On Tue, Apr 22, 2008 at 11:38 PM, Jerry Adams <jerry@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
By massive I mean that there are going to be about 30-40 PC's purchased
and installed from ground zero. The questions du jour relate to Client
Access.
Okay - this is primarily a windows centric question. Deploying
Software on Microsoft Windows is not an easy task, but it's doable.
First, you'll need to decide on how you want to implement this.
Basically, there are three choices: image deployment, software
deployment or the combined variant (which is used most).
For software deployment, you'll need a software deployment solution
that integrates with your network. There are many choices available
from a huge variety of vendors. We are using Microsoft's System Center
Configuration Manager which is probably better known under the
previous name "SMS". You'll need to package the application you're
trying to use specifically or read it's deployment guides. Using SCCM,
you can completely automate the deployment of the application. Be
aware that this requires quite a lot of Windows and iSeries Access
knowledge - if you do not have the time to learn this knowledge it
might make sense to bring in some outside help.
For image deployment, you install and preconfigure the Software on a
master machine, and then deploy the image. Microsoft offers several
tools for this that are free of additional charge. MDT 2008, the
Microsoft Deployment Toolkit was just released:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=3bd8561f-77ac-4400-a0c1-fe871c461a89&displaylang=en
With MDT, you can easily customize Images and Deploy them using WDS.
Ideally, you combine the image and software deployment approach. A
stable base image is deployed using MDT, and then maintained up to
date using SCCM.
Note that there are many alternative vendors other than Microsoft that
can help you with Software deployment. Altiris/Symantec has offerings,
Novell does, etc. pp.
Last but not least, you can manually install software. That does not
scale and will yield problems as soon as you need to implement
changes. So start with a managed solution now - with fresh machines,
this is an easy task.
midrange.com
