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Our employees use their laptops both as personal laptops and as work laptops. When they're at work they sign in to the domain and when they're at home they sign in to their laptop directly.

The problem with Windows 8 is that it's basically forcing them to remember to type JOE-LAPTOP\Joe when they're at home and then DOMAIN\Joe when they're at work. Ideally, I'd like the user switcher to just show these two accounts side-by-side and allow the user to click on the one they want, enter their password and be off to the races.

Is this possible? I've been playing around with tutorials like this and editing the registry / running logon scripts and yet these accounts refuse to show up side-by-side.

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    Why aren't they just signing into the laptop at home with their domain credentials?
    – mfinni
    Oct 29, 2014 at 17:47
  • Because at home it is their personal laptop. When they get to work I redirect folders like their Documents, Music, Videos (Video Editing) etc. to the server in order to back them up. At home they may want to have family videos and things I have no interest in backing up. Similarly, this way they can install whatever programs they like on their 'personal' side while leaving the domain side under the control of the server.
    – DTI-Matt
    Oct 29, 2014 at 18:11
  • Most sysadmins are used to working in environments where, for legal/liability reasons, no part of the laptop is considered "owned" by the user. So, you're in a bit of a different scenario than most of us are used to, I imagine. Also, if a program is installed, it's available to any user on that machine - regardless of the user's login, unless the installer specifically removes the ACLs in question.
    – mfinni
    Oct 29, 2014 at 18:14
  • That I'm fully aware of. The main reason I'm having them join a domain in the first place is to facilitate backups of their data as well as pushing them VPN certs/connections, some 'mandatory' applications, printers, and things like that. We're a small company so we're not yet at the point where everything needs to be locked down, I was just looking to offer them a convenience to switch between the two.
    – DTI-Matt
    Oct 29, 2014 at 18:19
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    I kind of understand what you're doing. Two different user accounts with two different user profiles and data sets. That kind of make sense, but your statement Similarly, this way they can install whatever programs they like on their 'personal' side while leaving the domain side under the control of the server doesn't hold true. Applications installed would be available to all users and any Computer Configuration GPO settings would be applied to the computer, regardless of who is logged in.
    – joeqwerty
    Oct 29, 2014 at 18:20

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