Deployment Solution

I'm trying to find out if, in Deployment Server 6.9 SP4, I can push a job (or folder of jobs) to a list of machines in a text file.  If this IS possible, can I have Altiris ignore machines that have already had the job executed or scheduled on it?

This is my first post here so I apologize if I didn't do it right.  I did search the forums for a solution that was already posted and found none... If it's out there, I'm sorry, and someone e-mail my boss and tell him these 12 hr days are killing me... ha!

Thanks in advance for any help!

The answer to the second question is for sure no.  This is what we have in Notification Server, dynamic filters that actually keep track of what's going on.  You don't get that in DS.  It does have the ability to keep trying for those that it failed on though, and in that way, it does ignore all those that succeeded.  Additionally, you can select those that didn't work, move them into a folder, and then execute the task on them a second time.

NS, truely, is better at this, but you can sort of fudge it in DS.

As for the text file execution thing - well, it could be done, but it's... interesting.  Can you give us perhaps a bit more information on how you get a text file you want to execute against?  Maybe there's a better way than what you're trying to do.

NS tends to be better at this as well BTW.  There are a LOT of external links in NS that DS doesn't have.  For instance, NS has connectors you can build to import from other solutions, products, and files (i.e. text/xls/csv/...) that will pull in data into filters or whatever you need.  DS isn't really designed for this.

What exactly are you trying to accomplish?  Can you be more specific, including where you got the text file?  That will help us answer your question.

OH!  And thanks for posting!!  Welcome!

Sorry, on review, I realized I answered incorrectly.  It'll be a challenge, but it's not simply "no".

:D

But managing your manual "collections" from a text file, as you 1st request for, is probably not the best Idea to manage them using DS 6.9.

Thomas is totally right this point, will be better using DS 7.x, as soon as being correctly finished from Symantec... :-(

It is a good topic for some reflexions, but the Symantec answer is already DS 7.1...

So can we workaround waiting for a final DS 7.x, using DS 6.9 ?

It is a good question: I should ask my DS 6.9 experts customers, Hubert, Jean-Marc, Christan B., Christan D. ???

Hi Thomas, sure we can with DS 6.9. :)

But this depending MBailey if your job can be trace from the inventory, or not. As you build the job, you can build the additional trace needing to build a such.

Inventory from DS 6.9 is very limited: can get firmware/hardware inventory (eg. bios versions), device inventory (device manager from Windows), and Add/remove software inventory.

So, in you job, add your own <MyEntry> in the "uninstall" Windows HKLM registry key (you can hide from add/remove windows display list), to add the entry of your job executed correctly. Do not forgot to add also a "get inventory" task after this.

After doing this: you can create a "condition" rule associated a job, or just display on the console the list of "computers not having <MyEntry> in add/remove".

So you can select & drag/drop all those "missing" computers to your job again.

You can also repeat this job daily, using a condition, to run only on missing computers !! That's it.

Please tell me If I answer correctly marking this a solution.

Enjoy DS 6.9, all the same end of life product to be replaced with DS 7.x. But I don't know if I will tell you "OK go", on the version 7.2 or 7.3, and which SP version, before we will get a "goal". But I am pretty sure Symantec will do the job, after a while... ;-)

from Jean-Marc: (I google translate for you)

Hello,

It's a good question and I'm already ask myself. That's something I have not implemented, but I've already used on a case by case. you are right it actually use the registry to maintain a database of scripts running on the PC.
It's simple because it takes is a registry key with a value like version of the script, once you master the command "reg query" "reg add" "reg delete" you can make scripts very relevant. After if you want a return on the DS you have to play with the ERRORLEVEL.
After that the rest of the DS .....
In total only for the use of any script should do "if exist" it avoids the blind scripts especially with DS.

Greetings.