Altiris™ Deployment Solution for Clients 7.0 from Symantec Release Notes

Deployment Solution for Clients 7.0 offers native integration with the Symantec Management Platform. It implements redeployments, management, and migrations. The key added benefit is the ability for Deployment Solution servers to share jobs and tasks, images, and security roles. Your management of image distribution can also take advantage of the platform's hierarchy and replication capabilities.

Deployment Solution 7.1 is now available. See article 49800.

Deployment Solution for Clients is part of Altiris™ Client Management Suite from Symantec. For the suite release notes, see article 40929.

Update: Localized documentation for this product is now available for French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Japanese, and Simplified Chinese.

To install localized documentation, open the Symantec Installation Manager, click Check for Updates and select the language documentation package that you want to install.

To view localized documentation, do one of the following:

Set your browser to a supported language, open the Symantec Management Console, and from the Help menu click Context or Documentation Library.
Go to C:\Program Files\Altiris\Documentation\Web\language\product

Where to get more information

The product installation includes the following documentation:

Document

Description

Location

User’s Guide

Information about how to use this product, including detailed technical information and instructions for performing common tasks.

This information is available in PDF format.

The Documentation Library, which is available in the Symantec Management Console on the Help menu.
The Documentation Web site, which is available at the following URL:
http://www.altiris.com/Support/Documentation.aspx
The Product Support page, which is available at the following URL:
http://www.symantec.com/business/support/all_products.jsp
When you open your product’s support page, look for the Documentation link on the right side of the page.
Quick Start Guide for Deployment Solution for Clients 7.0: Quick Start Guide developed by DS Technical Support Team https://kb.altiris.com/article.asp?article=46101&p=1

Help

Information about how to use this product. This information is the same as in the User’s Guide.

Help is available at the solution level and at the suite level.

This information is available in HTML help format.

The Documentation Library, which is available in the Symantec Management Console on the Help menu.

Context-sensitive help is available for most screens in the Symantec Management Console.

You can open context-sensitive help in the following ways:

The F1 key.
The Context command, which is available in the Symantec Management Console on the Help menu.

For more information, you can use the following resources:

Resource	Description	Location
Symantec Management Platform Release Notes	Information about new features and important issues in the Symantec Management Platform. This information is available as an article in the Knowledge Base.	https://kb.altiris.com/article.asp?article=45141&p=1 You can also search for the product name under Release Notes.
Installing the Symantec Management Platform products	Information about using Symantec Installation Manager to install the Symantec Management Platform products. This information is available as an article in the Knowledge Base.	https://kb.altiris.com/article.asp?article=45732&p=1
Altiris 7 Planning and Implementation Guide	Information about capacity recommendations, design models, scenarios, test results, and optimization best practices to consider when planning or customizing an Altiris 7 Infrastructure for your organization. This information is available as an article in the Knowledge Base.	https://kb.altiris.com/article.asp?article=45803&p=1
Knowledge Base	Articles, incidents, and issues about this product.	http://kb.altiris.com/
Symantec Connect (formerly Altiris Juice)	An online magazine that contains best practices, tips, tricks, and articles for users of this product.	http://www.symantec.com/connect/endpoint-management-virtualization
Online Forums	Forums for users of this product.	http://forums.altiris.com/

Features in this Release

The following are features of this release:

Native platform integration

The Symantec Management Platform provides job scheduling and status reporting. It also incorporates Task Server, which provides the scheduling and scripting capabilities. The Altiris Agent integrates the Deployment Agent capabilities, and the CMDB now stores the deployment jobs and tasks, inventory information, results, and all core data. The Symantec Management Console provides browser-based management features, and the platform's hierarchy and replication features can be integrated into the image and other deployment-related package distribution.

Disk image capture

You can use Windows disk images from the console by using Ghost or RapiDeploy. Both imaging engines are included. Image Explorer lets you edit captured images.

System configurations

You can create system configurations that are applied individually or during disk imaging. You can also specify fields, such as the computer name and network adapter settings.

Initial Deployment

You can configure what jobs that you want to run when a computer is initially deployed. Initial deployments require that you burn a bootable CD. To help you with this process, the Boot Disk Creator tool is included.

Redeployment

Each of your managed computers have a pre-boot folder that is automatically created. This feature and the Deployment Solution agent lets you re-image those computers remotely, without having to physically move to each of them.

Migrations

You can capture personalities and distribute them on a different computer. Using this process, you can effectively migrate user preferences, files, and application settings. PC Transplant Editor lets you add and remove data from your personality packages.

Backup and restore backup images

You can create backup images and later restore them onto the same computer.

Deployment tasks

You can create a number of tasks that are based on pre-defined task templates. You can then apply those tasks to the computers that you choose. Tasks can be imported and exported. Deployment tasks include imaging, migrations, backups, and system configurations. You can also take advantage of Deployment Solution's integration with Symantec Management Platform to accomplish other tasks, such as power control, run a script, and gather inventory.

Task scheduler

You can schedule deployment tasks by using the platform's standard task scheduler. You can specify whether a task should run immediately, at a specified time, or at a recurring time. You can also specify what objects the task is applied to, including dynamic groups.

Task execution status

You can review the status of tasks that were previously run. The status includes a short description of the task, its start time, the computers involved, and the completion percentage.

Deployment reports

You can access the included deployment reports to find the computers that have the deployment agent handlers installed on them. You can also find the status of all deployment tasks that ran. You can also generate custom reports using the native capabilities of the Symantec Management Platform.

Ghost Imaging Foundation

A set of Ghost tools is included with Deployment Solution for Clients. You can invoke the core Ghost engine from within deployment tasks. You can also consume other Ghost capabilities by directly accessing the Ghost tools.

Known Issues in this Release

The following are known issues in this release. For additional information regarding an issue, click the Article ID link.

Known Issue	Article ID
Static IP clients If you need to manage static IP clients in Deployment Solution's automation environment, click the Article ID link for the necessary manual steps.	44751
Deployment Task Server Handlers If you installed any of the previous beta versions and you then install this version, you need to enable the Deployment Task Server Handlers Upgrade policy.	Not applicable
Passwords in the Distribute Personality task The password is cleared from the Distribute Personality task when the task is edited. Re-enter the password to run the task again.	Not applicable
Data could not be loaded error You might see an error message when you select a personality package by using the Browse symbol. If you create a Distribute Personality task and use the Browse symbol to select a PCT Package, it displays the Data could not be loaded error message and selects the first PCT package in the list. To avoid this error, select the desired PCT package from lookup control.	Not applicable.
Disk Image task with multicasing command-line switches You must include the following command-line switches in the command-line options field, when you run the Deploy a Disk Image task with multicasting. Multicast is supported only with the RapiDeploy imaging tool. Multicast does not work with Ghost. -mdb -s2 -i5000001 -w2 -threshold:1.	Not applicable
Default resize partitions proportionately When you deploy a disk image using Ghost, the default resize partitions proportionately option fails. Currently, there is no command-line option to perform this task.	Not applicable
System Configuration task replication An Apply System Configuration Task that is replicated using the Replicate Now option from the right-click menu, replicates the task only. It does not replicate the configuration set that is required to successfully complete the task. To replicate the configuration set, from the right-click menu, on the Configuration settings tab, under All Settings, click the Replicate now option. You can also wait for a scheduled replication to occur.	Not applicable
Package locations need to include the FQDN of the server, not just the NetBIOS name If you create an image with Notification Server or an RSS feed as that image's task server, the package location shows the NetBIOS name of the server. The name becomes a problem when you try to do hierarchy and replication across subnets where NetBIOS names might not resolve. Use the FQDN of the server instead.	42818
Create Disk Image using Sysprep does not remove the preferred DNS IP setting You can use Sysprep to create a disk image of a computer that has a static, preferred, DNS IP address assigned to it. However, if you then deploy that image to another computer, Sysprep does not clear the static, preferred, DNS IP setting. In this instance, the computer will not join the new domain.	Not applicable
Duplicate IP addresses when creating or deploying disk images To avoid duplicate IP address errors, you need to capture disk images of clients that are set up to use DHCP rather than static IP addresses. If you want to have static IP addresses on your target machine after you deployed an image, create a new system configuration in your Deploy Disk Image task and specify the static IP address or range.	Not applicable
The Computers with Deployment Solution Installed report doesn't return any data The filter membership for the Computers with Deployment Task Server Handler installed filter isn’t automatically being updated. To fix the issue, choose Manage > Filters > Software Filters > Agent and Plug-in Filters > Computers with Deployment Task Server Handler installed. The filter membership immediately updates, and then the report works correctly.	Not applicable
Executable images won't deploy You can create self-extracted, executable images by changing the extension of the image file from .img and .gho to .exe. However, you cannot currently deploy the executable images on the Symantec Management Platform.	Not applicable
Cannot image single or selected partitions using Ghost This feature is not available for this release.	Not applicable

HOWTO10210 DS7.0 - Does Deployment Solution 7.0 include PXE?

Legacy ID

43818

Article URL http://www.symantec.com/docs/DOC1673

Altiris™ Deployment Solution for Clients 7.0 from Symantec Release Notes

Description