This operation has been cancelled due to restrictions in effect on this computer

Issue:

While using an application to open a file via an Open dialog box, you receive the following message:

 

Restrictions: This operation has been cancelled due to restrictions in effect on this computer.  Please contact your system administrator.

 

 

Cause:

Your system administrator has implemented a policy limiting your access to specific drives.  The Open dialog box of the application is defaulting to one of the restricted drives.

 

The Group Policy setting to configure this setting is called Prevent access to drives from My Computer and it is located here.

Solution:

Change the default location that the application uses to open, or change / remove the drive restriction.

 

More Information:

Restricting access to drives on Citrix Servers is very convenient security practice to implement, but needs to be planned with application access in mind.  The description given of the Prevent access to drives from My Computer setting in the GPO is:

 

If you enable this setting, users can browse the directory structure of the selected drives in My Computer or Windows Explorer, but they cannot open folders and access the contents. Also, they cannot use the Run dialog box or the Map Network Drive dialog box to view the directories on these drives.

 

However, this setting will also affect the application Open dialog boxes preventing any type of access to restricted drives.