8. OCS NG Software Deployment

Before, make sure you set DOWNLOAD to ON in server config/Deployment and pressed Update

Now we will deploy 7-zip on test computer. This package can be installed either by setup.exe or msi installer. For this one, we will use setup.exe with simple /s switch for silent. Navigate to OCS-NG server, open Deployment/Build:

Fill in necessary fields. Keep few things in mind:

Priority = 0 means install first if other packages with other priorities are available. Order goes from 0-9 where 0 is highest.

Action: Launch/ Store / Execute – Launch means start program from zip file. Store means store some file somewhere on remote host. Execute means execute command on remote computer.

Since we are using setup.exe we have to use Launch method.

Press Send. On next screen we can choose to divide package to smaller parts. It is useful if package is big or the network quality is poor (WAN/mobile etc). Assuming we have, we will divide into 4 parts:

It tells, that It will take 4 minutes to deploy it. You can shorten this time by adjusting configuration of OCS (Deployment section, periods, timings etc. – play by yourself J).

Press Send:

Now, we need to activate that package and affect some computers.

Open Deployment/Activate and press the arrows on the right in the package row:

Select Manual for manual affection of computers and manual timing. Then you will see fragments URI. You can change them but just don’t, ok? :)

You can adjust them in server config. Just press OK.

After that you will get warning:

Check mentioned URL with adding info at the end to make sure it’s a bug not a real problem:

Yup, it’s a bug (I will probably debug it sometime, but for now, it all works, we can leave it as is)

Package is ready and can be reached and deployed to computers, just press Yes

Now we need to affect a computer. You can do it in multiple ways but I will use simplest one: just assign a package to computer manually. Just select computer on the list, and press Deploy at the bottom.

On Next page do not select advanced teledeploy features and select as follows:

And press Validate

On next screen press small square on the right in package row:

AND VOILA!

Now just wait for package to deploy or right click on ocs inventory in systray and select Run inventory now.

Logs can be found in c:\ProgramData\OCS Inventory NG\Agent\

If everything works, you should have lines like below in OCSInventory.log:

AGENT => Inventory successfully sent

AGENT =>  Communication Server ask for Package Download

DOWNLOAD => Package <1488587331> added to download queue

DOWNLOAD => Download and setup tool successfully started

AGENT => Unloading communication provider

And right after there should be new log called Download.log:

DOWNLOAD => Starting new period of 10 cycles

DOWNLOAD => Parsing directory <C:\ProgramData\OCS Inventory NG\Agent\download> for packages

DOWNLOAD => Package <1488587331> verified and added to process queue

DOWNLOAD => High priority 0 package found, removing lower priority package from queue

DOWNLOAD => Downloading package fragment <1488587331-1>

DOWNLOAD => Downloading package fragment <1488587331-1>

DOWNLOAD => Downloading package fragment <1488587331-1>

DOWNLOAD => Downloading package fragment <1488587331-1>

DOWNLOAD => Downloading package fragment <1488587331-2>

DOWNLOAD => Downloading package fragment <1488587331-3>

DOWNLOAD => Downloading package fragment <1488587331-4>

DOWNLOAD => Building package <1488587331>

DOWNLOAD => Executing action <LAUNCH> for package <1488587331>

DOWNLOAD => Sending result code <SUCCESS> for package <1488587331>

After this you will notice 7zip in menu start!

9. Summary

It wasn’t so hard, wasn’t it? Like I mentioned at the beginning after couple of tries, well some more than couple it takes not even an hour to make it fully functional (including all downloads) so it’s not so long. We performed simple Debian installation with tools needed to make it work and to correctly install OCS-NG server. At this moment you have fully working environment with server that can be reached by client computers (assuming no other network-related blocks exists), an OCS Package that can be deployed straight away to computers. If you are using Active Directory, just create a GPO and install OCS Package using it. Also, you have a working software package that can be sent to client computers making sure they are using this great peace of software:)

Now, it’s your time to play with OCS-NG, make few improvements, break something, reinstall, debug things. I strongly encourage you to just sit and play with it. Keep it in mind, that if you deploy OCS-NG to target computers and change server IP afterwards. It may be difficult to switch them to new IP, but it is possible. Also, don’t change the SSL certs unless you are ready to deploy new ones to computers.

That is pretty much all, hope you enjoyed this guide and hope it will help you, dear reader with your work or hobby.

Like I mentioned at the beginning it took me good few days to actually research, build it several times, prepare all screens and descriptions and finally build this guide. If you find it helpful or useful and wish to say thanks. You can drop a comment or even better, buy me a beer! It’s possible on the right, through PayPal (safe and easy).

Thanks for reading!

Milosz

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