Microsoft Windows client personalization

The main container for personalization data in Windows is called the user's 

profile

. In Windows 2000 profile data is stored in:

c:\documents and settings\username

In Windows NT it is stored in:

c:\winnt\profiles\username

Windows uses these locations to store various kinds of personalization data, for 

example, user documents, application data and settings, temporary Internet files, 

 favorites , etc. This directory is named after the user name, but can also have a 

more detailed distinction, as sometimes the computer name or the name of the 

domain is appended. This happens if a user exists already and a new one is 

created with the same name but integrated in the domain. So one user name can 

exist several times on a machine, connected with the domain name or the local 

machine name or other combinations. The consequence is that Windows has to 

distinguish between user username.localcomputername and 

username.localdomainname.

The selection field in the login screen of Windows is where the user selects 

which profile to use. The data that defines personalization of the desktop and 

some other user based settings resides in the NTUSER.dat file. At logon time 

these settings are loaded to show the customized desktop.

In order to provide profiles that are saved on a network share and that can be 

used from more than one client, Microsoft uses different types of profiles.

A local profile is stored locally to the client and therefore is only accessible on 

that computer. If the same user logs onto another machine, a new profile for that 

user will be created on that machine. 

To make a single profile available to the same user from different client machines 

in the domain, a roaming profile must be created and stored in a shared location 

on the network. 

The third type or profile is the mandatory type. It is intended for environments in 

which a change of the profile is not desired. Only an administrator can edit this 

type of profile, and all changes during a session will be deleted after logging out. 

Thus an identical profile is provided each time a user logs on.

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Linux Client Migration Cookbook   A Practical Planning and Implementation Guide for Migrating to Desktop