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The Grand Quest

I work at a University and we have something like 15 main softwares that are included on our "Gold" Windows 7 Images. After that there is a long tail orf probably another 40 or 50 softwares that are installed on only a handful (sometimes only 1) of machines.

I look forward to bothering all of you people quite often as I attempt to create a customized silent installer for as many of these titles as possible. :D

Currently I include as much software as possible on the Gold image, and then capture the .WIM for that system which is then included in a win7 Source CD which is deployed from the K1 with scripted installs.

Of course this doesn't work out for all of our needs, and so I end up created other custom scripted installs, or less frequently have installed the needed software as a post-installation task.

I would like to get to the point where I install most of the softwares as a post-installation task as it increases the ease in maintaining the software.

And thus ends this random brain-dump, thanks!


Comments

  • It looks like we're in very similar situations. I look forward to following your progress. We've finally gotten K2000 to behave and do scripted installations in a reasonable amount of time. We're just starting on scripted post installation tasks. - lan.pham 12 years ago
    • thanks! - muebel 12 years ago
  • muebel, I know where you're coming from. Our K1 inventory of a freshly imaged machine points over 190 apps installed.... our image is huge... education is a completely different ball game to corporate (in many circumstances). Look forward to helpin you out if you do ask any questions! - Roonerspism 12 years ago
    • thanks! 190 apps... wowser. Do you use the K2 to deploy? - muebel 12 years ago
  • I'm in the same boat where I work. I spent approximately three months getting my first full WinXP scripted install working (when I wasn't handling all the other aspects of my job...). Most of that time was getting postinstalls working - lots of trial and error, as well as finding different methods when silent installs, etc just didn't work. AutoIT turned out to be the best solution for most legacy and "unreliable/unpredictable" app installs, but I'm not a programmer so it took a little bit to get a handle on that (particularly finding different methods when the standard key or mouse commands would flake out or act randomly). After getting through that, the Win7 scripted installs only took about a month to get everything working and now I'm that I'm actually using all of these it's saving me a ton of time. I've posted some of my various solutions (search on my nickname?), so maybe something there will help. Honestly, for some apps I feel like Edison inventing the lightbulb - just keep trying different things, research when out of options and ask when something doesn't seem to be working like it should. I'll try to post some more stuff when I'm not so swamped (probably in the blogs since that's what my posts tend to be anyways), but feel free to reach out if you need any ideas.

    John - jverbosk 12 years ago
    • Awesome... yeah I have been looking into AutoIT. So far I haven't had to use it, but I am sure it will come up. - muebel 12 years ago
  • AutoIT... *shiver*
    I find AutoIT to be the "last resort" sollution (or even a No-No!), but that's only my own thoughts.
    Most applications have some sort of deployment method, there is only a matter of finding them.
    If the installer isn't an MSI, I usually run the installer with /?, /help or have a look at the properties to find out what kind of installer it is and then google the bastard. If all else fails, I snapshot the installation and create an MSI.
    Good luck! - andemats 12 years ago
  • muebel, are you using K1000?
    Why don't you setup a list of Labels and deploy the software by using Managed Installation? - Aaron Cool 12 years ago
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