Once you create a custom setting, you can manage it using actions that determine its relationship to the parent organizational unit and other organizational units. Depending on your organizational structure, custom settings can be inherited from, overridden, and disabled between organizational units. Learn more about the organizational structure.
How the actions are applied
The four actions are not always applicable for each custom setting and each action is available at different times. The list below shows when the actions are available.
Inherit
- Available if the custom setting has a different value from the parent.
- Available if the custom setting is deleted and the parent custom setting exists (either on the parent or as inherited).
Edit
- Available for all custom settings. In the case of a disabled custom setting, the edit action will remove disabled status.
Disable
- Available for inherited and overridden custom settings.
Delete
- Available if the custom setting is overridden and disabled.
- Available if the custom setting doesn’t have a parent organizational unit (it's either applied at top-level parent or locally applied and doesn't inherit settings from a parent).
Actions matrix
The following table lists the actions available when a parent or child custom setting is created.
| Inherit | Edit | Disable | Delete | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Applied at root | ✘ | ✔ | ✘ | ✔ |
| Inherited | ✘ | ✔ | ✔ | ✘ |
| Inherited (disabled) | ✔ (removes disabled flag) |
✔ (removes disabled flag after edit) |
✘ | ✘ |
| Overridden | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✘ |
| Overridden (disabled) | ✔ | ✔ (removes disabled flag after edit) |
✘ | ✘ |
| Overridden locally (no parent) | ✘ | ✔ | ✘ | ✔ |
How the actions appear in custom settings
When you create a custom setting, it inherits all the settings from its immediate parent.
Here are a few common ways these actions appear in custom settings:
- If a custom setting matches its parent, you can change the custom setting using the Edit or Disable buttons, but the Inherit button is disabled since the parent and child match. The Inheritance column has a status of Inherited.
- If a custom setting has been changed so that it no longer matches its parent, the custom setting is marked with a grey dot to the left of the row. You can change the custom setting using the Edit, Disable, or Inherit buttons. The Inheritance column has a status of Overridden.
- If a custom setting has been changed so that it’s overridden locally and matches no parent, you can change the custom setting using the Edit or Delete buttons, but the Inherit button is disabled since the child has no parent. The Inheritance column has a status of Overridden.
- BitLocker uses actions that operate similarly to custom settings, except they only use the Inherit and Override options.
- If a BitLocker setting is changed for a parent or child organization unit, it’s marked with a grey dot to the right of the row. Changed Bitlocker settings can be modified further or they can be set to inherit the parent settings by using the Inherit button.
- If a BitLocker setting matches the parent or child organization unit, settings can be modified and then saved using the Override button.
Similar settings to override and inherit parent settings also exist in Windows security setup, Account settings, and Windows Update settings.
Related topics
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