A system with a network interconnecting a server and a plurality of user stations. The server stores a plurality of user applications for downloading to user stations and further stores access permissions for the applications for each user. When a user attempts to log onto the system, the server uses the user's log-on identifier to build a list of applications for which the user has access permission. The server downloads to the station a list of applications to which the user has access permission. The user station uses the list to build a folder containing only the applications from the list to which the user has access permission. The system further verifies from the list that the user has access to applications that are represented by objects that the user may have added to his or her desktop at an earlier time. For each user desktop preference specified by the user at an earlier time that corresponds to a user application, the access permission for the user to the user application is checked from the list, and, if the application is not included on the list, the desktop object representing the application is removed from the desktop.