Appendix E: Add Network Place Wizard and Web Publishing Wizard

In Microsoft Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 1 (SP1) users can use the Add Network Place Wizard to create shortcuts to shared folders and resources on the network or on Web or File Transfer Protocol (FTP) servers. Users can use the Web Publishing Wizard to publish files over the Internet or a local network so that those files can be viewed in a Web browser. If users do not have folders on a Web server already or do not have an account with a Web service provider, the Add Network Place Wizard or the Web Publishing Wizard can help them set these up.

This appendix includes the following:

  • An overview of the Add Network Place Wizard and the Web Publishing Wizard

  • How to control the use of the Add Network Place Wizard and the Web Publishing Wizard

    Important For greater control over the communication between components in Windows XP and sites on the Internet, use Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2 instead of with Service Pack 1. Windows XP Service Pack 2 provides a number of new Group Policy settings that control communication between components in the operating system and sites on the Internet. For more information, see the Microsoft Web site at:

    https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=23354

    https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=29133

Bb490851.3squares(en-us,TechNet.10).gif

On This Page

Overview: Add Network Place Wizard and Web Publishing Wizard
Controlling the Use of the Add Network Place Wizard and the Web Publishing Wizard

Overview: Add Network Place Wizard and Web Publishing Wizard

The Add Network Place Wizard and the Web Publishing Wizard are enabled by default for all users. Users use these wizards as follows:

  • Add Network Place Wizard: Users access this wizard through My Network Places\Add a network place or in Windows Explorer through Tools\Map Network Drive (through the link labeled "Sign up for online storage or connect to a network server").

    Users can use the wizard to sign up for a service that offers online storage space, or to create a shortcut to a Web site, an FTP site, or other local network connection. To add a shortcut in My Network Places to a folder on a Web server, the Web server must support network places. Supporting network places requires the Web Extender Client (WEC) protocol and Microsoft FrontPage® Server Extensions, or the Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) protocol and Internet Information Services (IIS). The user must also have read and write access to the Web server.

  • Web Publishing Wizard: In Windows Explorer, when common tasks are shown, users can access this wizard through several different tasks. These tasks are Publish this file to the Web, Publish this folder to the Web, and Publish the selected items to the Web.

    Users can use the Web Publishing Wizard to publish files over the Internet or a local network so that those files can be viewed in a Web browser.

You can decrease access to the Add Network Place Wizard and the Web Publishing Wizard using Group Policy.

For more information about the WEC and WebDAV protocols, see “About Web Folder Behaviors” on the MSDN Web site at:

https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=29223

Controlling the Use of the Add Network Place Wizard and the Web Publishing Wizard

To control the Add Network Place Wizard and the Web Publishing Wizard, use Group Policy.

Controlling the Use of the Add Network Place Wizard

To block users from accessing the Add Network Place Wizard from the Map Network Drive command, configure the following Group Policy setting in User Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Windows Explorer: Remove "Map Network Drive" and "Disconnect Network Drive". This policy setting does the following:

  • If you enable this policy setting, the system removes the Map Network Drive and Disconnect Network Drive commands from the toolbar and Tools menus in Windows Explorer and My Network Places. The system also removes these commands from menus that appear when you right-click the Windows Explorer or My Network Places icons.

  • This policy setting does not prevent users from connecting to another computer by typing the name of a shared folder in the Run dialog box.

  • This policy setting does not remove the Add a network place task from My Network Places.

Controlling the Use of the Web Publishing Wizard

To block users from accessing the Web Publishing Wizard, you can use Group Policy so that the display shows Windows classic folders and does not show common tasks. This prevents the display of the Web-publishing tasks described earlier in this section. To do this, configure the following Group Policy setting in User Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Windows Explorer: Turn on Classic shell.

This policy disables Active Desktop and Web view. Also, users cannot configure a system to open items by single-clicking. As a result, the user interface looks and operates like the interface for Windows NT 4.0, and users cannot restore the new features. This setting takes precedence over other Group Policy settings that would enable Active Desktop.