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Nomad Enterprise Webcast - March 5

It is not often I blog about 1E, I think it has only happened once before actually. Even before I got an offer from them they told me they didn't want me to blog about them or their products because they didn't want my blog to turn into PR for 1E. And over the last year I have not talked about the products at all. But as you may have noticed the number of posts I put up have also dropped dramatically. Well I spend most of my time working with the 1E products, back when I was at ESRI I spent...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: SMS 2003, SMS Tools, Packaging, OSD, Webcast, SMSNomad Branch, ConfigMgr, SCCM, 1E

Sequenced App Displays Popup at Launch - Every Time

I think we all have seen this happen when you install a fresh copy of Office and launch Word for the first time. Well if you sequence and app and this happens it can be rather annoying if the user gets it every single time when they start an app. Check out John's resolution to this issue below. Source . Windows Installer Pop-up When Running Virtualized FrontPage 2003 Symptom : After sequencing Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003, when the application is streamed to a client and a user tries to launch...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: Packaging, SoftGrid

MSI Utility for Microsoft Application Virtualization SoftGrid

Seasons Greetings Everyone! Overview The MSI Utility for Microsoft Application Virtualization is a new tool designed to extend virtual application deployment in certain key scenarios. In cases where a computer running Microsoft System Center Virtual Application Server is not available, the MSI Utility allows delivery of sequenced applications directly to Microsoft SoftGrid Application Virtualization for Desktops and Microsoft SoftGrid Application Virtualization for Terminal Services. The MSI Utility...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: Packaging, SoftGrid, ConfigMgr

ConfigMgr Maintenance Windows Explained

In ConfigMgr there is a new feature that hasn't gotten much attention called Maintenance Windows. This is a feature that I have heard numerous requests for and it gets a bit closer to the infamous 'Big Red Button'. So what is a maintenance window? A maintenance window is a rule applied to a collection of ConfigMgr clients that prevents those clients from: Executing a program, including a standard program such as setup.exe Running Software Updates And launching any Operating System Deployments...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: Packaging, Patching, Documentation, ConfigMgr

Why Patch Tuesday Turns Into Patch Thursday or Friday or Monday

I used to hate the second Tuesday of every month. I honestly liked it better when patches were released as they were ready. What happens with the scheduled updates is that everyone knows that it is coming and that means that everyone expects their SMS Engineers to have the patches deployed that night, no matter how late, no matter how many people, no matter what! And on Wednesday morning, usually around nine, everyone wants to know the status of the deployments. For me I had some advantages, one...  ... Read the full post or  the 3 comments. Filed under: SMS 2003, et. all, Security, KB Articles, Rants, Packaging, Patching, Reports, SCCM 2007, Funny, SUP, ConfigMgr, Configuration Manager, SCCM

System Center Configuration Manager 2007 Podcasts

On the System Center Configuration Manager site there is currently a list of five audiocast or podcasts that you can listen to. They are all fairly short and cover a specific area of ConfigMgr. Wally kicks it off with the best practices for upgrading and setup, and also discusses a few new features and prerequisites. I am sure they will add more to this over time so if you are reading this months after it has been posted use the bottom link to get to the page and see the whole list. NOTE: The links...  ... Read the full post or  the 2 comments. Filed under: Packaging, Patching, System Center, TechNet, Microsoft, SCCM 2007, OSD, SUP, BDD, ConfigMgr, Configuration Manager, SCCM, Podcast

SoftGrid SMS Connector Discontinued

The SoftGrid connector will be deprecated in the near future and replaced with Windows Installer Application Virtualization Extension or WIAV. The reasons they are moving away from the SMS Connector is due to future plans and interoperability with old and new products. What is it? Yes, you in the back, you have a question? Ah, yes what is it he asked. It is essentially a tool to take your sequenced applications and turn them into Windows Installer packages (MSI's). Another question? Go ahead...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: SMS 2003, SMS Tools, Packaging, News, SCCM 2007, SaaS, SoftGrid, Application Virtualization, ConfigMgr

Multicasting in Server 2008

Kevin is right, this has already been talked about , but he does a nice job of explaining the two types of multicasting. Two drawbacks to this however...First you cannot multicast across subnets, well you can but if your network supports this you are wide open to a SQL Slammer type of attack where one laptop brings your network to its knees. Second, you have to have Server 2008 to make this work. A simple, less costly solution, that you can utilize now is to use the 1E OSD Plus Pack , or SMSNomad...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: Active Directory, Group Policy, Packaging, Patching, Beta, Longhorn, News, Microsoft, SCCM 2007, OSD, SMSNomad Branch, OSD Plus Pack, ConfigMgr, Server 2008

SoftGrid and SMS 2003 Together

Chad Jones session Friday 11:30 - 1. 3 components of SG the sequencer, server, and client sequencer - wizard based, creates sft file, sprj (project file), osd (tells client how to run the app - XML file), and ico files policy based management through AD groups or OU's. SG server streams virtualized apps, can do pre-caching or load entire app on first use, actual video file is what is streamed to the client SG client version 4.2 will work on Vista If the namespace is not virtualized you can still...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: SMS 2003, Packaging, MMS 2007, SoftGrid

Converting Error Codes to Meaningful Information

So you try to install a software package in SMS, it does go as you planned and then when you look in the ExecMgr.log you see something like this A failure exit code of -1073741790 was returned. This of course means nothing to you, how could you get a negative number as an exit code? Here is how to convert that long negative integer into a meaningful exit code that will give a real error message. Open up Calculator form Accessories, change it into scientific mode (view/Scientific) in Dec/Degrees mode...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: Tools, Packaging, Hack

The SMS Connector for SoftGrid

I can’t say enough about this product, if you have not seen the demos on this visit the site and look at them here . If you have plans to package and send out and software this year with SMS I would encourage you to look at this as an alternative to the traditional ways of packaging and deploying with SMS. The cost is ~$10 for SA members, yes that’s ten dollars. Regards, Anthony Anthony Clendenen | Technical Consultant |Microsoft Practices | 909-379-8934 | Dimension Data “ Dimension...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: SMS 2003, Packaging, Microsoft, SaaS

MMS 2006 - Day 3 - SMSv4 (SCCM 2007) Beta 1 and Beta 1 Refresh Features

Presented by Josh Pointer and Michael Kelley IF YOU MISSED THIS SESSION MAKE SURE YOU ATTEND IT - THE SLIDES DO NOT DO IT JUSTICE YOU MUST SEE THE DEMOS!!! Included in Beta 1: (You may want to skip this section and get to the good stuff in Demo 1 below) Operating System Deployment (OSD) Software Updates Management (SUM) New UI Based on MMC 3.0 Filter Drag and Drop for patch and folders!!! Branch DP's What's new in the Beta 1 Refresh? - Matches Vista Beta 2 release time Deployment of Vista and Longhorn...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: SMS 2003, Packaging, Patching, Beta, Vista, Longhorn, News, Microsoft, MMS 2006

VBScript to Remove Old Versions of IXOS and SAP and Install New Versions

This is a script I put together to remove old versions IXOS and SAP and install the new versions. This has not been fully tested and I have altered it since I did my testing so use this AT YOUR OWN RISK . Make sure you modify it and test it throughly before using it. I cannot be held liable for any results, this is provided as is and only as a guide to help make a similar script for your own purposes. Make sure you watch the word wrap done during the posting or better, just get the attachment and...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: SMS 2003, SMS Tools, Scripting, Packaging