postpone reboot after regular swd

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postpone reboot after regular swd

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All Forums >> [Management Products] >> Microsoft Systems Management Server >> SMS 2003 >> postpone reboot after regular swd

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postpone reboot after regular swd - 10/18/2006 3:45:08 AM

hzawischa

Posts: 796
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Joined: 9/18/2001
From: Hamburg, Germany
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I believe there is no such option in the current product. But maybe someone has an idea.

I'd like to be able to show a notification (preferably a baloon) to the user in case a package SMS installed need a reboot. I want to give the user the option to postpone that reboot up to eight hours (or, let's have it a configurable time). The regular countdown provided will probably not do.

I want to decide this per package - program. One might need to reboot asap, one might be ok to postpone.

Any ideas?

Henrik

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Henrik Zawischa
Freelance trainer and consultant
myITforum columnist
Hamburg, Germany
hzawischa@web.de

Post #: 1

RE: postpone reboot after regular swd - 10/18/2006 6:45:49 AM

iglatz

Posts: 848
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Joined: 9/21/2001
From: Erding, Bavaria - Germany
Status: offline

How about to use a simple script created with SMS installer or VBS to pop up a message. Depending on the answer, the reboot will be postponed and a scheduler task will be created to re-run the script again after 30 or 60 minutes or whatever. The script also sets a counter in registry or somewhere else to figure out how often the reboot had been postponed. After the defined amount there won't be another choice but the reboot of the machine.
This script would have to be included per program and changed depending on the count of postponing that's allowed. I've used the scheduler a couple of times when I had to wiat for something to occur.

(in reply to hzawischa)

Post #: 2

RE: postpone reboot after regular swd - 10/18/2006 10:28:59 AM

jfunderburg

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From: Nashville, TN
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Henrik,

Let me share a little utility I wrote a few years back to address a similar issue that I had. To use it, have you installation script/package conclude by executing the RebootNotify program. You can pass to two optional parameters: rebootnotify [min] [custom text file] The first parameter specifies how often the balloon message will pop-up - default is one minute. With the second parameter you can do one of two things: 1) Specify a text file. If this is used then additional menu item will appear called "Installation details..." and when click on will display the contents of your text file. 2) Specify a file with an .MSG extension that followings this format:

TITLE=Software Installation
TEXT=The Desktop Management team has recently installed software... blah... blah..

Couple other items I might mention:

I've found issues with packages that are not downloaded to cache and run from the DP instead. The EXE file remains locked on your DP while computer(s) have it running in memory. Which makes updating your source files a real pain. As workaround, the program first copies itself to the local computer and then re-executed itself from there.
I've also found weird things happen if the user decides to logout instead of restarting. To fix this, I've prevented logoffs from happening.

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< Message edited by jfunderburg -- 10/18/2006 10:32:27 AM >

(in reply to hzawischa)

Post #: 3

RE: postpone reboot after regular swd - 10/18/2006 10:35:58 AM

jfunderburg

Posts: 295
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Joined: 10/26/2004
From: Nashville, TN
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Here's a couple screenshots...

Thumbnail Image

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< Message edited by jfunderburg -- 10/18/2006 10:36:11 AM >

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Post #: 4

RE: postpone reboot after regular swd - 10/19/2006 6:55:35 AM

hzawischa

Posts: 796
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Joined: 9/18/2001
From: Hamburg, Germany
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Sound good. I will give it a closer look. Thanks a lot.

_____________________________

Henrik Zawischa
Freelance trainer and consultant
myITforum columnist
Hamburg, Germany
hzawischa@web.de

(in reply to jfunderburg)

Post #: 5

RE: postpone reboot after regular swd - 8/15/2008 1:05:42 PM 1 votes

jwax

Posts: 10
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Joined: 4/18/2008
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Does anyone know if jfunderburg ever posted the source code his RebootNotify app? I use this a lot (it's great

) and I would LOVE to modify it to show a countdown for a forced restart. That alone would solve a boatload of political issues we're having at the moment.

It would look cool too....

Or, if you know of any other self contained solutions for forcing a timed restart in a pop up bubble (no shutdown.exe or psshutdown.exe), I'm all ears.

Thanks in advance!

J

(in reply to hzawischa)