Systems and methods to migrate a user profile when joining a client to a server and/or domain

• US 7,320,068 B2
• Filed: 06/05/2003
• Issued: 01/15/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 06/05/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Strully, Brian G., Zimniewicz, Jeff A., Fitzgerald, Paul R.
• Primary Examiner(s): Moazzami; Nasser
• Assistant Examiner(s): Baum; Ronald
• Application Number:
  US10/455,048
• Publication Number:
  US 20040260565A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,685 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 713/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising

Abstract

The present invention relates to systems and methods to generate accounts on a client when joining the client to a domain while preserving user profiles that were generated prior to joining the client. In general, a user with an account on a client can customize the account, wherein the customization can be saved in an associated profile. The client can employ the user profile when the user logs on in order to return the customization to the user. The present invention provides a novel approach to retain a user'"'"'s existing user profile when joining the client via mapping the user'"'"'s existing account to the account that will be generated, and then automatically migrating the user'"'"'s profile to the generated account during joining the client. The foregoing can provide reduced client setup time, improved setup efficiency, reduced setup cost, and mitigation of severing customization from a user'"'"'s account.

Claims

1. A system that migrates account information from existing accounts to generated accounts during joining a client to a domain, comprising:

an input component that obtains

information indicative of

the accounts to be generated and

the account information to be migrated during joining the client to the domain,

an account management component that employs

the information indicative of

the accounts to be generated and

the account information to be migrated to generate the accounts and migrate the account information from

the existing accounts to

the generated accounts,

wherein the account management component is further employed to

boot the client after

account generation and

user profiles migration,

destroy an administrative account and

relinquish control back to the client'"'"'s processor.

2. The system of claim 1, the account information comprising one or more user profiles.

3. The system of claim 2, the one or more user profiles comprising at least one of account customization, account configuration, an account attribute, an account setting, an account preference, an account color scheme, and an account theme.

4. The system of claim 1, the information indicative of the accounts to be generated and the account information to be migrated embedded in a file.

5. The system of claim 4, the file comprising one of a markup language file, a compressed file and an encrypted file.

6. The system of claim 5, the markup language file comprising one of an XML, an HTML, an XHTML and a DAML based file.

7. The system of claim 1, the information indicative of the accounts to be generated comprising at least one of a list of accounts to be generated, indicia signifying one or more users, and an association between the existing accounts and the accounts to be generated.

8. The system of claim 1, the information indicative of the account information to be migrated comprising at least one of the account information and a mapping between the account information and the accounts to be generated.

9. The system of claim 1, the input component employed in connection with an interface in order to obtain the information indicative of the accounts to be generated and the account information to be migrated.

10. The system of claim 9, the interface component comprising one of a user interface (UI), a graphical user interface (GUI) or a command-line interface.

11. The system of claim 10, the GUI employing at least one of a combo box, a drop-down-menu, and a list box.

12. The system of claim 1, the account management component further comprising generating an administration account that automatically logs on after a client power cycle, hard boot or soft boot, and loads the information indicative of the accounts to be generated and the account information to be migrated into memory.

13. The system of claim 1, the account management component migrating the account information serially and/or concurrently.

14. The system of claim 1, employed when joining the client to a small business server (SBS).

15. A system that creates accounts on a client and migrates user profiles to the created accounts during joining the client to a domain, comprising:

a graphical user interface that obtains information indicative of the accounts to be created and the user profiles to be migrated;

a packaging component that encapsulate the information indicative of the accounts to be created and the user profiles to be migrated, and

an account creator that employs the encapsulated information during joining the client to the domain to create the accounts and migrate the account information to the created accounts the account creator employed to boot the client after account generation and user profiles migration, destroy an administrative account and relinquish control back to the client'"'"'s proessor.

16. The system of claim 15, the packaging component encapsulating the information indicative of the accounts to be created and the user profiles to be migrated within a file.

17. T he system of claim 16, the file comprising one of a markup language file, a compressed file or an encrypted file.

18. The system of claim 17, the markup language file comprising one of an XML, an HTML, an XHTML or a DAML based file.

19. The system of claim 15, the information indicative of the accounts to be generated comprising at least one of a list of accounts to be generated, indicia signifying one or more users, or an association between the existing accounts and the accounts to be generated.

20. The system of claim 15, the information indicative of the account information to be migrate comprising at least one of the account information and a mapping between the account information and the accounts to be generated.

21. The system of claim 15, the account creator migrating the account information serially and/or concurrently.

22. The system of claim 15, the account creator negotiating with the client'"'"'s processor for control in order to coordinate account creation and user profile migration.

23. The system of claim 15, the account creator further comprising generating an administration account that automatically logs on the client, loads the encapsulated information to memory, and employs the encapsulated information in connection with creating the accounts and migrating the user profiles.

24. The system of claim 15, the GUI employing at least one of a combo box, a drop-down-menu, a list box, and an edit control.

25. The system of claim 15, the GUI comprising at least an available user region, a selected user region, an add user mechanism, a remove user mechanism, a map user region, and a current setting region.

26. The system of claim 25, the map user region providing a means to map existing user profiles to users denoted in the selected user region.

27. The system of claim 25, the selected user region providing a list of assigned users, the list comprising at least one of a user name, a user identification (ID) or a icon associated with a user.

28. The system of claim 25, the available user region employed to provide a list of available users comprising at least a subset of the domain users.

29. The system of claim 28, employed in connection with a filter mechanism to filter the domain users to provide a list of available users based on a filter criteria.

30. The system of claim 29, the filter criteria comprising at least one of authentication, security, workgroup, a property or a preference.

31. The system of claim 28, employed in connection with an input device to assign users from the list of available users.

32. The system of claim 31, the input device comprising at least one of a mouse, a keyboard, a keypad, a touch screen sensitive region, a pen, or a voice activation mechanism.

33. A method to generate accounts and migrate user profiles to the generated accounts on a client during joining the client to a domain, comprising:

selecting users from a group of users that can access the client;

mapping the selected users to existing user profiles accounts;

generating users accounts for the selected users;

migrating the user profiles to the generated accounts;

booting the client after the users accounts generation and the user profiles migration; and

destroying an administrative account and relinquishing control back to the client'"'"'s processor.

34. The method of claim 33, further comprising deploying a user interface to provide the group of users, wherein the group of users comprises at least a subset of the domain users.

35. The method of claim 33, further comprising constructing an XML file with information indicative of the selected user accounts and the mapped user profiles.

36. The method of claim 35, further comprising employing the XML file in connection with generating the user accounts and migrating the user profiles.

37. The method of claim 35, further comprising generating an administration account to automatically logon to the client and load the XML file to memory.

38. A method to migrate user profiles to accounts generated during joining the client to a domain, comprising:

receiving an XML file comprising information indicative of accounts to be created and the user profiles to be migrated;

loading the XML file to memory;

generating users accounts based on the information indicative of the accounts to be created;

migrating the user profiles based on the information indicative of accounts to be migrated;

booting the client after the users accounts generation and the user profiles migration;

destroying an administrative account; and

relinquishing control back to the client'"'"'s processor.

39. A computer readable medium storing computer executable components to migrate user profiles during joining a client to a domain, comprising:

a component to obtain information indicative of accounts to generate and user profiles to migrate;

a component to encapsulate the information indicative of the accounts to generate and the user profiles to migrate;

a component to employ the encapsulation to generate the accounts and migrate the user profiles to the generated accounts; and

a component to boot the client after the accounts generation and the user profiles migration and destroy an administrative account and relinquish control back to to the client'"'"'s processor.

40. A system to migrate user profiles during joining a client to a domain, comprising:

means for obtaining information indicative of at least one account to generate and at least one user profile to migrate;

means for embedding the information indicative of at least one account to generate and at least one user profile to migrate within a file;

means for automatically logging on to the client;

means for employing the contents of the embedded file to generate the at least one account and to migrate the at least one user profile to at least one generated account;

means for booting the client after the at least one account generation and the at least one user profile migration; and

means for destroying an administrative account and relinquishing control back to the client'"'"'s processor.