Deployment Solution

Hi,

We're running:

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition SP2
Deployment Solution 6.9 SP1
SQL 2005 SP2 (remote - eXpress DB in it's own instance)

All was running okay until a couple of days ago when the Console would no longer open.. It appears it's not database related as I can open and use the Web Console without any issue.

When I try and launch the DS Console ("D:\Program Files\Altiris\eXpress\Deployment Server\eXpress.exe") there is nothing launched but I can see the eXpress.exe process running and utilizing CPU cycles.

I'm thinking it might be .NET Framework related? Any other ideas on log's I can investigate etc?

update: I've repaired .Net Framework 1.1 and still experiencing the issue...

Thanks!

I'm assuming that you've rebooted? Have any updates been installed recently (between the last time the console worked and when it stopped working)?

Can you run the console from another machine? You should be able to install the console to a machine like your workstation. If that doesn't work, then there could be something wrong with your installation and you might want to back up your database and repair/reload the DS.

yep - have rebooted, this is a client I'm consulting to so my knowledge of their network is somewhat limited but as far as I can tell no updates have been applied and to my knowledge no changes have been made (although it's quite obvious someone/something has changed something as all was working okay..)

I've tried installing the console on another machine and am still experiencing the same issue.. still finding it very strange that the web console works okay..

The server this is running on has been generating altiris PXE server errors (amongst others) for some time so I'm thinking a backup / rebuild & reinstall is in order.. I've already removed and reinstalled DS for them a month or two back and the errors are still being generated intermittently so I'm pretty sure there's some underlying OS configuration issues..

any other tips/ideas before a full rebuild?

As far as the PXE server errors, I get them every so often and have just learned to live with them. I've set the service to restart itself on failure. I'm not sure if the DS setup allows for this or not, but you might try doing a repair, or reinstalling over top. Sounds as if the Express.exe is corrupt or one of the support files is. As you said the database appears to be ok.

I've already tried reinstalling, the console will connect for about 10 minutes then go offline again.. same result if you try and reinstall..

with that I'm pretty sure it's OS related so will begin the rebuild of the server today and see how that goes..

When rebuilding, you might keep track of any and all updates, so that if it happens again, you can compare.

thanks .. yeah I've got a standard build document which I use, the server was initially built by a different consulting firm and it's been trouble since day one..

..these issues have been a walk in the park compared to some of the ones I hit on NS!