It looks like we tried to push out some update before the worl did _not_ end :D.

File name: symantec.pl.xml
File hash: f66d34f93a3b240f0fa2f908428051b4
File date: 2012-12-20 10:31
File size: 13,727,806 bytes (~14MB)
Release date: 2012-12-21

Additional information:

• ProductListing definitionName="symantec_v2" majorVersion="7" minorVersion="1" buildVersion="11"
• Some changes occured in the package tree, as shown below with some prunning being done and Service Desk 7.5.1 being added

--- tree-737a531d1c28c34bd7b73f14e0633578.txt	2013-01-02 12:09:19.000000000 +0100
+++ tree-f66d34f93a3b240f0fa2f908428051b4.txt	2013-01-02 12:12:01.000000000 +0100
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-tree-737a531d1c28c34bd7b73f14e0633578/
+tree-f66d34f93a3b240f0fa2f908428051b4...

At the last couple of Symantec Endpoint Management User Group meetings I talked about a couple of things that can be done to improve the performance of your Symantec Management Platform.  I figured it would be best to summarize them in the group itself:

1. The first one I mentioned had to do with changing the Kerberos authentication order in the IIS website from Negotiate > NTLM to NTLM > Negotiate
   http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH156006
    
2. The second we just ran across this week.  Our 16 core, 24gb RAM SQL server was running a constant 80-90% CPU utilization and we were experiencing frequent deadlocks.  On Sunday, a deadlock/blocking situation corrupted our PMImport and broke Patch.  Very bad things happened.

   In any event, we found that the SQL Tuning guide had been updated by...

If you can imaging a picture of Mount Ranier on a cloudy day. The towering structure is only partialy revealed, clouds camouflage the snow covered cap. leaving one a guess at what could be under the blanket.

We have alot of items to migrate ahead, including:

1. A DS structure with about 300 packages vendor command lines and MSI built from Wise.
2. An HII image in Windwos XP that has not changed since 2009.
3. Wise to Admin Studio conversion.
4. Windows 7 image.
5. App Metering to block apps(If the header reading is better than version 6)
6. Exploring virtual applications with Workspace Streaming.
7. Mac OS image and software deployment.
8. Symantec MDM.
9. Customize console and training for the Desktop and service desk groups.

Should be a...

I completed some refactoring and aggregated the 2 related Patch Automation projects [1][2] in the last week and so I can call the 2 programs a toolkit :D.

Some features from the changes are only code related (sharing code between the projects) but there's a major addition to both project: custom patch exclusion.

This is implemented via the database, and it leaves plenty of room for you to choose which bulletins are excluded. The code is written to exclude bulletin by name, from the content of a table or view named "PatchAutomation_Excluded".

And here is a sample implementation, that will prevent duplicate entries in the table and will give some added information (a timestamp when a new exclusion is added):

if exists (select name from sys.objects where type = 'U' and name = 'PatchAutomation_Excluded')
	drop table PatchAutomation_Excluded

create table PatchAutomation_Excluded (
	_id int...