Novell ZENWORKS 10 CONFIGURATION MANAGEMENT SP3 - SYSTEM PLANNING-DEPLOYMENT-BEST PRACTICES GUIDE 10.3 30-03-2010 System Planning Manual page 75

To make sure that every device receives the required and effective settings, we recommend that you
define the order in which policies are applied. There are four options you can use here, and you need
to understand your policy requirements before you make these decisions:
Apply device policies first, user policies last (user-assigned policy wins)
Apply user policies first, device policies last (device-assigned policy wins)
Use only device policies
Use only user policies
All policies are applied in the following order: folder, group, then device or user.
The following graphic shows the effective policies on a given device:
Assigned Policies Page in ZENworks Control Center
Figure 4-20
In the above example, there is a policy group assigned to a folder BRA. This group contains all
policy settings (Policy-STD) that are required for all users in BRA. Additionally there is policy
group assigned to the NCS folder (below BRA). Finally, there is a direct policy assignment to the
NCS folder that modifies the DLU settings only.
The following sections contain more information:
"Recommendations for Managing Policies" on page 75
"Advantages to Assigning Group Policies through ZENworks Configuration Management" on
page 76
Recommendations for Managing Policies
Organizing policies into folders and policy groups makes it easier to manage the assignment process
to devices and users. When managing policies, you should consider the following items:
When managing policies, you should:
Define user and device categories during the assessment phase, such as Standard-user,
Administrative-user, Management-user, Help Desk-device, and so forth.
Define required policies and sets that can be used for policy groups.
Define the order in which policies are applied.
Assign policy groups to folders as needed.
Use folder or group assignments wherever possible.
Performing Design Activities 75