Deployment Solution

When you want to add a virtual center server to the Altiris Deployment console, you previously would just need the hostname and authentication settings for the virtual center server. As long as you installed the Web Service component in Virtual Center 1.x everything worked just right.

The best way to install the Altiris AClient as part of the base imaging task, is to have the Deployment Server copy the most recent version of the AClient to the local drive, followed by a call from the Windows XP Cmdlines.txt file to run the installation.

This is a small script to change the Notification Server an Agent is pointing to remotely. It's a very basic script. There is not any error checking nor arguments that can be passed.

The size of the WinPE boot file looks scary when multiple clients are downloading it in a PXE boot. I have found a way to reduce the size of the boot.wim file to 33% less in size than the boot file that Boot Disk Creator creates and of course it downloads 33% faster. The end result should have a 110 Meg size WinPE boot file.

With the recent release of Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 3, Altiris administrators might be taking this opportunity to build a new base image for their environment. There are dozens of ways to build this base image and with more than a dozen documents circulating in the Altiris community related to creating Hardware Independent Images it can be frustrating to find all the information necessary in one document. The purpose of this document is to provide a step-by-step process that walks through every step necessary to build a Hardware Independent Image.

So the debate went through our office about what is the best pre-image environment... WinPE, BartPE, Linux or DOS. Consequently, we tried to do a complete analysis of many of the factors and determine what is really the fastest route to take. In the end, it all comes down to how quick we can get our imaging done and move on to other projects.

If you have been holding back on installing Office 2007, you will most likely be installing Office 2007 on a multitude of systems. If you have already created a distribution method for Office 2007, turn around, do not pass go, this document is not for you. If you have not undertaken this journey yet, hold on to your pants and continue reading. The goal of this document is to help you achieve a comfort level that will take you into the advanced features of creating a silent installation, without you having to step into the same pot holes as I did. Please comment on this document in order to make future documents even better.

A COM class is code which is capable of instantiating or creating an object, or multiple objects for that matter. These objects can have methods and properties which allow manipulation of the object and or its contents. An example COM object which could be used with everyday use is the "FileSystemObject". Instantiation of a "FileSystemObject" will allow you to manipulate the file system using methods and properties of the "FileSystemObject".

This is a great way to further optimize your 'post deployment' configuration of machines.