April 9, 2009 at 15:27The friendliest ghost.
Ghost
In less than six months, I finally had a moment to write a long-promised explanation. Of course, I mean a note about why I recommend using the Symantec Ghost Solution Suite to perform the routine task of maintaining the software on a large fleet of machines in an adequate and current state.
Let's get started
So, what is a Solution Suite? And he presents a software package consisting of the following tools:
- AI Builder
- Ghost boot wizzard
- Ghost console
- Ghost explorer
- Ghostcast server
- Ghost
- Ghostwalker
- User Migration Package Explorer
Honestly, I did not find how the first and last points could be useful for our purposes. But everything else is very, very valuable tools. Let's start in order.
Ghost boot wizzard
As the name implies, this is a wizard to create bootable disks and Ghost images. Native features include creating bootable disks and Linux images, WinPE, Pc-Dos. If you have somewhere floppy disk from 98 Windows (Or you know how to use Google) then boot images of Ms-Dos are also created.
Immediately outline the situation. WinPE is perfect for booting from sidyuk, and the network firewalls get up on their own and if the turnaround is not very large and badly squeezed then you can beautifully unfold with sd / dvd. To transfer the image over the network, it is a bit big, about ~ 300 meters.
Linux Generally a very strange thing. The most valuable thing that this item gives is the ability to tear out the Ghost binary for Linux. With the practical use of the assembly, what comes out of this wizard is a lot of difficulties and problems.
Pc-dos. It is stated that it is fully compatible with the drivers for Ms-Dos, but in practice there are unpleasant surprises, so it is possible to use, but not very convenient.
MS-Dos. Here it is eldorado. Got it. Geeks can chuckle ridiculously at the hackneyed boot disks of Windows 95-98. And rejoice in the fact that they found a real application. For transmission over the network (as we talked about in previous articles), the ideal option is due to its small volume, the presence of a good driver repository, including a (almost) universal one. I use this option for my needs.
Ghost explorer
A simple but not the most convenient utility for working with captured images of hard drives. Allows you to watch their contents, as well as change it. Everything is simple and no additional comments, it seems to me, is not necessary.
Ghostcast server
A key element of the whole system. This application in any of three modes (Multicast, Unicast, Broadcast) transfers images of hard drives to client machines. There are many conveniences like setting up a multicast range, auto start, and the most delicious is transmitting keys to clients to change their explicitly specified settings depending on the current server settings. Extremely simple settings in the general case are limited by the name of the session, the command (take an image, fill in the image), the path to the image file, and the disk / partition number. Trivially.
Ghost
The client part, which in the absence of a network can perform all the same functions, but referring only to local disks. Working in a network with an automation key, it does not require anything from the user except the session name, after which it performs everything in quiet mode. Without it, all settings can be made on each machine separately.
Ghostwalker
Post-casting utility designed to rename a machine and change its SID. It works both in user mode and in automatic mode, which cannot but rejoice.
Ghost console
The heart of the package. And his Achilles' heel.
I explain.
From this part, any actions can be performed, and without tambourines. A little one-time setup (creating an AD record, collecting information about serviced machines, creating tasks), and everything will happen in 2-3 clicks or on a schedule. In general, not a utility - a dream).
Now about the sad. This is the only licensed part of the package, the trial version allows you to control 10 machines for 30 days. On the other hand, dances with tambourines described in previous articles do not require this part at all, and all other components work perfectly and being unregistered.
The second minus, to perform a zero fill (that is, there is no OS at all on the machines), you still need the tambourines described earlier.
Here it is the most friendly and useful network ghost.
Now, if there are those who wish, I can draw step-by-step instructions for setting up the entire system for uploading hard images over the network.