Microsoft KB Archive/148664

= XCLN: Description of the Profile Descriptor File =

Article ID: 148664

Article Last Modified on 10/28/2006

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Exchange Server 4.0 Standard Edition

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This article was previously published under Q148664



SUMMARY
This article describes the format of the Profile Descriptor File (.PRF) that is used with the Automatic Profile Generator (Newprof.exe).

The PRF file contains profile settings that Newprof.exe reads and which are then added to the newly created profile.

Each of the Microsoft Exchange Clients share point's, contain a template PRF file, named Template.prf. When the Microsoft Exchange Setup Editor is run against the client share point, it copies Template.prf to Default.prf. Any user option changes made using the Setup Editor, are then written to Default.prf. When the client Setup program is run, if the file Default.prf is present in the client installation directory, it is copied to the Windows directory on the client machine and then Newprof.exe is run to create a new profile.



MORE INFORMATION
The Profile Descriptor File contains information relating to the services to be installed in the profile and contains 4 major sections:
 * Section 1: Profile Defaults


 * Section 2: Services in the profile


 * Section 3: Default values for each service


 * Section 4: Mapping for profile properties

Section 1: Profile Defaults
This part of the PRF file contains values that apply to the entire profile specified below the [General] section

Under the [General] section, the following entries are used.
 * ProfileName=

This entry specifies the name to be used when creating the profile.


 * DefaultProfile= [Yes/No]

If the value is set to Yes, then the profile being created will be set as the default profile. By default, this entry is set to Yes.


 * OverwriteProfile= [Yes/No]

Determines whether the profile being created should overwrite an existing profile with the same name. If the value is set to No, and a profile with the same name, as that specified in the ProfileName entry, does exist, then the profile will not be created. The default value is No.


 * DefaultStore=

 corresponds to a service that is to be used as the default store. The Service ID's are got from the entries listed in the [Service List] section, described below. By default, the value is set to Service2, which corresponds to the Microsoft Exchange Server Service. This is determined by looking at the [Service List] section. In that section look for an entry whose name is Service2. The value of this entry is the actual name of the service.

Section 2: Services in the Profile
This part of the file lists all the services that are to be installed on in the profile. The names of the Profiles are listed as entries under the [Service List] section. By default the [Service List] section is as below:

 [Service List] Service1=Microsoft Exchange Client Service2=Microsoft Exchange Server Service3=Personal Address Book

The services listed in this section will be installed only if the settings associated with each of these services are valid. If the Automatic Profile Generator encounters a problem with one or more of the settings associated with a service, it may not install that service in the profile being created.

Section 3: Default Values for each service
This section of the file contains service specific information for the services listed under the [Service List] section. For each of the services listed under the [Service List] section, there should be a section with that service name. This section should contain entries for each configurable option for the service.

By default, there are the following sections:

[Service1]

This section contains configurable options for the Microsoft Exchange Client. The different settings available in the Microsoft Exchange Client, are enumerated in Section 4 of the PRF file, which is described below.

[Service2]

This section contains settings for the Microsoft Exchange Server service. The different configurable settings available in the Microsoft Exchange Server service, are enumerated in Section 4 of the PRF file.

[Service3]

This section contains settings for the Microsoft Exchange Personal Address Book service. The different configurable settings available in the Microsoft Exchange Personal Address Book service, are enumerated in Section 4 of the PRF file.

Section 4: Mapping for profile properties
This section of the file contains a listing of all the supported properties for each of the services that Automatic Profile Generator supports.

For each service, there is a section, under Section 4, with the name of that service. This section contains all the settings for that service that the Profile Generator supports. By default, there are sections for [Microsoft Exchange Client], [Microsoft Exchange Server], [Personal Folders], [Personal Address Book] and [Microsoft Mail].

For each entry in the [Service List] section, there must be a corresponding section in Section 4 of the file. So, for example, if under the [Service List] section, there is an entry:

  Service1=Microsoft Exchange Client

There must be a section called [Microsoft Exchange Client] in Section 4 of this file. The [Microsoft Exchange Client] section contains descriptions of all the options that can be set for the Exchange Client. Each description contains the type of that entry and an internal id number. There is also a text description of the entry which explains the use of that option and the values that can be assigned to the option.

NEWPROF.EXE reads Section 4, to determine how to interpret each of the options. The textual description of each option is commented out and hence NEWPROF.EXE ignores these lines.

Using the above example, if in the [Service List] section, we have the entry:

  Service1=Microsoft Exchange Client

There should a section called [Service1] in Section 3 of the file as well as a section [Microsoft Exchange Client] in Section 4.

For each entry specified in the [Service1] section, there must be a corresponding entry in the [Microsoft Exchange Client] section which describes the type (whether the option is a Boolean variable, integer,...) and an internal id number. If the corresponding entry is not present in the [Microsoft Exchange Client] section, the Automatic Profile Generator (Newprof.exe) will not be able to interpret that option and will display an error message.

Hence, in order to have Newprof.exe set a particular option for a service, that service id might be listed in the [Service List] section. The option must be listed with a valid value in the [Service id] section, where Service id is the entry name corresponding to that service in the [Service List] section. There must also be a section corresponding to the Service Name in Section 4 of the file, and this section should have the description information for the option that we need to set.

Keywords: kbusage KB148664

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