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Enable or Disable Group Policy Object in Windows Server 2008

By Codrut Nistor

Posted in How-to, Windows-server-2008-operating-systems

Although when a group policy object is created and linked to any organizational unit domain or site the effect is by default inherited to the child objects from the parent objects. However when there are several organizational units and thousands of group policies linked to many of them it becomes quite impossible for the administrators to find out and troubleshoot any error that arises. When this is the case administrators can enable or disable the GPOs or their configurations for test and trial purposes. Disabling GPOs or their configurations does not delete or unlink them from the OUs Domains or Sites but they stop working on temporary basis. If you want to disable any GPO or some of its configuration you are required to follow the steps given below:

1.       Make sure that you are logged on to Windows server 2008 a domain controller with domain admin account.

2.       In the search box at the bottom of start menu type Group Policy Management and press enter key to open Group Policy Management Console.

3.       From the left pane expand Forest > Domains and then expand the name of the domain in which the group policy exists.

4.       Click on Group Policy Objects tree to expand and select the group policy which you want to disable.

5.       From the right pane go to Details tab and from the available drop-down menu of GPO Status choose the appropriate option.

6.       On the confirmation box click on Ok button to save the changes and close Group Policy Management Console window.