Hello, Esmond!
Offline folders work as well as roaming profiles do : nice fast networks and low overhead/beefy servers work well, odd things happen if you have impatient users with laptops, wireless etc. Sometimes its simply easier to have a scheduled task sync files to a local folder. This will also address the central-server-share-Firefox I/O bottleneck you will see with medium size offices.
Agreed, in large or slow networks this would be a better solution.
You will lose the turnkey application securityI don't guess this to be a problem. If user haven't an administrative rights, he/she couldn't edit a FF files copied from server. Anyway, we are solving a problem of fool-tolerant network in this topic, not about internal wrongdoers, is it? ;)
the original poster sought.
In IE, you can combat this using a configuration script in place of the proxy server (and preferredly in a public location) and outside of GP.
Mozilla/Firefox understands autoconfig scripts too.
Autoconfig script may enumerate hosts which don't require a proxy. Usually there are a very few intranet servers in corporate network.The script hardcodes the proxy based on certain criteria (e.g. if local ip is your corporate addressing - use internal proxy otherwise use none).
More, I consider IE feature to ignore proxy for LAN hosts may be dangerous. Imagine a worm which spreads by this algorithm: it launches HTTP service on victim host, lures user at another PC to open URL pointing to victim, then launches on target PC. The fact as previosly affected host is situated in Local intranet zone, significantly facilitates worm spreading.
Proxy servers are increasingly used to clean/protect IE users.This is irrelevant of browser's vendor. Good proxy always is the best addition to a good browser :)
-- Best regards, Raoul Nakhmanson-Kulish Elfor Soft Ltd., ERP Department http://www.elforsoft.ru/
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