Client Management Suite

Hello,

I am trying to figure out how to remove a computer from all software collections in DS. (6.9) To explain a little more, let's say we have several static software collections that we manually assign computers to. If a machine is associated to let's say 15 of these collections, the only way I know how to remove that computer from those collections is to go into each collection and remove it manually. Which can be a pain when reassigning a computer to a different user.

Is there an easier way to do this based on this setup?

Instead of removing computer from all collections, can we transfer said collections from one computer to another? Example: A machine is up for lease, needs to go back, new computer comes in, I want new computer to be quickly associated with the app collections from old computer...

An SQL query could remove all instances of the computername from the DB, then delete computer could solve the first part of this. (thanks @esop)

Hi Canuck,

If you assign a new GUID to the Altiris Agent, it would then have no links to the collections that it was previously in, since it is being tracked in the collections by the previous GUID. You could use the AeXAgentUtil.exe option for resetting the GUID, among other ways.

I will try that out, and i guess completely nuking it from NS would do the trick as well.

The thing that I would be more interested in is transferring those computer collections to a new computer\GUID when the old one gets retired. Would involve some SQL i'm sure as there does not seem to be any sort of automated process. I just don't know where to start.

Hmm. I've never researched it before. But, I wonder if you could re-use the guid of the old computer. Maybe have a script take the guid of the old computer and insert it into the registry of the new one?

On paper that sounds like it would work, but i am sure there is more that goes on behind the scenes when the are two exact GUID's in Altiris with two different computers. I don't know that though. We'll try it out in the test environment. Basically going to go in the Registry and replace the GUID ID with the old computer. Thanks for the idea.

If anyone else is reading, has anyone tried this, have any luck?

Sounds good. Let us know how it works. I suppose when you replace the guid you should re-run all the inventory so that old hardware info, etc. is up-to-date. I don't know what other potential issues there could be though.

One idea I had for you is to consolidate your collections so that instead of a computer being added manually to so many individually, maybe you could have a more role-based approach. In our setup we have collections for deploying software and we link the tasks for each software install needed to ONE collection that will be used for that specific area within the organization. That way a computer is only added in one spot. Not sure if that's a comparable scenario for you though.

The GUID's are not re-used in NS, even if you "nuke" it.  There is a "Deleted Items" collection and your GUID is still there.  May I suggest that the road this thread is taking would be a rather dangerous one?  True, it might work, but I'd think there's a FAR better way!

1) The suggestion from George is a good one.  Static collections are a bit awkward anyway and cause messes down the road.  It's far easier to make things based on some kind of inventory or OU or something like that so that all you have to do is change a setting on the computer and bam - it's in all the right collections.

2) Since the collections a computer is assigned to shows up in Resource Explorer, it IS possible to essentially "clone" a set of collections from one computer to another.

Sort of.

Many of the collections a computer belongs to are dynamic, and you'd not be able to clone these - or rather, PLEASE don't do that.  You'll make a huge mess of things if you do.

However, for your static collections, it wouldn't be too hard to build some SQL around those.  ItemReference I believe is where you look for the linking between computers and their collections.  I'd have to dig a bit more to really find it, and then you'd have to put in some sort of ... filter to determine if it's one of the ones you made vs one of the ones that are truly dynamic, but it's doable.  I've done thigns "like" this before.

If you can't find the tables, let us know.  My guess is someone here has those memorized, but I'm not "quite" that good.  Yet.  ;-)