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Friday 5 October 2012

Flashing your NSA310 with Debian Squeeze to run Sabnzbd, Sickbeard & CouchPotato - Part 4


This one has been in my drafts forever, I thought I would take the time to post it in-case anyone followed parts 1-3.
If you missed parts 1-3 of this post here they are:

Part 1

Part 2
Part 3

Otherwise lets get started!


OK, at the end of part 3 I asked you to make a note of the MAC address assigned to eth1, providing you have it then SSH to your NSA310 and login, then type


pico /etc/rc.local


then edit your file to look exactly like mine below:














Once you have edited the file, press Ctrl+O to write it out, Ctrl+X to exit.

This statement will fix the brightness of your LEDS. Now to set your MAC address to what it should be (instead of 00:00:00:00:00:00)

type pico /etc/network/interfaces and edit your file to look like mine (changing the MAC to your own)















save and exit

now to edit sysctl.conf, type:


pico /etc/sysctl.conf and add these lines:



# Set VM min memory
vm.min_free_kbytes=8192

save and exit

Now for one last edit:

pico /default/rcs, delete the entire contents and type/paste
:
#
# /etc/default/rcS
#
# Default settings for the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/
#
# For information about these variables see the rcS(5) manual page.
#
# This file belongs to the "initscripts" package.

# delete files in /tmp during boot older than x days.
# '0' means always, -1 or 'infinite' disables the feature
TMPTIME=0

# spawn sulogin during boot, continue normal boot if not used in 30 seconds
SULOGIN=no

# do not allow users to log in until the boot has completed
DELAYLOGIN=no

# assume that the BIOS clock is set to UTC time (recommended)
UTC=yes

# be more verbose during the boot process
VERBOSE=no

# automatically repair filesystems with inconsistencies during boot
FSCKFIX=no

# mount /run/lock as a tmpfs (separately from /run)
RAMLOCK=no

# mount /run/shm as a tmpfs (separately from /run)
RAMSHM=no

# mount /tmp as a tmpfs
RAMTMP=no

again save and exit

That’s the hardware setup and ready for action now we can install Sab, CP & Sickbeard.

**NOTE** If I get time I will post these steps up, but for now Parts 1-4 are a good place for anyone to start with this

MAP - Application To Machine Correlation Report


This quick blogpost covers using Microsoft Excel to present data from a Microsoft Assessment And Planning Toolkit (MAP) database in a way that allows you to show which computers have what software installed.

If you do not have MAP installed/ inventory gathered you can follow my previous post here if you wish.

This is a really quick and simple thing to do if you have Office installed on the same host as MAP, and as I have MAP on my local machine and just import the databases I collect this is great for me :)

Firstly open an elevated instance of Excel then click Data->From Other Sources->From Data Connection Wizard

Select Microsoft SQL Server in the box that appears then press Next

In the server name box enter LOCALHOST\SQLEXPRESS

Once the list of views are displayed scroll down and select InstalledProducts_View, press Next and then Finish

The next box that appears allows you to add a pivot table if you wish, once done press OK

Voila! your data to manipulate as you wish

Cheers

EDIT: For MAP 8 you will need to connect to (localdb)\Maptoolkit

Thursday 4 October 2012

Provisioning Windows 8 to go with Config Mgr 2012

This blog post will cover provisioning Windows 8 to go USB Flash devices with Configuration Manager 2012.

Pre-Requisites


  • A working Configuration Manager 2012 SP1 installation with at least OSD
  • A Working windows 8 deployment task sequence (not covered here)
  • A Working Windows 8 Machine

**NOTE** for the purposes of my lab environment I have not included Bitlocker, therefore my windows 8 deployment task sequence does not include steps for Bitlocker and subsequently neither will the provisioned Windows To Go media.


Step 1 - Create pre staged Media

Open your Configuration Manager console and navigate to Software Library->Operating Systems. Right click on Task Sequences and click Create Task Sequence Media. The create task sequence media wizard will appear.

On the Select Media Type page make your selections as shown
Press Next

On the Media Management page select Dynamic media. 

This will allow a management point to redirect the media to another management point, based on the client location in the site boundaries. Alternatively  Site-based media ensures that the media will only contact the specified management point.

On the  Media Properties page fill out your information and select a location to save the .wim file

click Next.

On the Security page, fill out the information as shown. The user device affinity is optional but I prefer to have it set automatically, change it as you wish


Click Next

On the Task Sequence page, select your Windows 8 task sequence 

Click Next.

On the Boot Image page add your boot image and select your distribution points.
I always choose the x86 boot image as this will run on both x86  & x64 computers but you may change this as you wish

On the Images page, specify the image package that contains your windows 8 Operating system image, select the correct image index you wish to use and fill out your distribution point information

click Next.

On the Select Application page you may add additional applications to include in the media, I have not added any extra. Once done click Next

Again on the  Select Package page you may add additional packages to include in the media, I have not added any extra. Once done click Next

On the Select Driver Package page add any driver packages for the hardware this might be running on, once done click Next.

On the Distribution Points page any distribution points that contain the content required by this task sequence,once complete press Next.

On the customisation page click the star symbol to add a new variable and enter the name SMSTSPreferredAdvertID as shown

For the value you will need to locate the Package ID of your windows 8 task sequence as shown below
Click Next once done
Allow the wizard time to complete
Press Close once done, the wim file you generated will now reside in the location you specified.

Step 2 - Create The Windows 8 To Go Creator Package

In a suitable location, create a folder for this package and copy the wim file we created in step 1 to this folder.
Navigate to ProgramFiles\Microsoft Configuration Manager\OSD\Tools\WTG\Creator and copy wtgcreator.exe to the folder also.

Now we need to create a package, to do this open your Configuration Manager console and navigate to Software Library->Application Management, right click Packages and click create package

On the Package page, enter the name Windows 8 To Go Creator and tick This package contains source files. Fill out the path of the folder that contains your wim file and the wtgcreator.exe file and click Next

On the Program Type page, select Standard program, and then click Next.

On the Standard Program pagefill out the information as shown. The command line is WTGCreator.exe /wim:Win8ToGo.wim /enableBootRedirect


On the Requirements page fill out the details as shown, specifying that this program can only run on Windows 8 (32 & 64 bit)


Click Next twice and then close

Step 3 - Deploy The Windows To Go Creator Program 

Now we have to deploy the program to a collection, so first of all create a new collection with a name of Windows 8 To Go and add a windows 8 client to it

Now open the Configuration Manager console and navigate to Software Library->Application Management->Packages 

Find the Windows 8 To Go Package we just created, highlight it and click Deploy

On the General page browse and select your Windows 8 To Go Collection, 

Press Next

On the Content page add your distribution point/s to which you want to deploy the content for this package to. Press next once done

On the Deployment Settings page select Available for the deployment type and then click Next.

On the Scheduling page just press next

On the User Experience page press next also

On the Distribution Points page fill out the information as shown


Press Next once done, and then Next 2 more times and then Finish

Step 4 - Deploy The Task Sequence

Now within the Configuration Manager console navigate to Software Library->Operating System->Task Sequences

Right click on your windows 8 task sequence and click Deploy

On the General page browse and select your Windows 8 To Go Collection then press Next

On the Deployment Settings page ensure you select Only Media and PXE (hidden) as shown below

Press Next

On the Scheduling page just press next

On the User Experience page press next also

On the Alerts page press next also

On the Distribution Points page fill out the information as shown:

Press Next
Press Next 2 more times and then close

Step 5 - Running Windows To Go Creator

On your windows 8 client machine open Software Center, you should see something like this:

With your USB drive inserted into the machine click Install, wait for the content to download and you should see the following prompt


Select your drive and allow your device to be prestaged, the computer will then reboot and the task sequence should take over from there.

**NOTE** I was not actually able to test this part as I do not have a certified USB Flash drive, As soon as I get my hands on one I will verify this and update this post. However this was all based on Microsoft Documentation and should work fine.

Cheers
Wayne