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PowerShell to the rescue – Clean up direct collection memberships

We where talking to a customer about how to avoid waiting for Active Directory group synchronization to occur and place a device in the correct collections faster than “until the next synchronization”. The main problem with this setup was caused by the fact that they used a group-in-group membership to identify collection memberships and apparently SCCM 2012 don’t include indirect changes to group membership as delta changes (I have not tested this in details yet). So we came up with the idea to just create a direct membership to place the device in the collections instantly to make sure that [...]

By | 2013-03-12T12:31:15+00:00 March 12th, 2013|Configuration Manager (SCCM), Powershell|3 Comments
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Quick and Dirty Management Point check

If you have a big Configuration Manager environment and you don´t have a monitoring solution like SCOM or NAGIOS, then PowerShell can help you too.  This script queries all Management Points from SMS_SystemResourceList WMI class and it will check MPCERT and MPLIST website status. If you want to use this script then run it on your Central, CAS or Primary Site Server like this: Get-CMSMPStatus.ps1 -SiteCode PS1 -SiteServer Localhost -OutPut c:\Temp\MPStatus.csv. This will create a CSV Report (example below) This script should work with PSH v2 and v3. You can download the code example from here

By | 2013-01-29T14:20:44+00:00 January 29th, 2013|Configuration Manager (SCCM), Powershell|2 Comments
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Changing the regional related (small) stuff! Dot vs. Comma

During OS deployment you normally set the regional settings to match the nationality of the user who are to receive the computer! This can be anything from the OS UI and keyboard,  to Date and time formats, and is normally done using sysprep values like SystemLocale, UserLocale, UIlanguage etc. One problem though, is the UserLocale value, which sets all the Date and time formats. These settings are all pre defined in the system based on the regional setting, which means all machines running English UserLocale will get the settings defined for en-US by Microsoft. But every now and then, you [...]

By | 2012-02-23T15:48:12+00:00 February 23rd, 2012|General info, OS Deployment|3 Comments
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Updated version of the Coretech Shutdown Utility v. 0.8

A new and updated version of our popular shutdown utility is available for download. Read this post for a detailed description of the utility. Changelog: Additions: Added Exit Error Codes. Added Minimize Button. Added Notification Form when Minimized. Added the support for an external description text file. Added the argument support for LastBootTime more or less. Added the argument support for RegistryKey equals or not equals. Added the support for using Capital Letters as argument type. Changes: Changed Main form as well as the Notification form to be Desktop Modal. Changed the design to "Splash Form" style, with background and [...]

By | 2012-02-16T16:13:31+00:00 February 16th, 2012|Configuration Manager (SCCM), Tools|3 Comments
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Power management trough the TS (No more automatic Sleep!)

  I have a number of customers who wants to set the power settings trough the TS, as opposed to using GPO’s. I guess that makes sense if you want to allow you users to change the settings them self… By default windows 7 will set the following power options: Sleep/standby in 15 min on battery (DC), Sleep/standby in 30 min on Power (AC). Hibernation after 360 min on both AC and DC. Sleep/standby when lid is closed on laptop. Some of my customers do not want their machines to sleep or hibernate, unless the user makes this choice. this [...]

By | 2011-06-06T12:17:22+00:00 June 6th, 2011|General info, OS Deployment|1 Comment
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Set default keyboard settings based on Running OS

While doing refresh scenarios, its possible to have USMT set the current Keyboard settings for the existing users on the reinstalled OS. The problem however, is setting the same default keyboard settings for new users on that machine.. By default the Keyboard settings will be that of the reference image, so if the keyboard settings in the image is en-US/00000409 it will be so on the deployed machine, unless this is changed somehow ( E.g Unattend.xml, variable, Reg e.t.c) In an XP to Win7 migration scenario (or 7 to 7), you could run a script, to pick up the current [...]

By | 2011-06-02T20:51:33+00:00 June 2nd, 2011|OS Deployment|2 Comments
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VBScript: Cleanup all computer objects for local PC

When we are deploying OS via ConfigMgr, we usually do a cleanup of all old objects before creating the new object. This helps prevent errors and mistakes, and is pretty easy to do. We are able to use both SMBOIS GUID and Mac addresses for the cleanup. usually I recommend using mac addresses, since I have experienced that laptops who have had their mainboard exchanged, have the BIOS GUID of "0000-00000-0000-0000", this happens because the repair shop forgets to write in the GUID after the repair. The mac addresses are always usable , since they are not typed [...]

By | 2011-05-24T10:05:17+00:00 May 24th, 2011|Configuration Manager (SCCM), OS Deployment, Scripting & Development|2 Comments
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Coretech Package Source Changer 0.3.0.0 Beta

This is the post that describes the tool and configuration. Please view  this guide https://blog.ctglobalservices.com/kea/updating-the-package-source-in-configuration-manager-2007/ by my colleague Kent Agerlunds, on how to use it in a ConfigMgr Migration 1. Introduction   As we start migrating from CM2007 to CM2012 one of the requirements is that the package source used for packages must be a UNC. I have seen many site installations where the package source is either a local source on the site server or a UNC pointing to the site server. In either case, you must somehow update the package source before starting the migration. This utility [...]

By | 2011-05-03T09:47:03+00:00 May 3rd, 2011|Configuration Manager (SCCM), Tools|17 Comments
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Coretech SCCM Manager 1.0.4 – Freeware Download

This week a customer contacted us, claiming that the tool did not work on sundays! I thought that was pretty strange, so I asked for log file/event log messages, and it was true. It did fail! It was even “Kernelbase.dll” or “kernel32.dll” that was throwing the exception! I tested it on our test environment, and got the same errors.! I turned out to be an old Visual Basic function, that is used to retrieve the name of the current day, that was failing on sundays. This new version has an updated logfile writer, which writes the correct format [...]

By | 2011-03-29T10:37:41+00:00 March 29th, 2011|Configuration Manager (SCCM), OS Deployment, Tools|8 Comments
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How to fix ConfigMgr 2007 Console Error: “MMC cannot initialize the snap-in”

Today I was working in my test environment, my colleague had been testing some backup/restore of the site software. This had resulted in the console not working. this error appeared, when I tried to start it: “MMC cannot initialize the snap-in” I searched the net and found this article: ConfigMgr 2007: Unable to open Configuration Manager Console, error: MMC Cannot Initialize the Snap-in It helped me a lot in finding the installation log and testing the error. I had the problem in the installation log, but when I ran the commandline test: “C:\windows\Microsoft.Net\Framework\v2.0.50727\installutil.exe "Drive:\Program Files\Microsoft Configuration Manager Console\AdminUI\bin\AdminUI.ResourceExplorerConsole.dll" /logfile=C:\inst.log  /showcallstack” [...]

By | 2010-12-29T13:04:38+00:00 December 29th, 2010|Configuration Manager (SCCM)|1 Comment
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Coretech SCCM Manager 1.0.3.1 – Freeware Download

New Version out! 1.0.4! Get it here: https://blog.ctglobalservices.com/?p=2852 Since we found a minor bug in the 1.0.3 version, we have decided to release version 1.0.3.1. This has fixed the bug that cause distribution points that did have “-“ in the name, not to show up in the list of DPs. We are still working on a newer version, but can not give any info about when it will be released, since we don’t know. Changelog / What’s New 1.0.3 -> 1.0.3.1 Fixed bug that caused DP’s that had “-“ in their name, not to show up in the list. 1.0 RC1 [...]

By | 2010-08-04T12:03:55+00:00 August 4th, 2010|Configuration Manager (SCCM), Tools|6 Comments
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VBScript: Move computer object to another OU via Command line parameter

UPDATE: New improved script 0.0.3 uploaded. Thanks to Nico_ at Technet Forums! Hello everyone My collegue Michael Petersen, needed a script to move computers to another OU, after re-installing them via SCCM/ConfigMgr. He have written a blog post to show how to use it in a Task Sequence: https://blog.ctglobalservices.com/mip/using-ts-variables-when-running-a-script-under-a-different-account/ therefore i developed this small script All you needs to do is to run it with the CN for the new OU (without the LDAP://) in the commandline like this: cscript.exe MoveOU.vbs "OU=HQ,dc=woodgrovebank,dc=com" [crayon-5ba526c6c7923603970036/]

By | 2010-03-17T16:30:33+00:00 March 17th, 2010|Scripting & Development|69 Comments
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Coretech Auto Install Warning – Freeware

DOWNLOAD REMOVED! Update: New version out. please look at : https://blog.ctglobalservices.com/home/coretech-auto-install-warning-1-0-3-freeware-update/ When we are deploying application to the user's computers, we sometimes want to warn them about what is happening. This is to prevent any complains about etc. "My Computer is slow", "Do i have Virus?" or similar complains that might occur when the computer slows down while installing. Therefore i have created this small utility. It can show a message, with a countdown, that all. This can be used in etc. Config Mgr Setups. for a guide of how to use it please read: https://blog.ctglobalservices.com/confmgr07/software-distribution/running-a-custom-notification-before-installing-a-program-with-configuration-manager/ Requirements: Windows XP / [...]

By | 2009-04-29T15:23:44+00:00 April 29th, 2009|Configuration Manager (SCCM), Packaging & Installation, Tools|14 Comments
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Coretech SCCM Manager 1.0.3 – Freeware Download

New version is out! https://blog.ctglobalservices.com/confmgr07/coretech-sccm-manager-1-0-3-1-freeware-download/ . We're back with a new version of Coretech Application Creator! We have decided to change the name of the application, since the old name did not fit with all the features available. Changelog / What’s New 1.0 RC1 -> 1.0.3 Application has a new name, the old name did not cover the features, and future plans for the application. Configuration wizard is shown the first time the program is run, to help setup the basic settings. Changed collection structure, which means that no specific collection names are needed, only a user-defined “root collection” is [...]

By | 2009-04-27T13:07:34+00:00 April 27th, 2009|Configuration Manager (SCCM), Tools|5 Comments
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