UpdateWS

Version 2 - Updated 8.9.1999

Automatic Update System with version and group management.

Files:
updatews.exe            - The program
updatews.pas            - Delphi source code
updatews.txt            - You read it
f:\login\wsgroup\       - The data files directory
c:\updatews\config.sys   \
c:\updatews\autoexec.bat |- Alternative startup files
c:\updatews\logo.bmp     /

This program is intended to automatically install workstations in computer
labs with the help of non-push hard disk imaging programs like ghost, hdcp
etc. UpdateWS gives some sort of push capacibilities to those programs. The
assumption is that there are groups of identical workstations that use the
SAME installation of Win95.

Groups are denominated by letters A-Z (others might also work), Versions by
numbers 1,2,3,... (letter, etc might also work).

UpdateWS keeps the group & version of a workstation and its installation in
two environment variables WSGROUP and VERSION that should be set in config.sys

The "current" version is kept on the network in a datafile called
UPDATEWS.DAT in f:\login\wsgroup\WSGROUP\updatews.dat, where WSGROUP is
replaced by the appropriate group denominator. The datafile contains ONE line
containing the current version.

UpdateWS compares the version set in config.sys with the version on the
network and if they are not identical copies config.sys, autoexec.bat from
f:\login\wsgroup\WSGROUP\ to c:\ and logo.bmp from c:\updatews to c:\. After
that it appends two settings to the new config.sys: SET WSGROUP=group and
SET GETVERSION=version from network.

It is up to the new config.sys and autoexec.bat to initiate the correct update
proccess, like connect to the network and install a new installation from
there.

There is no error checking so that the administrator should always double
check his/her work. A common mistake is, especially if using imaging software,
to forget that each image contains its version and that you cannot change that
"internal" version from outside. If you do so the effect will be an endless
loop of installations. If for example image six has internal version 5, after
installing image "6" the workstation thinks it is not "6" and UpdateWS
reinstalls image "6" and so on ...

I advice running UpdateWS from the registry's RunServices section (add
f:\login\UpdateWS.exe to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunServices )
since, at least when using Novells Client32, at that stage network access to
sys:login is already available.

Alternatively one can use a ZEN application associated with the workstation
object. My experience shows that when using CLient32 version 3.1 SP1 I had to
specifically map f:=sys: in order for updatews (or any other program) to run
from the network (I did this in the launch script of the updatews app). I also
had to give the workstation (in my case the workstation group) specific rights
to read from sys:\login (otherwise the map won't work), I did this by giving
rights to the application and thus NDS gives the rights to all associated
objects of the application.

This system leads to asyncronous updates of the workstation (whenever UpdateWS
is run by the workstation). Especially you cannot re-install the same image to
the workstations (since UpdateWS compares version). To fix this problem there
is also a "forced mode" where UpdateWS initiates the update process regardless
of the current version of the workstation. To switch on the forced mode set
the appropriate UPDATEWS.DAT file to read-only. As long as it is read-only,
UpdateWS will reinstall the workstation, therefore I recommend to use this
mode only to reinstall all computers at the same time and then revert
UPDATEWS.DAT to read-write to return to normal mode.

This program is freeware. If distributing please keep all the updatews.* files
together. Feel free to adapt the source code to fit your environment or add
additional features, as long as you note me for the original idea.

Hints:
You can use ANYTHING for WSGROUP and VERSION. All comparisons etc. are done as
strings, not as numbers.

It is most important that in all cases where you give updatews information, there
be no extra spaces (like at the end of "SET VERSION=32 ", or in the data file
updatews.dat) since extra spaces are NOT removed and will lead to loop updates.

You can use the command line parameter FORCE (in capital letters) to force an
update in addition to setting the data file to read only. This is if you want
manually to update a specific workstation. It makes sense to have an
application that runs updatews with the FORCE parameter to enable system admins
to conviniently re-install a workstation.

1998,1999, G. S. Schapiro