Tech Tips, Deployment & Migration

A few weeks back I needed to figure out how to add some computers to our domain. I did not want to go to every computer. There are a couple of ways to add a computer to the domain. The first is a VBS script. I am not sure where I found this script, but here it is:

I work at a college, and there is a need to have students who are registering or applying to our school to use computers. The problem is that they usually don't have a user name or password. In the past we created an account they could use to log in to a computer, but we discovered that everyone ended up knowing the user name and password. It became a security risk.

There are several different ways to update Windows computers. Most people use Windows Updates. That doesn't work well in a corporate environment, especially if you need to make sure that the computers get updated. Another useful way to update your computers is to use Altiris Patch Management. There have been a few great articles on Patch Management lately:

Resetting a local user account on one or more computers on your network, whether they are in a domain or workgroup, using Altiris Deployment Solution is very simple.

Making use of Micrsoft's commands to create a script that will do this for you.

If you’re planning to use ianatkin’s suggestion of “MS-DOS as a PXE Automation Option”, you use Emulex Fibre Cards, and you would you like to configure them remotely, this is the program you need, DosLpCfg from Emulex.

DosLpCfg is for use with MS-DOS, FreeDOS, IBM PC DOS and DR DOS operating systems.

Do you use Emulex Fibre Cards? Would you like to configure them in Winpe? Then the program you need is WinLpCfg from Emulex.

WinLpCfg is for use with 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the Microsoft WinPE operating system. (Although not the intended use, you can use WinLpCfg with Windows Server 2003)

I have installed Task Server on three Deployment Servers without a reboot and on all of them deployment web console stopped working, normal deployment console was fine.

After looking at IIS I found that task server installation process has stopped IIS service and never started it.

If you do an Unattended install of 2k8 or Vista and it does not finish as you expected it or if you just want to know what went on while it installed, look for these log files.

There are a few ways to have a batch script wait for a number of seconds. The simplest and most widely available without any additional programs is to use the ping command.