Manage Windows Unified Write Filter (UWF)

[LeoPete08]

Hello,

We are using Intune to manage 50 Windows PCs in a public lab environment. Our plan is to use Windows Unified Write Filter on these computers so that any changes made by a user will be cleared on reboot. Is there a way to configure/manage Unified Write Filter with Intune?

[#2]

No replies? Why is there no information on managing devices with UWF under Intune? Surely someone out there is doing this.

[#3]

@LeoPete08 seconding this question. I managed to get a great UWF setup for a single use device. I'd love to be able to issue this over Intune to many devices.

[#4]

@Adam_Patterson unfortunately it looks like UWF is not supported with intune. From https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/mem/intune/fundamentals/supported-devices-browsers#microsoft: 

Intune does not currently support managing UWF enabled devices. For more information, see Unified Write Filter (UWF) feature.

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I'll continue to hold out hope that Microsoft decides to add support for UWF in the future, since I see a definite use-case for a managed single use device. Meanwhile, you might look into the intune single-app or multi-app kiosk mode in case either of those would work for you. It doesn't for me unfortunately.

[#5]

@ameyer85 Why not just use a shared device profile in Intune with only a guest account, remove local storage, and block admin tools such as powershell, cmd, and registry. 

the guest account profile is automatically removed sign out or restart. People can still download to the download folder, but it will be erased after signing out. 

[#6]

We were using deepfreeze before on public access computers. I have public computers in intune with intune and office 365 device licenses applied. We have a Kaseya so after the autopilot setup is complete a procedure is used to configure and enable the UWF. If you wanted to use intune to enable UWF I would create an app that would run a PowerShell script that would enable it. add the computer config group to the app after the computer has finished configuring. I use intune to create a local account named public access on each of the public computers. Software called PC booking is used so Library patrons can use their library card and pin to access the computers.

Unified write filter has a servicing mode that is automatically supposed to perform the windows updates, this servicing mode does not work with the pc booking software we use. I have a window on Thursday mornings where the bios wakes the computers up and then a script that runs every 15 minutes in the background checks if the computer is in the windows update window or not and then disables the write filter if it is in the windows update window. I have been having problems still with the updates, sometimes with the restart command the computers shutdown instead. I am getting close to making UWF an alternative over deepfreeze but it has been a bit of work.

[#7]

Need youre help I kinda stuck on the project I am trying to do we enable UWF and wanted to push some updates via servicing mode but is there a way to turn off UWF and run servicing mode then after update uwf will turn back ON? I am talking about managing it to intune? so we will no going to touch the computer one by one @TylerH117