Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Paul Fitzgerald

Jeff A Zimniewicz

Erin Marie Bourke-Dunphy

Adam C DePue

Brian G Strully

A restore system may perform a two staged restore operation. The first operation may restore system state and basic operational data to a system sufficient that the system may begin performing a set of basic operations. The second operation may restore secondary data over a period of time while the system is at least partially operational. The system state and basic operational data may be identified and backed up in a separate operation than the secondary data, or may be extracted from a backup volume of the system. The system state restore may be performed by installing a base set of data or applications and injecting specific system state information.

Staged, lightweight backup system

The present invention relates to systems and methods to generate accounts on a client when joining the client to a domain while preserving user profiles that were generated prior to joining the client. In general, a user with an account on a client can customize the account, wherein the customization can be saved in an associated profile. The client can employ the user profile when the user logs on in order to return the customization to the user. The present invention provides a novel approach to retain a user's existing user profile when joining the client via mapping the user's existing account to the account that will be generated, and then automatically migrating the user's profile to the generated account during joining the client. The foregoing can provide reduced client setup time, improved setup efficiency, reduced setup cost, and mitigation of severing customization from a user's account.

Systems and methods to migrate a user profile when joining a client to a server and/or domain

A software tool and method are provided for performing a setup operation in a computer system. The software tool comprises a setup component adapted to sense an attribute associated with the computer system and to selectively provide one of standard prompting and special prompting to a user according to the attribute, and a user interface component adapted to render a plurality of setup prompts to a user and to obtain at least one setup parameter. The invention advantageously provides for customized user prompting according to the system attribute whereby one or more prompt screens may be suppressed and default setup parameters used where the attribute indicates that the prompt screens are unnecessary. Moreover, one or more additional prompt screens may be rendered to the user according to the attribute.

Growing community of inventors

Woodinville, WA, United States of America

Paul Fitzgerald