Updated / Finalized October 28, 2013
In hopes of removing some of the mystery and challenge of Deployment Solution 7.1, this series was developed.
As time will allow, I'll try to do the same for the 7.5 release. For now, consider the content in this specific version / series to be closed. Future released content will all focus on 7.5
The Goal?
Document
Video_Part_1 Video_Part_2 Video_Part_3 Video_Part_4
Title: Putting It All Together: Getting Started (Quick Start) Guide
Congratulations on purchasing Deployment Solution 7.1. This document, and the related videow, are designed to help you get started with the product. Small companies, or companies building a lab is the target of this content. This is a significant upgrade to the old Support Quick Start guide in the KB, and like that guide, is meant to help anyone new with the product get going. There are other sections dedicated to troubleshooting and/or more advanced functionality.
Content:
Document: includes Preparation & Testing,Scalability issues, a brief on Hierarchy considerations, a Step-by-step quick-start to getting up and running, and some common issues.
The Videos mostly follow or enhance the Step-by-step guide in the document:
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Document:
Title: Putting It All Together: The Best of Two Versions - DS 6.9 and 7.1
When deciding to upgrade, or even simply which version to use, there are many questions, and concerns, including supportability, migration, and the pros and cons of both product versions. This document hopes to help unwind that problem and assist you in making the right choice for you. It is designed for anyone comparing the two products for any reason, such as pre-sales, migration either direction, or perhaps those using the two in tandem.
Content
The document covers the topics below. There are no reasonable ways to capture this in videos.
Title: DS 7.1 Samples!
This is a set of samples that can be installed into the product. There is limited support for these because they're not from Dev, but it's a good starting point for getting to know the product, and do a bit of custom work with it as well.
Title: DS 7.1 Dataflow and Architecture (Updated July 2013)
This presentation-like document is a deep-dive into the inner workings of the product. It's very useful for both explaining what is (or is not) happening, and for troubleshooting. The Architecture part of the document attempts to describe most of the product that otherwise you'd never see or know about, with details beyond what the standard documentation provides. The Dataflow section then breaks down the processes themselves in a dataflow format where you can see what happens first, and who talks to whom.
Title: Putting it All Together: Scaling Deployment Solution to the Enterprise
DS works, but how do you make it work across a HUGE organization? Far-flung Sites? Multiple SMP Servers? Will DS work with Hierarchy and if so, with what limitations? Mid-scale to large companies who want to ensure reasonable performance and compatibility of Deployment Solution with their needs will be interested in this document. It is designed to assist in the planning stages to ensure mistakes are not made that may become costly.
Content: This is a document only for videos are unreasonable. The document contents include:
Video
Video Title: Putting It All Together Video: Customizing Policies
This video demonstrates the "good" way to modify the built-in policies for DS for pilot testing and/or hierarchy scenarios. It also shows how to overcome a problem where a policy may be missing a package link.
Video_P1 Video_P2_1st_Half Video_P2_2nd_Half
Video Title: Hardware Independent Imaging in DS 7.1
This Three-part video mini-series will discuss essentially the two parts to HII or Hardware Independent Imaging as used in Deployment Solution 7.1. Part 1 (Complete!) is an overview of what it is and how to achieve it, mostly dealing with the front-end of the process and assuming all goes well. Part 2 (Complete!) is a deep-dive into how to get the most from DA, common issues, getting around limitations, debugging, etc. It was long enough we had to split it up.
WinPE 3 & 4 Support in 7.1 will not be covered here. HOWTO85100 has been taken down and is no longer supported. I do not have the time to spin it up. Suffice to say though that if you have your own WIM file you built using any PE tool, and you name it the same as the ones we deliver, you can swap it in for one we made. TFTP will pull down which ever file you put there, so you can make it PE4, PE5, PE... whatever, or BartPE, or... That is the BEST way to get a newer version. UNLESS...
Unless you decide to use DS 6.9 SP6 which has full support for PE4 and is, frankly, pretty easy to use!!
Video Title: Customizing WinPE for your environment
This video will show how to add elements to WinPE for greater usability while in automation, including adding a thin-version of PCA for remote control (useful for remote imaging), and using BGInfo for system identification.
Title: Task to capture logs from Automation
To aid in troubleshooting, here's a task you can build to capture all your automation logs including those from Windows post-imaging if need be.
Video Title: Troubleshooting in WinPE
Meant to demonstrate most of the basics of finding what's going on while in automation, if it's NOT what you expected! There's a very good chance this will solve your problems, but if not, you'll be very well prepared to call support
Video Title: Putting It All Together Videos: Troubleshooting Packages in DS 7.1
Meant to help you understand how DS packages work, are unique compared to others, and how to troubleshoot specific issues related to them, including some known issues around missing packages, retrying downloads, an extra Backslash that appears in images, and problems when upgrading automation folders.
Thomas,
If you do become aware of any videos or other related content I'd love to hear about it. I've been talking to various support engineers from Notification Server core and Deployment Solutions to help get my company's Client Management Suite products setup and running. Also, I looked in the Symatenc eLibrary and didn't find any information regarding Deployment Solutions or other Client Management Suite products that I can remember, and I never heard back from the eLibrary people when I asked, so if you know of any content from there let me know!
In response to your question, YES! I think these videos would be very helpful. Through my experience between reading through the lengthy Symantec documents and talking with support engineers, if there is one thing I've found it’s that experience speaks volumes when working with the Symantec Management Console and its various components. There are numerous nuances that the user/admin guides gloss over or don't point out in a way that is friendly to novices like the videos do. In your (now old) PIAT videos, you offered some advice on the side in different areas that A.) prevented some potential disasters/roadblocks and B.) helped build a better, more comprehensive understanding of how the software is working. As I'm chugging along on getting the product(s) of the client management suite working I've been getting a much better understanding of how the product is actually working. I am still a newbie in the products, but I've still gained a great level of knowledge through experience and the videos offer a much better/thorough experience than reading the various technical documents.
In way, it’s a lot like book knowledge versus experience. A car mechanic can read about vehicle engines and how to operate various tools they will use on the job all day. However, when comes to actually installing, configuring, or replacing parts, hands on, visual experience is far more useful when it actually comes to completing the task; videos like the PIAT series offer the next best thing to working with a support engineer in a web-ex session. That said, I believe both Symantec and their customers could benefit from these and similar videos because the customers will be more adept with the software and less likely to tie up lines with support engineers, saving customers some time and preventing their support engineers from being overtasked. That'd also allow Symantec to provide a higher level of support to their customers. For example, I recently had a call with one of the support teams that had to end a bit prematurely because of another scheduled call. I had no problem with the support engineer, as he was very helpful, but it would have been nice and you could say I would have been a more satisfied customer if the end of our call was not rushed due to another appointment. Having less calls would likely allow support engineers become better experts on their products and more versed in related products as they'd have more time to work with the various products. I'm certainly not an expert nor a Symantec employee, so I don't have all the insider knowledge, but those are just my thoughts as a customer with limited knowledge. I hope Symantec employee(s) catch notice of these thoughts!
I'll get off my soapbox now, but long story short I definitely feel that videos like the PIAT series videos and others could be very helpful! I hope this information helps; feel free to contact me for additional information.
-Johnathan
I know of no plans. Well, ONE plan - I had hoped to make more myself, but we'll see. Now that I'm not in the same industry, that'll be a bit tricky.
Shameless Plug: I've friends that have joined ITS and I think they (ITS) have posted some videos. I can't honestly speak to the quality for I've not viewed them. I have other friends at Novacoast that COULD do videos, but likely don't have time. I don't think they've done any.
Question:Of how much use do you and/or others feel these would be? When I was there of course I knew all the hot issues. I can still use the product really well, but I'm no longer "up to date" on what's hot/what's not. I'm just wondering how much the community wants this?
OH! I know there WAS an initiative to get some of the official training online, and I believe free. Have you looked to see if there was any online training that might help fill the gaps? I have not, so I do not know. When I built these, that was not there, and this was designed to ... well, make things simple, not replace a week of training. I'm just wondering if any official stuff has now been released since I left.
A thought. Comments are always welcome!
I'm sad to hear that you left Symantec which means no more updated videos! I've been working with 7.5 SP1 and while its not entirely different from 7.1, its different enough to confuse someone with essentially no experience with the management platform or deployment solutions.
Do you (or perhaps another Symantec employee) know if new updated videos/detailed how-to guides are in the works for getting started similar to the PIAT videos that you made? They were very helpful overall, but the changes that have happened since then seem to have thrown off some of the best practices mentioned in the video or changed where you'd find things so that following them could have potential consequences.
Hopefully we'll hear some good news!
Thanks,
Johnathan
Hello TBG IT,
For current and previous ITMS release documentation, you can refer to the following article -
https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/articles/it-management-suite-documentation
Ankit Shrivastava
Well! I'd heard rumors, so I came to look, and HOWTO85100 has been taken down! Translation: no more official support for PE 4 in 7.1. That was unexpected, but not a huge surprise. It would be helpful for those who had used it before to actually get an explanation in the KB instead of "just use 7.5" but that's OK.
So I'll take an educated guess. I'm not an employee anymore so this IS just a guess, but it's pretty well educated since I left not long ago.
The "official" support was being provided by the Support team only. That is, we had to promise to support it, but didn't have any dev support behind us. At some point since I left, I'm guessing the weight of carrying that in the Support team became too much. Consider as well that DS 7.1 is now in the EOL cycle, and how important it is to FIX problems, and you get a difficult thing to support.
SOOOO, my friends, here's what my video, then cancelled, was going to suggest. No videos planned at this time.
Done. Well, sort of.
IF you want to add in the PECTAgent stuff, then, uh, well, the easiest way to do that is to read the bootwiz.log file that is created when BootWiz runs. In 7.5 it's on by default, but I think you have to turn it on in 7.1. This will tell you what it actually does. You'll see, for instance, that it launches DISM to inject the drivers it has and... well, other things. Follow it's example and you'll get the PECTAgent in your WIM, but manually.
I'll bet you could script it... huh...
Anyway, that's the JIST of what I was planning on doing, and now wish I had. <sigh> Oh well. Drama Drama Drama!!
If anyone has the files needed to add WinPE 4 to DS 7.1 (as per HOWTO85100), I'd appreciate it. I've tried every username/passoword combo in TECH66995 as instructed, but they either don't work or it says the destination no longer exists.
Anyone have the x64 version of this zip anywhere?
Thanks.
Hello Thomas,
Thank you very much for these videos. It is really helping me learn the product better. Looking forward to more such good stuffs from you.
Thank you once again.
Raju.
OK - I am now actively working on new content for 7.5. Having some technical issues, but you'll see new content posted soon. I'll probably start a new page and put a link to it in this one.
Sorry everyone for not updating this for 7.5. Time is of the essence, and mine ran out.
I did however put together (start) the Recommended Reading List for 7.5 which is as far as I was able to get prior to leaving Symantec. WHEN I get the time, I'll make a new series for 7.5 as well - I hope. We'll see, right? LOL
Thanks!!
Mkoka,
Thank you for the link. I took a look at it and it did confirm my suspicions that PXE configuration was moved to NBS. However, I have now found a new problem that I am creating a new discussion for.
Thanks for the link though.
Not sure if this would suffice your needs as it does not have links to any videos :
However do take a look at the following article , you may find it useful
http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO92284 :
Regards,
Mkoka.
Is there any updated documentation for 7.5? I am trying to follow this series for testing 7.5 and some significant changes have occurred such as the lack of a PXE configuration menu under Deployment and Migration settings.
Thanks!
The title the KB HOWTO85100 " Adding UEFI and WinPE 4.x support to Deployment Solution 7.1 "
seems proposing a compatibility with ADK 8.1, but all talk about 8.0.
Is it official support from Symantec being able to replace ADK 8.0 with 8.1 ?
I am looking at the video at this time.
Can you direct me to any video about installation?
I will try to build a new box when Altiris 7.5 is available.
We are still using 6.9
Tu
Tu Vu, if you will post a question with details of the problems you are having in this forum http://www.symantec.com/connect/endpoint-management/forums/altiris-deployment-suite someone may be able to help you there.
Thanks, Cheryl
We have problem to deploy Altiris 7.1 with Windows 7.
Is there anyone successfully deploy Altiris 7.1?
Good work
Very much appreciated :) Keep it comming!!!