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Symantec Software Management 7.5 Troubleshooting and Best Practices: Part 2, Managing Software Products 

Apr 22, 2015 10:55 AM

Managing Software Products
   Reviewing Known Products
   Creating Software Products \ Identify Inventory
      Software Inventory
   Application Metering, Usage
      Enable usage tracking option for the managed software product installed with an MSI-based installer
      Enable usage tracking option for the managed software product at the component/version level
      Enable usage tracking option for the managed software product at the product level
   Troubleshooting
      Software Components Missing
      Application Metering Finding the Right EXE

Managing Software Products

The emphasis on Software Components in 7.0 created some logistical or management nightmares when it came to tracking what software was out in the environment. By taking a step back to the Product level, most of these issues have been made moot. Software Components, whether captured during Inventory or created manually by an administrator, will now by manually or dynamically assigned to a Product. This removes any need to reconcile duplicate resources as the Product rules will automatically assign them to the correct Product.

Reviewing known Products

You can view Products under the Resources screens. The following provides the full steps of how to review Software Products:

  1. To view what Products are available, in the Symantec Management Console browse under Manage > All Resources > and select the "Default" node. The following steps will add the category if it is not already available in the tree list.
  2. In the right pane click the Filter... button.
  3. In the list, find the entry for Software Product and ensure it is checked, as shown in this screenshot:

    01_9_0.png

  4. Click OK to add the category.
  5. In the resulting left-hand tree, browse under Default > All Resources > and select Software Product.
  6. You can now search through what Software Products are available.

Note that you cannot edit Products from this location. You can open Resource Manager, which will give you additional information than what is displayed in the grid. Products can be created and managed through Asset Management, or through the Software Catalog. Since not everyone will necessarily have Asset, I will focus on the Software Catalog.

To access the Software Catalog, in the Symantec Management Console browse under Manage > and select the Software Catalog. This will load the Catalog interface as a pop up window. Note that all active Products will be shown in the upper right pane, as shown in this screenshot:

02_8.png

From here you can assign, create, or edit Software Products using a simple UI provided by the Software Management Framework. However in 7.1 SP1 this field has been removed, which pushes you to use the Silverlight Catalog area for assigning, editing, and creating Software Products. This ensures the correct method and details are used/provided.

03_8_0.png

First, you can search for existing Software Products using the search field.

image001_14_0_0.png

You will notice that not all Software Products are shown in this list. Only manageable Software Products will show. For a Product to be managed it needs to be associated with a Software Component.

I wanted to point out that there is a significant change in the edit mode for a Software Resource between 7.1 and 7.1 SP1. This was in an attempt to let the NS automatically manage discovered Software Products. This ensures that the assignment is done correctly. As previously shown, in 7.1 you had the ability to manipulate the Product directly from the Software Resource Edit/Creation screen. Now you must use the new UI.

Creating Software Products \ Identify Inventory

The Identify Inventory section provides you the filtering and parameters of what software will be included in the product. Each field will limit what is shown, so you must work through the values reported by inventory to find the optimized parameters. For example by putting 10.5, you will not include versions 10.4 or 10.6, only 10.5. If you want all 10 versions to be in the filter, only put version 10 in. The same goes for the Name and Company, so as you go through the steps below, be aware of the limiting function of any values put into the fields.

To create a Software Product, follow these steps. These steps can also be observed when editing a Software Product.

  1. In the Symantec Management Console browse under Manage > and select Software Catalog.
  2. When the Manage Software Catalog window appears, click on the Add Product button.
  3. The top section of the dialog is for labeling and identification purposes. It will not be used when calculating or auto-assigning Software Components to the Product. Provide your Product's details, as shown for an example in this screenshot:

    04_8_0.png

  4. Provide one or more values in the provided three fields. This will automatically search for Software Components that match the criteria, as shown in this example:

    05_8_0.png

  5. Note that it found one match based off the criteria I provided.
  6. Check the box "Include components associated with other products" to ensure you are not missing components based on previous associations (whether made manually or automatically).
  7. You should fine-tune the values so it includes, and excludes, the software resources you want. Review these examples:
    a. In the above example, if I only wanted the ActiveX components and not the actual flash player, I could change the Software name to: Adobe Flash Player 10 ActiveX.
    b. If I only wanted the 10.2 versions of the ActiveX to be associated here, I would change the Version value to 10.2, thus excluding any other 10.x versions.
    c. If Adobe had a release of this software that had a misspelling in the Company name (i.e. Addobe) I could remove the Company designation altogether, if I trust the other two criteria/values.
  8. Click OK to make the change.
  9. Note that the associations will be made immediately for the software that shows up in the lower list. When new software comes in that matches the criteria, the association is made during the following Scheduled Task:
    a. NS.Nightly schedule to associate Software components to software product...
  10. Done!

Additional information on using the Identify Inventory filter fields:
Quotation marks limit your search to an exact match.
• "Adobe Acrobat" = EXACTMATCHAdobe Acrobat.

Omitting quotation marks allows for matching search text anywhere in a string.
• Adobe Acrobat = LIKE Adobe Acrobat anywhere in the name.

You can use the following search operators to express various arguments:

OR
Use the Pipe ( | ) sign
This operator does not require leading spaces.
Adobe|Microsoft= software manufacturer LIKE Adobe ORLIKE Microsoft

AND
Use the Plus ( + ) sign
This operator requires a leading space.
Adobe+Microsoft= software manufacturer LIKE Adobe AND Microsoft

NOT
Use the Minus ( - ) sign
This operator requires a leading space.
-Adobe -Microsoft = software manufacturer NOT LIKE Adobe and NOT LIKE Microsoft

Once you have made the associations you are done as far as assigning Products go.

image001_14_0_0.png

NOTE: It has been noted that only certain Products are displayed in this user interface. If a Product does not show up, it can only be modified if Asset is installed. If it doesn't show in the list, it does not have enough criteria and a new one should be generated.

Software Inventory

You may have noticed that in the Software Catalog Add Product interface the default tab is Identify inventory. The Inventory that this ties into is the Software Discovery module. This is captured during the Software Inventory Policies. The specific option within the Inventory Policy interface is shown in the screenshot below, namely Software - Windows Add/Remove Programs and UNIX/Linux/Mac software packages:

06_6_0.png

This is the process that provides the Inventory needed to make the associations between Software Components and Products.

Application Metering, Usage

The second tab in the Product field is for Application Metering or product usage. Follow these steps to enable this tracking based on the Inventory done:

Enable usage tracking option for the managed software product installed with an MSI-based installer

  1. On the Meter / track usage tab, you can see that the Inventory Solution has already performed its 2-step software identification process. At least one software component in the software product has the association with a proper key program file under Programs. You need only to check Turn on metering / usage tracking for this software product.

    07_6_0.png

  2. In the Count software as used if run in the last ... days box, type the number of days that meets your needs. Standard monitoring is for 90 days.

    08_5.png

  3. Click OK.

    09_5.png

Enable usage tracking option for the managed software product at the component/version level

  1. On the Meter / track usage tab, locate the software component that you want to meter and click Add Program.

    10_7.png

  2. In the Add Program dialog box, perform the following steps:
    1. Under Available programs, type in the name of the program file to filter the results.
    2. Select the correct program file and version from the Available programs list.
    3. Click the arrow to move the selected program file to the Associated programs list.
    4. Click OK.
     

    11_6_0.png

  3. On the Meter / track usage tab, check Turn on metering / usage tracking for this software product.

    12_7.png

  4. In the Count software as used if run in the last ... days box, type the number of days that meets your needs. Standard monitoring is for 90 days.

    08_5.png

  5. Click OK.

    09_5.png

Enable usage tracking option for the managed software product at the product level

  1. On the Meter / track usage tab, locate the software component that you want to meter and click Add Program.

    13_6_0.png

  2. On the resulting window, locate the executable which is associated with this software component. In the Add Program dialog box, perform the following steps:
    1. Under Available programs, type in the name of the program file to filter the results.
    2. View all available program files that can be associated with the software component.

    14_5.png

  3. Because in this method we track usage at the product level, select all correct program files with all versions that you want to associate with the product version. In this case, all 9.x.x versions should be selected and associated as the product has version 9 in the Software Catalog. Use the arrow to move each selected program file to the Associated programs list. Click OK.

    15_5.png

  4. On the Meter / track usage tab, you can see that only one component has associations with program files.

    16_5.png

  5. This method lets you track usage of all the software components that are associated with the software product as long as at least one component has associations with all the correct versions of program files for the product version.

    17_5_0.png

  6. In the Count software as used if run in the last ... days box, type the number of days that meets your needs. Standard monitoring is for 90 days.

    08_5.png

  7. Click OK.

    09_5.png

Troubleshooting

This section covers troubleshooting for the Software Products and functions surrounding it.

Software Components Missing

In the Inventory tab known software components are not showing in the list when they should be. The criteria matches for them to be included, but they do not show up.

Possible resolutions:

  1. Check the box "Include components associated with other products" to ensure you are not missing components based on previous associations (whether made manually or automatically.
  2. The component is considered "Hidden".
    a. We key off of the following registry key:
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\{053ACA98-6B07-4DD0-9DB3-F51E3EB1780C} (GUID will differ based on MSI Product code)
    VALUE: SystemComponent = anything not 0. Typically Windows will reserve this for OS related updates, and we filter these by default.
    b. Our value where we pick this up is in the dataclass:
    Inv_AddRemoveProgram - Column Hidden = 1.
    c. A background task will look for this and set the Inv_Software_Component_State column IsManaged to 0. This filters the software from the view.
    d. The best solution is to find out why the install is setting that key, and if it has been repackaged, change it so it does not set the SystemComponent registry key to anything other than 0.
  3. The component does not contain Inventory. Any component that does not have inventory from at least one computer will not show up in the list. This includes components that once had inventory but no longer do. Also software releases created by Admins to roll software out may not have inventory relating to it, and may have a separate inventory-based component that the clients are reporting to.

Application Metering Finding the Right EXE

MSI based imports of Software Resources, and the inventory from MSI based installs are the easiest for us to automatically make EXE references for Application Metering to use. If this is not an option, it is best to include as many of the EXEs that we know about. Use this process to implement:

  1. Edit the Software Resource (double-click or right-click, Actions > Edit Software Resource).
  2. Under the file Inventory tab, click the Add button.
  3. Click the Add dropdown button and select Server File...
    18_5_0.png
  4. Search for the file name. Use multi-select to select all of them. Note that these files are files that have been captured by Inventory, so should include all files of that name in your environment, at least from managed systems.
  5. In this view you cannot select a version, but after you add all the files and click OK, you can see the size, as shown here:

    19_5.png

  6. If in doubt, add them all. We will be able to select which ones to use later.
  7. Click OK to save the changes to the Software Resource.
  8. Now go into the Software Product you wish to use (that contains the Software Component you edited). This can be done under Managed > Software Catalog.
  9. Under the Metering tab, click on the Add Program link. The resulting window will show you the files you added, including the version (if applicable).

    20_5_0.png

  10. Add the files you need and click OK. These files will now be tracked as part of Usage Tracking.

Symantec Software Management 7.5 Troubleshooting and Best Practices: Part 1
Symantec Software Management 7.5 Troubleshooting and Best Practices: Part 3
Symantec Software Management 7.5 Troubleshooting and Best Practices: Part 4
Symantec Software Management 7.5 Troubleshooting and Best Practices: Part 5
Symantec Software Management 7.5 Troubleshooting and Best Practices: Part 6
Symantec Software Management 7.5 Troubleshooting and Best Practices: Part 7

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