most endearing feature, although it would be nice to be able to save multiple starter GPOs in a single cabinet file. (I guess Microsoft didn't want to have to worry about coming up with unique file names for those files living inside the CAB archive.) And we'll all have to remember that, like anything else, starter GPOs published on the Web can be good, bad, or indifferent, depending on the source.

See recent blog posts...

How can you create a starter GPO?

Everything you need to know about Server 2008 Group Policy Objects (GPOs)

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