I am feeling stupid trying to understand logic beyond BranchCache policies.

ayubjon

Why on earth these should be so complicated? Today is second day I cannot understand the logic beyond BranchCache policies? Here are some questions. Let’s discuss them.

1. What if only “Turn on BranchCache” policy is applied (enabled) for Windows 7 computers? Windows 8 computers?
2. Does “Set BranchCache Hosted Cache Mode” affect Windows 8 computers? On other words, if I enable “Turn on BranchCache” and “Set BranchCache Hosted Cache Mode” policies will Windows 8 computers be configured for hosted mode?
3. Say I have both Windows 7 and Windows 8 computers in the branch office. Which policies I should enable in order for all client computers to use BranchCache?

NetworkingStudent

Here is a video on BranchCache

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgDN2c6FaaU

ayubjon

Thank you for the link. Although it partly answers my questions.

Snow.bros

Okay this is just my two cents.

You are welcome to correct me if I am wrong. If you have been studying the Branch cache feature you will recall that there are two methods of Branch cache which are the hosted cache mode and the distributed cache mode.

*Hosted Cache Mode: In this mode we have a dedicated server at each branch office that caches contents for client computers, so if we have a user trying to download a file from a file server at the head office (HQ), the client computer will make a connection to the file server at HQ to request the file, before the client computer starts to download the file, it will first check on the caching server (hosted at that site) to see if the file in question is available on the cache if it is it will download the file from there if not it will download it from the file server at HQ through the WAN link and then the caching server will then store the file onto its cache so that when another client/user requests the same file it will not download it directly from the WAN link at HQ but instead it will download it at the local cache on the server.

*Distributed cache: In this mode there is no hosted server that caches content, here any peer (Client computers) in the subnet can cache contents, so if one client downloads a file at HQ via a WAN link the client computer will store it onto its cache so that if there is another client computer/peer in the subnet trying to download the same file it will download it locally from the other client/peer that cached or stored the file on to it's cache. Any client/peer who downloads the file first will cache the file in the same manner as the hosted cache server. note this is a cheaper or economical solution to having a server at each site caching data contents.

Once you have configured branch cache on your file server for distributed cache mode to work you must configure a GPO(group policy object) onto your client computers (through your domain controller or wherever the GPMC role has been configured) if this GPO's have been configured the branch cache will take effect on your client computers.

If for some reason this does not answer your question, please refer to this link: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd637820%28v=ws.10%29.aspx

Chitownjedi

ayubjon wrote: »

Why on earth these should be so complicated? Today is second day I cannot understand the logic beyond BranchCache policies? Here are some questions. Let’s discuss them.

1. What if only “Turn on BranchCache” policy is applied (enabled) for Windows 7 computers? Windows 8 computers?
2. Does “Set BranchCache Hosted Cache Mode” affect Windows 8 computers? On other words, if I enable “Turn on BranchCache” and “Set BranchCache Hosted Cache Mode” policies will Windows 8 computers be configured for hosted mode?
3. Say I have both Windows 7 and Windows 8 computers in the branch office. Which policies I should enable in order for all client computers to use BranchCache?

Unless you do some kind of security/wmi filtering then all the machines should get the policy that meet the minimum OS requirement for the GPO if they are are in the same OU.

Your question seems a little open to interpretation. Sounds like you are concerned about making sure the policy applies to everything on site.

If you set BranchCache in Hosted mode then you will need to input the FQDN of the server/machine that's hosting in the GPO object configuration for SetBranchCache hosted Mode.. If you turn on BranchCache but don't set Hosted or Distributed modes then the clients will use their local caches until otherwise configured and will be enabled, for all supported computer objects that the GPO link inheritance covers. Does this help a little?