we are currently evaluating Win8 for our company and we are trying to get our heads around the centralized administration of it. We are currently working with Win7 and Server2k8 in a company domain with centralized administration. Now here's the problem:

On boot or prior to shutdown of a machine we currently launch an application for employees timetracking (it's a commercial app that we don't have control over). This is a simple executable that is locally installed on every employees machine. So when the computer starts up and the user logs on, the app is started and if he is logging off, the app is started right before windows is shutting down. This is the way to remind everyone to log in and off to time tracking. We found this to be easy to make this a rule in Win7 but there are troubles with Win8.

In Win8 we also have the GPO for starting this app but in case of a shutdown it is behaving oddly. The app is started correctly but gets hidden by a windows screen and can not be brought to the users sight again. The computer is not able to shut down since the application is blocking it. No dialog or anything is indicating this, the computer is just running forever with shutdown blocked by an user-invisible application. 

With less impact, this applies to log on too. The user is logged on and the app is started correctly, but the user has to switch to the desktop to see it. There is no indication in the metro view that the app has been started.

Can anyone help us out on this? Basically we just want to bring the app to the users attention, that is it has to be visible on log in and log off without the user searching for it.

**Update**

We already found out that Microsoft is intentionally blocking the user from booting straight to the desktop. ([Article on ZDNet.com](http://www.zdnet.com/microsoft-said-to-block-ability-to-boot-straight-to-desktop-in-windows-8-7000002219/ "Article on ZDNet.com"))