Ghost Solution Suite

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  • 1.  Initiating Tasks in DOS on Client

    Posted Jun 08, 2007 03:33 PM
    Here is what I want to do, but I can't figure out how:
    1. Put a boot floppy in any machine in our domain (this may or may not be a client that has been discovered by the console).
    2. The batch file on the floppy should boot to MS-DOS and initiate a task on the ghost server.
    3. The client should download the image with very little interactment from the administrator other than password and selecting correct image file, etc.

    We have the Ghost Solution Suite 1.1.  I don't want to have to start the task on the server first or use Windows at all.  Ghostsrv.exe and ngctw32 will not run in DOS mode.  Can anyone help?



  • 2.  RE: Initiating Tasks in DOS on Client

    Posted Jun 08, 2007 03:43 PM
    I do not know of a way for the DOS client to do anything like that.  What the client does is basically "Ping" the server periodically to see if their is a task to be performed.   Additionally I do not think you can make a floppy with nic drivers AND ghost.exe as the size of ghost is much larger than long ago and it doesnt compress at all.  You might have better luck making a boot CD/PXE or USB drive that connects to a "static" ghostcast session.


  • 3.  RE: Initiating Tasks in DOS on Client

    Posted Jun 08, 2007 04:12 PM
    Okay, I set up a service that automatically starts the ghostsrv.exe file if the machine gets rebooted by using this article:  http://support.microsoft.com/kb/137890.
     
    Now, how do I set the boot disk to open a session??


  • 4.  RE: Initiating Tasks in DOS on Client

    Posted Jun 08, 2007 04:18 PM
    You will need to become a bit familiar with the ghost command line arguments.  It is difficult to know what to tell you to do without knowing what you are trying to do.
     
    For example, a disk clone command line might be would be:
     
    ghost.exe -clone,mode=restore,src=@mcSESSIONNAME,dst=1 -batch -auto
     
    where SESSIONNAME needs to match the name you gave the ghostcast server.
     
    This assumes you are just putting an image back on to a machine that came from the machine and you arent trying to rename it or set a domain membership up etc...
     
    More ghost arguments reference:
     
    Also,  for your service, have you confirmed that it is up and running?  You can do an nbtstat -n on the server to view the names on the network for that host.  The ghostcast session name should be among them.  Alternatively you can choose the "Interact with desktop" option if you are running the service as system and then you can actually see the session window up and running on the desktop.

    Message Edited by David.Poprik on 06-08-200701:21 PM



  • 5.  RE: Initiating Tasks in DOS on Client

    Posted Jun 08, 2007 04:39 PM
    Well, I basically want to initiate a session with the ghostcast server while at the client.  I want to open the session, connect to it and download the image all from the boot disk(s).


  • 6.  RE: Initiating Tasks in DOS on Client

    Posted Jun 08, 2007 05:00 PM
    As I said in my first response, I do not know of any way to "initiate a session" from the DOS client.  It does not communicate with the console to give it commands.
     
    My suggestion was to make a static ghostcast server that is always running as you have via srvany.exe  From your client then you can initiate a connection to the ghostcast server via your boot device via the network. 
     
    One hitch, you will have this session up and running, once you connect and use it then it will be occupied until the session ends and restarts (assumed you used the restart switch).  So no clients can connect once the session joins.  Again, through switches you can control behavious such as how many clients to wait for and/or a timeout to wait to elapse from when the last client joins before the ghostcast server begins.
     
    What I meant by not knowing what to tell you to do was in reference to your image and restoration of it.  ie... is it a full disk restore, a partition restore... do you want to name the computer etc... etc...
     
    Out for the weekend.....


  • 7.  RE: Initiating Tasks in DOS on Client

    Posted Jun 12, 2007 01:48 AM
    Hi Jaime,

    What I understand from your post is that you are not running Console, but want to run GhostCast server and just re-image the machines. In this way, you do not expect Ghost to handle the Configuration of the new machine such as Computer name changes.

    Thinking about the floppy is not the best thing now a days, since executables like Ghost.exe are too large to fit in to a single floppy. If you chose to use floppies, you need to wait longer to boot, and use multiple floppy disks. You can consider booting from CD or USB flash drives. Ghost Boot Wizard supports creating them.

    If you are imaging one machine at a time, there is no major advantage of useing GhostCast server, since multicasting is really beneficial when using more than one machine at a time (there are other advantages such as easy authentication etc.). If you do not want to use GhostCast server, you can create a drive mapping boot disk and map a share in your image repository. Then run Ghost using GUI or with command line and select the image since you wanted to do it manually.

    One other thing you can consider is using WinPE. With Ghost32.exe you can image machines after booting to WinPE. This will take away the hassle of finding correct DOS driver etc.

    Krish