Q. How can I configure applications published using Remote Desktop RemoteApps to only be visible to certain users?

A. The RemoteApp Manager in Windows Server 2008 R2 lets you configure and manage Remote Desktop Services (RDS) remote applications. You can allow a set of users to be configured for each remote app.

As a best practice, I like to create an Active Directory (AD) security group for each application or suite of applications, such as Microsoft Office. I can add users or other groups to those application AD groups and just assign the application AD group permission to the application in RemoteApp Manager. This way, if a group of users needs access to a remote application, they just need to be added to the AD global group that has permissions for the application.

In the example below, you can see that I grant the global group RDS_OfficeUsers permission to see the Office suite using RemoteApp. I then add the users and groups who should be able to see Office into the RDS_OfficeUsers global group.