Dan Thomson at myITforum.com

A replacement for the SMS mmc in the works.

I've been spending quite a bit of time working on a very ambitious project that will allow an SMS admin to interact with SMS clients and perform other SMS related tasks without having to use the mmc. In its current form, the project is developed using DHTML as an HTA application. What this means is that the SMS admin no longer needs the mmc to be installed in order to perform certain functions. Which in turn means that the SMS admin can perform tasks from anywhere that has access to this application (freedom from the mmc).

Here's a brief rundown on some of the features:

Client

Current features

• Perform tasks on a collection, a collection member, or a stand alone system.
• Initiate Remote Control
• Initiate Resource Explorer
• Ping
• Manage a remote system using the compmgmt.msc mmc snap-in.
• Initiate Regedit to manage a remote registry
• Execute Explorer.exe to view drives on a remote system
• Perform a Shutdown, Reboot, PowerOff or LogOff on a remote system.
• Send a net message (soon to include sending email) to a remote computer
• Execute a process on a remote system
• List or kill processes on a remote system
• Copy files to a remote system
• Initiate an interactive command prompt with a remote system
• Delete the selected system(s) from the SMS database
• Show collection membership of the selected system(s)
• Initiate clients actions
  • Hardware and software inventory (full & delta)
  • Re-Run Advertisements
  • File Collection
  • Evaluate Policies
  • Refresh Machine Plicy
  • Update Software Metering Usage
  • Update Windows Installer Sources
  • Create Discovery Record
• Restart the SMS client service
• initiate a repair of the SMS client
• Regenerate the SMS client GUID
• Delete the SMS client certificate
• Modify the SMS client cache size and location
• Change the SMS client port nnumber
• Reassign the SMS client to another site
• Run the Advanced Client Spy & Policy Spy

Soon to be added features

• Add the selected system(s) to a collection
• Rename a remote system
• Push the SMS client to a system (Legacy or Advanced)
• Reinstall the SMS client (Legacy or Advanced)
• Repair the WMI Repository
• Set the Preferred DP or MP
• View the advertisements seen by the SMS client
• View the SMS client logs
• View and clear the client cache
• WakeOnLan
• Initiate a Remote Desktop session

Collections

Current features

• View collections
• View members
• View and modify the collection membership rules (direct or query)
• Save the collection information to mof or txt file

Soon to be added features

• Create
• Rename
• Delete
• Add remove members
• Refresh membership
• Dare I attempt drag and drop....I think yes

Queries

Current features

• Run a query (partially working)
• View queries
• View and modify the query syntax
• Save the query information to mof or txt file

Soon to be added features

• Create
• Rename
• Delete

Coming attractions

• Manage Advertisements
• Manage Packages

Conclusion

Please let me know your thoughts on this project (Is it something that you are interested in, Do the features listed above meet your needs, ...).

If you're interested, here's some links to a few screen shots.

• Managing Collections and Queries
• Preparing to copy files to a remote system
• Showing some of the SMS client actions which can be initiated.
• Managing the SMS client configuration settings

Feel free to contact me

Published Thursday, December 02, 2004 2:20 PM by dthomson