Endpoint Protection

I've had a little dig around, but can't seem to find an article, that shows you how to export the polciy settings, to say a text file.

I see you can export the policy as a dat - to be imported into anotehr SEPM environment, but can you get a list of the settings?  Or is there a DAT viewer?  DAT > TXT converter?  Or will it all be junk I get back?

Is it possible to do such a thing - trying to make document writing a bit easier for myself and don;t want to plaster the document with screen dumps :-)

Thank You kind people.

Hi,

You can export the policies to dat files. That is correct. But there is no public tool from symantec to view these files.
You can however, download any third-party tools and try it yourself.

Aniket

You can download any tool to view the dat files from the internet and achieve the objective.

The policy files are XML files. The are not designed to be user-readable. Depending on the type and complexity of the policy, it may or may not make any sense when you view it with a text editor.

If you must view the policy file, here are the steps.
1) Rename the .dat file to .zip file.
2) Expact your new .zip file.
3) Find the .XML file that has been extracted.

NOTE: I would NOT recommend trying to import the .xml file back into SEPM after you have extracted it.

I've got you.

Thanks a lot for the replies.

Would this work for Importing a policy into the client ?

Hi, if you want to import a policy into the client, you can't use the exported, and then extracted, main.xml file.
However, the server does generate files that you can import into clients, but it's not the type described earlier.

What I previously explanined was how to view the XML of a "Policy". What you actually import into clients is technically called a "Profile", but the terms are often used interchangable. The difference between a "policy" and a "profile" is that "policies" are rules for a specific feature or compontent. A profile, on the other hand, is a compiled collection of all the policies.

To get a profile, you can do the following.
1) On the SEPM console, browse to the group who's policy you want.
2) Note the first for letters of the policy number, you can also look under the details tab and get the whole group ID if you wish.
3) Browse to %SEPM Install Dir%\data\outbox\agents\
4) Search for the folder that starts with the same 4 letters of the policy number.
5) Open the folder and copy the "Profile.xml" to a convenient location.
6) On the client, run the command "smc -importconfig <Location of Profile.xml>". Example:

smc -importconfig c:\Profile.xml

There is another feature called "3rd Party Management". I don't remember all the details off the top of my head, but what it does is create an "inbox" folder on the client. You can then take the Profile.dax and Profile.sig files (generated in the same location as the Profile.xml) and copy them to the clients inbox. The client would then import the files automatically. This allows you to manage the client using any software of your choose, or even a custom made script.

So that is your two main options for importing policies (technically "profiles") into a client.

P.S. The *.DAX files in the outbox\agents\ folder are different from the exported policy .DAT files. You cannot change a .DAX profile to .ZIP and extract it.