Do you have an article on software repackaging? Please submit it and share it with others.

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I wrote a short How-To on working around installing the software for each user on the primary Wise Server system here.

The fix is obvious to most desktop admins or people who have had to create defaults for everyone on a system before but not so obvious for those without this experience.

Enjoy!

PS: This may voilate the license per Wise Support. They have a problem getting around real Enterprise use it seems. In my present environment we have a SQL DBA and a Server Admin, and then we have the developer. We had to have the Server Admin create login priveledges for the SQL DBA to install the Wise software from scratch because he had to create the databases in order to conform to the internal policies because he also had to set up the Wise Services using the "secret" SQL DBA password and ID and then I had to hack the registry as outlined above so I could setup the services and such later because it would otherwise force me to reinstall the software and it would have required me to know the SQL password because it pulls from the original ID of who installed it in the first place. Very, very ugly setup and installation IMHO.

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Duped Alert!

This weekend I was reading the new C# books I had gotten in and one of them was "Programming in the key of C#" by Charles Petzold. I went online to get the program examples for it and a basic C# editor and project editor from the authors site. While I was there I noticed an article here that Charles had added to his blog on Saturday, 1 April 06. The post was about CSAML or C# Markup Language that was to be released this fall. So I clicked on the article above and read it to my growing dismay. Charles demonstrated what a For loop looked like in C# and what one would look like in the new language. I was shocked and horrified. Here I had picked up C# in the hope it would be a strongly typed and rigidly formatted like Python only to be disappointed to find it free form. That I could live with, but the markup language he was so thrilled to be working with had me cringing in my shorts.

So I wrote him a note asking him about it and if he could tell me what the benefits of the changes were supposed to bring. He replied telling me I would find more information here. I got had. Unless you click on both links you will not understand the how and why, so I encourage you to follow them. Argh!

Best wishes to all!

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Some of the C# code that Wise released recently to help automate some of the functionality of the database has some errors. Predominately this one:
Iterate Through a Collection of Packages

Object cs;
package.Read("MSIPRODUCTCODE",out cs,null);
Trace.WriteLine("package: " + pack.Name + " ProductCode: " + cs.ToString() );

Instead of:

Object cs;
pack.Read("MSIPRODUCTCODE",out cs,null);
Console.WriteLine("package: " + pack.Name + " ProductCode: " + cs.ToString() );

Another thing they fail to point out is that you must have Repository.dll from the Manager directory under its program files registered in order to declare it with a "using" statement in C#. In fact if you are learning C# only to automate some of the work you are in for a rude surprise. None of the code examples work as is and the predominant attitude in the documentation is that you are supposed to know what you are doing so the sparse examples and terse explanations are to be of some help. If you are not well versed in C# programming or COM in general then you can toss up your hands or put your nose to the grindstone and see what it takes to get under the hood without having to become a C# expert as a second occupation.

C# does look to be a very promising alternative to Python for Windows utilities.

3/16/06 Update: I did not realize the code was not showing. For some reason the editor showed it that day and now it doesn't. Go figure. It is "fixed" now although I will have to find out what the special code words are that allow you to post code without changes being done to it.

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I will be going to the Wise seminar on the 10th of March to give the whole team an opportunity to take a look at the whole product in action. This should be a good demo of what I am expecting for them learn and what I have to teach them.

I have been quite busy populating the databases, learning how C# interfaces with the repository and find ways to use it for reporting or other information. It is something of a learning curve since I have not taken a good look at it to date. It does look like I can use it so I expect I will be posting some C# code in the future as a means of manipulating Wise and its repositories among other common utility uses. I still like using wisescript for quick and dirty utilities but C# has more functionality that I am going to explore even though it is more time consuming to use and get a working project.

Later!

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Here is a link to the newest article to the database.

Device drivers are often a under the radar type application. Install them once and that is it, you never return. Yet even drivers have patches and how do you determine what systems have what patches. What do you use as a reference for this? Wise of course. Like anything else it takes some foresight and thought on how to set it up in order to make the best use of it. While a device driver database will not provide any real functionality with regard to conflict management it does provide revision tracking and reference information that you can utilitize with other reporting tools by being able to precisely target a set of systems by what driver is installed on them and what file version(s) can be found on a subset of those systems.

Device drivers are time consuming though. Unlike a MSI which is imported once, importing a device driver can spawn 60+ instances due to the different configurations a single INF file may support. And of course changing the package status from Under Development to Available is a royal pain in the rear. But I also include a tip with a short cut method of doing this. How much of a shortcut? Not much, but it is better than no shortcut at all. I wish there was a preselection for device drivers to set them as available after importing but this feature does not exist.

Enjoy!

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Here is a short blurb on how to use subscriptions in Wise Package Studio.

Enjoy!

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John McFadden has written up a good post on self healing.  This is a nice little gotcha that we all get bitten by occasionally.  Here is his take on how to fix these problems and how to set up self healing when you need it as well. 


Enjoy!   Not bad reading and it contains information you usually have to figure out yourself because the classes don't always seem to get enough depth on the crucial stuff or you were sleeping at the time the instructor was discussing it.