Deployment

Using TS variables when running a script under a different account.

2010-04-21T06:22:00Z

Using TS variables when running a script under a different account.

One of the features available when running a Task Sequence in Config Mgr R2, is to run a command line as a different user, which can comes in handy in a number of scenarios. There is however a small but important thing to be aware of.

When using this step to run a script, you will notice that you cannot use any of the “task sequence variables”, as they are not passed through to script. So if you need to use TS variables in your scripts you will have to pass them to the script as arguments instead.

1: Add the argument feature to your script

Set ArgObj = WScript.Arguments

2: Set your variables based one the argument added to the script

strObjectOU = ArgObj(0)

strDomain = ArgObj(1)

It is now possible to use the values stored in the Task Sequence Variables OU and DOMAIN by running the script like this:

Cscript.exe script.vbs %OU% %DOMAIN%

%OU% will be passed through as argument 0 setting the script variable strObjecteOU to the value stored in %OU%. %DOMAIN% will be passed on as argument 1 and so forth.

The is no limit to how many arguments can be passed through, but be aware that one argument must be one complete line ex. %DOMAIN% = MyDomain.com.

Should the variable be composed of more lines ex. %OU% = OU=Clients,OU=Domain Computers,DC=MyDomain,DC=com you will have to put it in quotations or the %OU% argument would actually be two arguments OU=Clients,OU=Domain and Computers,DC=MyDomain,DC=com

Problem finding the Win7 Time Zone names!

2010-02-12T08:26:18Z

Remember In the good old Windows XP days, when the Time Zone you used when creating your Sysprep.inf/Unattend.txt was just a number you could look up in a Microsoft table (and properly also remember)

Well those days are almost gone and now you will have to use Time Zone ID which is a Name rather than a number, so the Danish time zone that used to be 105, is now Romance Standard Time…

So the question then is, where do i get a hold of those names?? The answer is simple…TZUTIL which is an embedded windows 7 command line tool.

Just run TZUTIL /l from a prompt in Win7 and you will get at a full list

The annoyance of none elevated command prompts.

2010-02-09T08:11:06Z

You know how when ever you run something from a prompt in Windows 7 or Server2008 you need to remember to elevate the privileges, or you will get the annoying message that you do not have administrative privileges, which then means you will have to open a new prompt, run it as administrator, and do things all over again.. (especially annoying when working with WAIK)

Well I know that you could just disable UAC all together, but that's not what Microsoft intended when they put it there! and it would also mean a huge decrease in security.

So what to do about that! Well the simple solution is an old one that everyone knows, but like me might have forgotten.

	first open the shortcut to the app in question. In this case it is the Deployment Tools Command Prompt used when working with ImageX, DISM and other WAIK tools. Hit the Advanced button.
	Make sure Run as administrator is checked, and click OK twice to accept the change. That's is! Not very hardcore technical stuff, but none the less, it saves me a lot of headache..

Capture none syspreped image using SCCM (Running imagex from a TS)

2009-11-23T21:23:34Z

One of the limitations of SCCM is the use of Imagex. When you want to capture an image of a computer, this computer needs to be syspreped before capture, or the capture process will fail.

To do a capture of a reference image before sysprep, you normally would have to create a separate WinPE and run ImageX from that. This is also the case if you want to backup a system.

So once again MDT comes to the rescue… By using the ZTIBackup.wsf script, you not only get to run ImageX from a Task Sequence, you also utilize the Append part of ImageX, which lets you add images to already existing images, only adding changes.. By taking advantage of that you can add a new reference image to already existing one, and the size will only increase with the changes.

Another benefit is the speed with witch the image is created. Because all the general Windows files are already captured in the initial image, only the changes will have to be captured..

So how is this done then--

1. You will have to integrate MDT into SCCM

2. (Create Toolkit Package)

3. Create the Task Sequence

	First you must ad a step to use the MDT toolkit package.
	In Toolkit package: Browse and select your MDT toolkit package.
	Now add a step to Set Task Sequence Variable.
	In Task Sequence variable: type in the MDT variable ComputerBackupLocation In Value: Type in the path of the share where you want to place the image.
	Add another Task Sequence variable, to assign a name to the image file Variable: BackupFile Value: The name of the image file, including the .wim extension NOTE: If you leave out this variable, the image file name will will be set to ComputerName.
	Finally add a Run Command Line Step
	In the Command line: type in cscript.exe “%scriptroot\ZTIBackup.wsf”
	That’s it. The Task Sequence should now look like the on to the left. Just advertise, and run it on the computer you want to make an image of. remember it must be run from the Boot image.

Handling HAL switching during XP deployment (no BSOD /0x07 error)

2009-09-11T05:53:00Z

Because of the issue with different HAL’s (Hardware Abstraction Layer) used by XP, it is necessary to make some changes to both Sysprep, and the Kernel files during deployment..

I thought I'd supply my HAL changing script, as it does not require the reference computer to be build from a specific ACPI structure , and you do not need to add any files to the image beforehand, as it’s done by the script.

Run the script just before booting from WinPE to the MiniSetup. (Before the Setup windows and ConfigMgr. step in SCCM)

The Refrence script "ZTIUtility.vbs" is found in Microsoft Deployment Toolkit under Scripts (get it here) and must reside in the same folder as this script.

<job id="HAL">

<script language="VBScript" src="ZTIUtility.vbs"/>

<script language="VBScript"> 

' //***************************************************************************

' // ***** Script Header *****

' //

' // Purpose: Change HAL

' //

' // Prerequsits: The refrence image must be SP2 or SP3

' //

' // Coretech History:

' // 1.0.0     Michael Petersen 19/09/2008  Created initial version.

' //

' // ***** End Header *****

' //*************************************************************************** 

  

'//----------------------------------------------------------------------------

'// Global constant and variable declarations

'//---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

  

Option Explicit 

  

Dim iRetVal, sHalType, sLocalDrive, sHalSource, sSysprep, sfile, sSystem32, sHal, sNtoskrnl, sNkrnlpa 

  

'//----------------------------------------------------------------------------

'// End declarations

'//---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

  

'//----------------------------------------------------------------------------

'// Main routine

'//---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

  

On Error Resume Next

iRetVal = ZTIProcess

ProcessResults iRetVal

On Error Goto 0 

  

'//---------------------------------------------------------------------------

'//

'// Function: ZTIProcess()

'//

'// Input: None

'// 

'// Return: Success - 0

'// Failure - non-zero

'//

'// Purpose: Perform main ZTI processing

'// 

'//---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Function ZTIProcess() 

  

iRetVal = Success 

  

ZTIProcess = iRetval 

  

' Check for Sysprep.inf and set Path

If oFSO.fileExists("C:\sysprep\sysprep.inf") Then

    sSysprep = "C:\sysprep\sysprep.inf"

    sLocalDrive = "C:"

    oLogging.CreateEntry "Found sysprep in "  & sSysprep, LogTypeInfo

Else

     sLocalDrive = oEnvironment.Item("OSDTargetSystemDrive")    

  

    If oFSO.fileExists(sLocalDrive & "\sysprep\Sysprep.inf") then

    sSysprep = sLocalDrive & "\sysprep\Sysprep.inf"

    oLogging.CreateEntry "Found sysprep in " & sSysprep, LogTypeInfo

    Else

     oLogging.CreateEntry "Could not locate Sysprep", LogTypeWarning

    End if

End If    

  

'Set HAL source path from sp2 or sp3

    

If oFSO.fileExists(sLocalDrive & "\WINDOWS\Driver Cache\i386\sp3.cab") then

    sHALsource = sLocalDrive & "\WINDOWS\Driver Cache\i386\sp3.cab"

    oLogging.CreateEntry "HAL replasment files will come from: " & sHALsource, LogTypeInfo

elseIf oFSO.fileExists(sLocalDrive & "\WINDOWS\Driver Cache\i386\sp2.cab") then

    sHALsource = sLocalDrive & "\WINDOWS\Driver Cache\i386\sp2.cab"

    oLogging.CreateEntry "HAL replasment files will come from: " & sHALsource, LogTypeInfo

else

    oLogging.CreateEntry "no HAL replasment fileses present", LogTypeInfo

end if

        

'Get the HAL type from the registry (from Windows PE).  This will tell us if we are running on a PIC or an APIC chipset.

    oLogging.CreateEntry "Configuring HAL replacement", LogTypeInfo

    sHalType = oShell.RegRead("HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\Root\ACPI_HAL\0000\HardwareID")

    oLogging.CreateEntry "Windows PE is using HAL " & sHalType(0), LogTypeInfo                

            

Select Case lCase(sHalType(0))

    

Case "acpipic", "acpipic_up"

    'Add the UpdateUPHAL command to the Sysprep.inf file.

    oUtility.WriteINI sSysprep, "Unattended", "UpdateUPHAL", "ACPIPIC_UP,C:\windows\Inf\Hal.inf"

    oLogging.CreateEntry "Updated SYSPREP.INF to replace HAL with uniprocessor PIC HAL", LogTypeInfo

                    

    'Configure HAL and Krnl

    sHal = "HALACPI.DLL"

    sNtoskrnl = "NTOSKRNL.EXE" 

    sNkrnlpa = "NTKRNLPA.EXE"

        

Case "acpiapic", "acpiapic_up"

    if oShell.Environment.item("NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS") > 1 then

    'If Processors.Count > 1 Then'Add the UpdateHAL command to the Sysprep.inf file.

        oUtility.WriteINI sSysprep, "Unattended", "UpdateHAL", "ACPIAPIC_MP,C:\windows\Inf\Hal.inf"

        oLogging.CreateEntry "Updated SYSPREP.INF to replace HAL with multiprocessor APIC HAL", LogTypeInfo

                    

        'Configure HAL and Krnl

        sHal = "HALMACPI.DLL"

        sNtoskrnl = "NTKRNLMP.EXE" 

        sNkrnlpa = "NTKRPAMP.EXE"    

                    

    Else

        'Add the UpdateUPHAL command to the Sysprep.inf file.

        oUtility.WriteINI sSysprep, "Unattended", "UpdateUPHAL", "ACPIAPIC_UP,C:\windows\Inf\Hal.inf"

        oLogging.CreateEntry "Updated SYSPREP.INF to replace HAL with uniprocessor APIC HAL", LogTypeInfo

                    

        'Configure HAL and Krnl

        sHal = "HALAACPI.DLL"

        sNtoskrnl = "NTOSKRNL.EXE" 

        sNkrnlpa = "NTKRNLPA.EXE"

    End If

                                    

Case "acpiapic_mp"

    'Add the UpdateHAL command to the Sysprep.inf file.

    oUtility.WriteINI sSysprep, "Unattended", "UpdateHAL", "ACPIAPIC_MP,C:\windows\Inf\Hal.inf"

    oLogging.CreateEntry "Updated SYSPREP.INF to replace HAL with multiprocessor APIC HAL", LogTypeInfo    

                        

    'Configure HAL and Krnl

    sHal = "HALMACPI.DLL"

    sNtoskrnl = "NTKRNLMP.EXE" 

    sNkrnlpa = "NTKRPAMP.EXE"

        

End Select        

  

'Check if System32 is present and unpack needed files.

sSystem32 = sLocalDrive  & "\Windows\System32\"

oLogging.CreateEntry "Checking for access to " & sSystem32, LogTypeInfo

  

If oFSO.FolderExists(sSystem32) then 

    oLogging.CreateEntry sSystem32 & " Found", LogTypeInfo

  

    For Each sFile in Array(sHal,sNtoskrnl,sNkrnlpa)

        oShell.Run "expand " & Chr(34) & sHalSource & Chr(34) & " -f:" &sFile & " " &sSystem32,0,true

        oLogging.CreateEntry "Copying " & sFile & " to " & sSystem32, LogTypeInfo 

  

    Next

        oFSO.CopyFile sSystem32 &sHal, sSystem32 & "HAL.dll", true

        oFSO.CopyFile sSystem32 &sNtoskrnl, sSystem32 & "NTOSKRNL.EXE", true

        oFSO.CopyFile sSystem32 &sNkrnlpa, sSystem32 & "NTKRNLPA.EXE", true

        oLogging.CreateEntry "rename HAL and Kernal files", LogTypeInfo 

    Else

        oLogging.CreateEntry "Error - Folder " & sSystem32 & " Not Found", LogTypeError

End If

    

End Function 

</script>

</job>



Get the script here.

This post was originally posted on http://kongkuba1.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!EEFF1607E296E5AB!440.entry April.8 2009