How To Use the MSDN Library Successfully with Terminal Server

Terminal Services can be used with Windows NT 4.0 Server Terminal Server Edition as well as Windows 2000 Server. This article describes the best way to install and use the MSDN Library with Terminal Server. It also covers some known issues of MSDN installation on Terminal server.

On Windows 2000 Server, you have the option of installing the Terminal Services feature at a later time. Before doing this uninstall all MSDN Libraries on the system so that you can reinstall them properly after Terminal Services have been enabled.

Installation

You must place Terminal Server into Install mode before installing the MSDN Library. This can be done by using the Add/Remove Programs application from the Control Panel. Please see the following Knowledge Base article for more detailed information on this step: There are different considerations for how the MSDN Library is installed when multiple users are remotely accessing it. With the standard setup, the content is located on the CDs. A remote user cannot replace disc 2 on the server with disc 3. Also, the disc must be present in the server's CD-ROM drive at all times.

Copy the MSDN CDs to the server's hard drive or to a network location. When installing off of the server's hard drive or a network location, all MSDN Library information points to the server rather than to a disc. Use the following steps to do this:

1. Create a shared folder and give read permission to the users.
2. Copy all files and subfolders from the MSDN Library Disc 1 to the target folder.
3. Copy Msdn332.inf from the root of Disc 2 to the root of the target folder.
4. Copy all files from the \MSDN subdirectory on Disc 2 into the \MSDN directory of the target folder.
5. Copy Msdn333.inf from the root of Disc 3 to the root of the target folder. Note that the MSDN Library that ships with Visual Studio 6.0 does not have a third disk, so this step and the next step can be skipped.
6. Copy all files from the \MSDN folder on Disc 3 into the \MSDN directory of the target folder.
7. Run Setup on the server computer using the Typical setup option. An Administrator, who is logged onto the server locally, needs to do this step. You must use the Add/Remove Programs application in the Control Panel to launch the setup. If AutoRun starts the setup when the CD is inserted, exit setup and allow the Add/Remove Programs application to find Setup.exe and launch it.
8. At this point, all files will have the read-only attribute set, which is inconvenient for the sample files. To alleviate this problem, run the following command from a prompt on the target folder and all contained subfolders (this may take a while, given the large number of files involved):

   attrib -r *.* /s
   						

   NOTE: After running this command, the folders will still have the read-only attribute set.
9. On Windows NT 4.0 Terminal Server Edition, additional steps are needed for the MSDN Library to work correctly for each user. See the following Knowledge Base article for more details:
   195878  (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/195878/EN-US/ ) PRB: MSDN Help Cannot Find msdn*.col File on Terminal Server
10. Verify that the MSDN Library installation succeeded by logging on remotely using the Terminal Services Client.

Other Installation Strategies

You can perform a full install of the MSDN Library using the Add/Remove Programs application. This eliminates most of the CD problems, except many of the samples remain on the CD even after a full install.

Another strategy would be to have multiple local CD-ROM drives on the server that would hold each MSDN Library CD. Along the same lines, one DVD drive that holds the DVD version of the MSDN Library would work as well.

Optimizing the Terminal Services Client

The MSDN Library performs best if the Terminal Services Client is set to Enable Data Compression and to Cache Bitmaps. Older versions of the Terminal Services Client list this option as Low Speed Connection.

Additional Considerations

Following are some additional things you should consider when using the MSDN Library on Terminal Server:

• Make sure that sufficient licenses have been purchased to cover the number of users connected to the server. See the End User License agreement for more details.
• The network computer should be able to handle the required number of concurrent client connections.
• The server should have enough bandwidth to handle the anticipated load.
• The network computer should not use a compressed file system, unless this is commensurate with the hardware and the anticipated load.

Limitations

The following are some limitations of using the MSDN Library on Terminal Server:

• Setup only places the MSDN Library icon on the desktop of the user who installed the MSDN Library on the server.
• Multiple language versions of the MSDN Library on Terminal Server are not supported, which can result in corrupt subset information.
• Problems can occur if one user has multiple client sessions open on the server with the same version of the MSDN Library open on each. If changes are made to media locations or subset information, only the changes of the MSDN Library that is closed last are saved.

For more information, see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: