Cliff Hobbs at myITforum.com

MMS - SY05 - SCCM What's New in Software Distribution

Attended this session and made the following notes: 

Branch DP

• Can install on XP/ Vista machine
• Need lots of disk space
• No auto deploy of Branch DP – Need to assign to specific machine so no fallover like with SMSNomad
• Up to 2,000 per site
• Doesn’t support Internet clients – these Clients can only use Standard DPs
• Package Maintainence Task – Specific to Branch DPs to ensure Package up to date

• MOM MP supports Topology and Events for Branch DPs

Bandwidth

• BITS enabled – can schedule/ throttle
• Distribute on demand – Computer in boundary requests Package.  SCCM targets the Package to the DP where the Client sits – don’t need to manually add the DP to the Package (whahoo..!!)
• Manual content provision – Can preload software on machine, ship to Site and when it comes online will sync in without resending the content
• Also supports DVD, CD, Robocopy, etc.
• Clients don’t use BITS to transfer from the Branch DP as assumption is clients are “local” to the Branch DP + removes the need to install IIS on the Branch DP

Can specify specific drive to use for Branch DP – can’t specify for regular DPs through the MMC though :-(

SMS 2003 Clients CAN use Branch DPs in mixed version hierarchies

Copy Package Wizard

• New “Copy Package Wizard”
• Setup new DP
• Run the Wizard – select DP, select Package(s) (includes support for Folders – like Explorer), browsing supported to select a DP and then all Packages on that DP are copied to the new one

Wake-On-LAN

• When create Collection/ Advert can specify if it needs WOL
• Unicast (default) and subnet directed broadcast
• Magic Packets sent from Site Server – can control when they are sent and how often

Client

• Hardware and Software needs to support WOL
• Timezones supported

Packages

• Binary delta replication
• Large Packages with small changes – only the changes are sent
• Site to Site
• Site to DP
• DP to Branch DP – necessary support for this on XP/ Vista machines acting as Branch DPs supported
  
• Configurable per Package as calculating the differences between changes to small packages is pointless
• Leverages Windows R2-based technology

Packages

• Can persist in Client Cache
• Client side clear cache function

 Advertisements

• Maintenance Windows supported
• Program re-run – never, always, if previous success/ fail
• Protected DP fallback
• Notification settings per Advert over how often users receive notifications

Collections

• Optimised evaluation algorithm
• Maintenance windows supports
• Policy Poling Interval – can specify how often a Collection updates

Client side interaction

• Branding support
• Run Advertised Programs improved
• Consistent experience for new available updates