Remote Web Workplace 2008 Users can only see one or few computers in the list of computers to connect to (RDP)

I just noticed that some of my users that use Remote Web Workplace (on SBS 2008) don’t have the ability to connect to certain computers within the network when they attempt to view a list of all computers. To be honest, I’m not quite certain how the list was originally created for each user, and I’m far to lazy to spend any time trying to figure that out.

I’m already certain that users have the right to connect to each PC because there is already a group policy in place that grants Domain Users RDP permissions to each computer in the domain (You can read about how to do that here), it’s just that when they click to view a list of computers to connect to on the RWW website, they only see one computer, or at best a few computers.

I’ve tried to find a more eloquent way to do this, but failed. The only way I could change this list was to make individual changes to each User’s or Computer’s properties within the Windows SBS Console, this is fine for networks with 5 computers, but if you’ve got 50 computers this could become painful.

Here are the steps to add computers to a user’s list:

  1. Open the Windows SBS Console
  2. Click on “Users and Groups” at the top
  3. on the “Users” tab, Right click the user in question and select “Edit user account properties”
  4. Select “Computers” on the left
  5. Highlight each computer individually, and then check the box labeled “Can remotely access this computer”
  6. Click Apply when done, and have the user log off of the RWW site, and log back on
  7. They should now be able to see all computers when they view the list of computers to connect to.

This can also be performed on a computer basis by following these steps:

  1. Open the Windows SBS Console
  2. Click on “Network” at the top
  3. on the “Computers” tab, Right click the computer in question and select “View computer properties”
  4. Select “User Access” on the left
  5. Highlight each user individually, and then check the box labeled “Can log on remotely to this computer”
  6. Click Apply when done, and have the user log off of the RWW site, and log back on
  7. They should now be able to see all computers when they view the list of computers to connect to

That should do it, if anyone knows of a faster/better/easier way to do this please let me know.

3 thoughts on “Remote Web Workplace 2008 Users can only see one or few computers in the list of computers to connect to (RDP)

  1. Sam

    Hi Sean,

    Do you know if there is any way to make Terminal Servers show up for normal users, without enabling the ShowAllComputers registry hack as that shows ALL computers. I only want to show our Terminal Server to all users.

    Thanks,

    Sam

    Reply
  2. Lori

    This is one of those days when I found just the right article just when I needed it. I’m bookmarking your blog.
    Thanks!

    Reply

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