Group Policy Template Updates

16th January 2023

Why would i want a template update?
The original Group Policy Templates installed are based on the OS of the domain controller and they do NOT get updated with OS updates, they need to be updated manually. They provide more ways to secure the computers in your domain.
ie i wanted to be able to force the Application Install options on Windows 10 PCs to Warn my users when they were installing software that wasn’t from the windows store/signed by Micro$oft.
I also made a Group Policy that Prohibits installing software from anywhere but the Micro$oft Store

go here
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-US/troubleshoot/windows-client/group-policy/create-and-manage-central-store
and download the latest template. There is NO case were you want something other than the latest.

Run the installer. Installer is only used as a self extracting zip. It will choose a dumb location in C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Group Policy. just note the location

Open file explorer, In the address bar enter
\\domainname.com

Double Click the SYSVOL share

Double Click the directory that is your domain name

Double Click the Policies dir

scroll to the bottom

right click the PolicyDefinitions folder and choose copy, paste it somewhere outside the SYSVOL folder so we have a backup

now copy and paste all of the folder contents from the location noted in step 2 into the PolicyDefinitions folder

Optimization: inside the new Policy Definitions folder there are sub folders for each language, you can delete all of these except the languages you are using, in my case en-us

the command gpupdate will force update the group policy applied to the local computer you are using for testing, without needing to reboot