Terminal Services Sessions
When a user logs on to a Terminal Services–enabled computer, a session is started for that user. Each session is identified by a unique session identifier. A user can log on multiple times, creating a separate session identifier for each logon. The effect is as if the user were simultaneously logged on to multiple machines.
Each Terminal Services session is associated with an interactive window station. The only supported window station name for an interactive window station is WinSta0; therefore each session is associated with its own WinSta0 window station. There are three standard desktops for each window station: the Winlogon desktop, the screen-saver desktop, and the interactive desktop.
The user associated with the interactive window station for a session is known as the interactive user. On a Remote Desktop client there can be multiple interactive users in addition to the interactive user on the Terminal Services console.
When a user logs off from a remote desktop, the client session on the Terminal server is deleted and the window stations and desktops associated with that session are removed. However, because the Terminal Services console session is never deleted, the window stations associated with the console session are not deleted. This affects how applications behave in a Terminal Services environment when they are configured to run in the security context of the interactive user.
See Also
Last updated on Saturday, April 10, 2004
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