Pushing Out acad 2008 through Active Directory

[dxarhoulakos]

I'm trying to push out A2008 through Active directory. I can't seem to get it to push out all custom settings. (ie: search paths). The base install does happen, just no custom settings.

I push out the acad.msi in the admin folder as well as the acad-....mst file also in the admin folder.

Anyone else run into this problem? Am i doing something wrong?

[rkmcswain]

Are you simply calling the .MSI file in your GP?

[dxarhoulakos]

Calling acad.MSI as well as .MST that was generated after the deployment.

[dxarhoulakos]

Problem solved. I recreated the deployment, and now it works.

[dxarhoulakos]

UPDATE:

I can now get all the search paths, acad opens fine, but i get several error messages in the process. Anyone seen these messages?

See Attachment.

[Opie]

I've seen the first and third message. Unfortunately, I don't know the solution for either one.

The second one looks to be a DirectX issue. You may need to verify the installation of DirectX or reinstall it on the affected machine.

[Opie]

UPDATE:

I can now get all the search paths, acad opens fine, but i get several error messages in the process. Anyone seen these messages?

See Attachment.
Here's one article, "Error: Unable to load profile file (http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/item?siteID=123112&id=9450291&linkID=9240617)" for the first issue. It may fix the third one as well. I just haven't tested it.

[rkmcswain]

UPDATE:

I can now get all the search paths, acad opens fine, but i get several error messages in the process.

Are you also installing all the prerequisites beforehand? (vba, flash, directx, xml, etc)
You can't just install the "acad.msi" and expect everything to work OK.

[dxarhoulakos]

Are you also installing all the prerequisites beforehand? (vba, flash, directx, xml, etc)
You can't just install the "acad.msi" and expect everything to work OK.


i thought everythign is being installed as part of the deployment?

wont the msi point to the ini files, which direct everything else.....and mst will load all sustom settings

this is exactly how i rolled out 2K6.

[rkmcswain]

i thought everythign is being installed as part of the deployment?

That is not my understanding. We were using a BAT file to install 2008 and had to call each msi file separately.



this is exactly how i rolled out 2K6. 2k8 deployments are different.

[dxarhoulakos]

That is not my understanding. We were using a BAT file to install 2008 and had to call each msi file separately.

2k8 deployments are different.

Hmmm...Are you pushing it out the group policy or something to that effect? or are you installing on each machine manually?

When I install it on machines manually (just by running the deployment shortcut) everything seems ok. i get all custom settings, search paths, etc.

I'll try the BAT file trick. So do you call all of the msi files that are created through the deployment? plus the .mst?

[rkmcswain]

Hmmm...Are you pushing it out the group policy or something to that effect? or are you installing on each machine manually?

When I install it on machines manually (just by running the deployment shortcut) everything seems ok. i get all custom settings, search paths, etc.

I'll try the BAT file trick. So do you call all of the msi files that are created through the deployment? plus the .mst?

We tried this way for a while (see partial BAT FILE below). But it has a bad side effect - no local .LOG file (the one "setup.exe" creates). So when an install failed, we had no way to find out why. We went back to using the default shortcut created by the deployment.

\\server\Software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\LDT\AdminImage\SETUP.EXE \\server\Software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\LDT\AdminImage\LDT.ini


In 2006, we could call deploy.exe and the BAT file would wait until that executable finished before going to the next line --- However in 2008, when you call SETUP.exe, it executes and then the next line in the BAT file executes immediately without waiting on SETUP.exe to complete - Since we are installing LDT and RASTER - the whole thing fails since they would both take off at the same time - hence the desire to install each LDT component separately.



ECHO INSTALLING MSI RUNTIME 3.1
START "MSI 3.1 Runtime" /W "%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\msi\WindowsInstaller-KB893803-v2-x86.exe" /quiet /norestart

ECHO INSTALLING .NET FRAMEWORK 2.0
START ".NET Framework Runtime 2.0" /W "%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\support\dotnetfx\dotnetfx.exe" /q /c:"install /l /qn"

ECHO INSTALLING VBA RUNTIME
START "VBA Runtime" /W "%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\support\VBA\vba6.msi" /qb

ECHO INSTALLING DIRECTX 9.0 RUNTIME
START "DirectX 9.0 Runtime" /W "%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\support\DirectX\DXSETUP.exe" /silent

ECHO INSTALLING MSXML 6
START "MSXML 6 Setup" /W "%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\support\msxml\msxml6.msi" /qb!

REM ECHO INSTALLING FLASH
REM START "Flash" /W "%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\support\flash\Install Flash Player 9 ActiveX.msi" /qb

ECHO INSTALLING %PROD%
START "%PROD%" /W "%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\%MSI%.MSI" TRANSFORMS="%SERVER%\software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\%PROD%\AdminImage\%MSI%-%PROD%.mst" /qb

ECHO INSTALLING AutoCAD Raster Design 2008
START "AutoCAD Raster Design 2008" /W "%SERVER%\Software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\ARD\AdminImage\ARD.MSI" TRANSFORMS="%SERVER%\Software\AutoDesk\Deployments\2008\ARD\AdminImage\ard-ARD.mst" /qb


Long story short - we are not using GPO to push this out - so I know this doesn't help you much.... You might try contacting Jerry Milana at Autodesk - he is the guru on network installs.

[dxarhoulakos]

ok. i finally got it working. We haven't deployed it yet....but it worked on a handful of users, and will send it out to everyone middle of this week.

I had to take a bit of a backwards approach, but it works. I was getting 3 error messages. the first two were file related.

1. Thanks Opie for pointing me to the "fix" on the profile error. That did the trick. We had to make that a part of the GP roll-out.

2. As far as the .dll error, for some reason the file is not being copied into the ...\system32 folder. So I wrote a script that will copy the file from somwhere on our network to the folder. (I have a suspicion that this has something to do with our permissions policy. 90% of the C: is locked from people writing to it. Although, my IT guy, claims that when the file is being installed it is being done with admin rights)

Anyway, thanks for everyone's help. BTW, I was not here all weekend doing this....got it done late friday.

Demetrios

[RobertB]

In 2006, we could call deploy.exe and the BAT file would wait until that executable finished before going to the next line --- However in 2008, when you call SETUP.exe, it executes and then the next line in the BAT file executes immediately without waiting on SETUP.exe to complete - Since we are installing LDT and RASTER - the whole thing fails since they would both take off at the same time - hence the desire to install each LDT component separately.You could use the following to force the .bat/.cmd to wait, e.g.:

\\corp.sparling.com\dfs\apps$\mep2008\AdminImage\Setup.exe \\corp.sparling.com\dfs\apps$\mep2008\AdminImage\Sparling.ini
:wait
%systemroot%\system32\ping -n 30 127.0.0.1 >nul
%systemroot%\system32\tasklist | find /i "setup.exe" >nul
if errorlevel==1 goto continue
goto wait
:continue

[mbhame]

Hmmm, this is all very different from what I've done with 2007 & 2008.
When you say "pushing...thru Active Directory" I thought it'd be a thread about Group Policy but it sounds like you're all a bunch of script wizards.
If you Deploy ACAD08 through Group Policy, you simply follow the steps in the network administration guide Autodesk provides. You basically grab the CD, install their wizard, run the wizard and point your GPO to the resulting MSI file.
I have had zero problems with this.

[dxarhoulakos]

Hmmm, this is all very different from what I've done with 2007 & 2008.
When you say "pushing...thru Active Directory" I thought it'd be a thread about Group Policy but it sounds like you're all a bunch of script wizards.
If you Deploy ACAD08 through Group Policy, you simply follow the steps in the network administration guide Autodesk provides. You basically grab the CD, install their wizard, run the wizard and point your GPO to the resulting MSI file.
I have had zero problems with this.

Glad to see you have had zero problems. But if you read my original post, you will see i ran into some problems doing that, and had to come up with some scripts to get around it.

And if you read the entire thread...you'll see that I DID install 08 thru GPO, however I had to also run scripts as part of it to get around some of the bugs i ran intio.

Curious? how much customization do you have?

When did you run your GPO? Since I pushed out 08 to my office there has been a SP. Perhaps that has resolved some of the problems.

[mbhame]

I wasn't speak at you but to everyone in the thread. In that context there seems to be a lot of people who refrain from using Group Policy without scripts, that's all I was trying to say.

My predecessor (who unlike myself was our company's CAD Manager) used Profiles as the customization management (I hear a lot of groaning going on right now). So unfortunately for you in particular I am of no help/benefit since I am not even attempting to push the customization during the installation. Whether it's right or wrong, I see software deployment and CAD customization as two independant tasks which should be managed independantly, so I am not rewriting my GPOs for every change made to CAD on the network. Sorry to be of no help.

[dxarhoulakos]

[QUOTE=mbhame;813837]So unfortunately for you in particular I am of no help/benefit since I am not even attempting to push the customization during the installation. Whether it's right or wrong, I see software deployment and CAD customization as two independant tasks which should be managed independantlyQUOTE]

which explains why it was working for you.

By seperating the two entities, the CAD Manager is doubling tripling his/her workload...

Sure it can be pushed out the lisp, and profiles, but why bother?

long story short i was able to push out the standard deployment package along with all customizations (2 pull-down menu's, standard profile, a dozen palettes, one toolbar, and a partridge in a pair tree... :^)

but becuase of some bugs....i had to do some tweaking...

[mbhame]

...By seperating the two entities, the CAD Manager is doubling tripling his/her workload...

I deploy a version of AutoCAD and never have to again. How is that increasing my workload?

[dxarhoulakos]

I deploy a version of AutoCAD and never have to again. How is that increasing my workload?

i think we're speaking 2 diferent languages...

good luck

[mbhame]

i think we're speaking 2 diferent languages...
good luck
I guess I won't be able to learn then. Thanks for the help.

[Harold Pei Jr]

I guess I won't be able to learn then. Thanks for the help.

It's more work because you seperate the customization and the installation. You have to install, then set directories and do your customization. For smaller organizations, it's no big deal, but if you have a lot of machines that you have to do this for (especially if they're over an ocean away) it tends to be a lot of work (and waiting).

[mbhame]

It's more work because you seperate the customization and the installation. You have to install, then set directories and do your customization. For smaller organizations, it's no big deal, but if you have a lot of machines that you have to do this for (especially if they're over an ocean away) it tends to be a lot of work (and waiting).

So then in a single-site environment there's not much to gain or lose either way?