Client Management Suite

Can anyone offer suggestions for the best way to upgrade users with flash 10 to flash 11 (patch management won't do it).

I have a flash 11 package and I thought the only way to push it out would be a managed software policy that ran every X hours that basically checked in Flash 11 was installed and if not, install it.  I was thinking I'd let that run for a week or 2 and turn it off or at least change frequency to much less often.  

I left it on for about a week and got maybe 80% of our clients.  It seemed after a week those other 20% of clients are clients that are mostly powered off and it seems like a waste to be running the managed policy for the 80% that already got it over and over.

Support from another case just mentioned I could schedule a job and it would run the next time the computer comes on (I had thought if a computer wasn't on at scheduled time it would fail).  So is this a better way to do the install?

If so, any tips for scoping to computers with 10.x installed?  If I go to managed software, I have made all of our different versions of flash 'managed' so I can see we have about 13 different variations of flash 10 installed.  Is there any way to group them somehow to all to be considered 'flash 10' and then scope to that whole group at once?

For now I started creating 'installed software' filters for each of the 13 variations - was wondering if there's a better way?

Thanks.

What's your Detection Rule?  I'd suggest creating something like the following for Flash in IE:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Adobe Flash Player ActiveX

VersionMajor >11

VersionMajor <12

VersionMinor >= 1

Then I would define your Filter as so:

That's one of the benefits of Policy based management, it keeps your machines in a known state.

Another way of doing what mclemson proposes is to right-click on the Software Resource > Actions > Create Installed Software Filter. Then exclude that Filter from the Target of your install policy.

Make sure you have an Applicability Rule similar to mclemson's Detection Rule that stops the policy from applying if a newer version of Flash is installed.

Thank you both for the quick replies.  This is my first stab at building a customized msi installer and pushing it through altiris so I'm learning a lot as I go. 

That filter makes a lot of sense now that I see it.  Thanks.

As for my detection rule, I just have in the drop down box the package I created (screenshot).  This seemed to work in that at least if user had it installed, it wasn't reinstalled over and over.  Is this only good for me for now because the next version of flash 11.x hasn't come out yet?

When I look at registry on a machine with package installed I see a GUID matching Flash 11 with Version Major and Version Minor (screenshot).

If I change the MSD policy to be applied just to the 10.x Filter, do I still need to worry about applicability rule?

I'm not really sure how to build the applicability rule if so.  If I build an applicability rule something like this, would that work?  I'm thinking it wouldn't because if someone updated their flash, would the GUID key be different?  

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\adobeflash11guid

VersionMajor < 11

thank you again!

It's just good practice. 

You'll have to create filters for each version of Flash 10 that you have, if you use the Detection and Applicability rules you can just "set and forget" the Policy. And what about machines that have 8 or 9?

The Detection rule you are using looks like a built in one from Patch Management, I think the latest version of Patch no longer uses Detection rules so newer rules won't be available.

The built-in rule is MSI, so if the product is upgraded even a little bit, the MSI product code will be different and you'll reinstall an older version.  You should create a new detection rule using the registry keys I specified above.  Let me know if you need steps on this.

If you're using that filter for the target, won't that attempt to install on everything that had v10 until a new full inventory is sent in?  More to the point, why not just use the All Computers filter and let the detection rule figure it out?

If you wouldn't mind posting the steps, I'd appreciate it.  I understand the general idea - but did I miss the boat this time because I didn't build in the proper registry key in the package for Adobe 11?

Seems like the delta software inventory (which we do daily) would get them out of the filter.  

We could (and prevoiusly did) scope to all computers - I'd just rather not have another policy going on if I don't have to.  

We have some issues with imaging and software delivery post imaging, so having less going on is ideal for me right now (and Flash is updated on the image so they don't need this managed delivery).