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Automatic Task Sequence Selection from USB Drive?

Unanswered Automatic Task Sequence Selection from USB Drive?

  • Wednesday, February 27, 2013 7:30 PM
     
     
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    Hey Guys,

    This is an odd question, and I'm a little doubtful that it's possible, but what the heck, maybe someone knows a way...

    I "need" to be able to store separate Task Sequences on different thumb drives. Then when I boot into a LightTouch DVD, have it automatically check for attached USB devices for a Task List, and then, having found one, automatically select and use it so that the tech has nothing to do but to make sure that they have the USB drive plugged in, and boot from the DVD.

    The goal is to be able to use a single basic image to perform automated installations of different configurations

     

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  • Friday, March 01, 2013 9:00 PM
     
     
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    You can always create a standalone media for a USB memory, and boot from that. When you create it you can specify what selection profile you should use. That way you can select the OS images, drivers, applications/bad drivers, and task sequences. When you boot from it you will run a normal LTI scenario and get guided through a default installation scenario where you get to choose diffrent between the diffrent Task Sequences. You can still have just one OS image, just a few diffrent Task Sequences using the same base media, and do diffrent things with each Task Sequence.

    I would create a linked deployment share, syncronise over the OS, Drivers, Apps & TS you need and create the media from that LDS (as it will get a customsettings.ini of its own) This is how I have setup my MDT for future Win8 Tablet installations, mainly becuse the 'main' MDT is heavily configured for ZTI and has a customsettings.ini pointing to the MDT database, and then when it cannot talk to it during installation, it gets upsets and breaks the installation.

     
  • Friday, March 01, 2013 10:11 PM
     
     
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    Wow! So how would I go about imaging the USB drive? Can you explain a little more about the "linked deployment share"? and, lastly, out of curiosity, what is the difference between LTI and ZTI?

    Thanks so much~

     
  • Friday, March 01, 2013 10:37 PM
     
     
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    Lars?

    Why would you create a linked deployment share for your offline media? Just to have a customsettings.ini and bootstrap.ini of its own? Each media content you create has an customsettings.ini and bootstrap.ini of its own. No need to create a linked deployment share for that!

    Fubeca6,

    All you need to do is, create a selection profile called "Offline Deployment" for instance, select all the resources used in your task sequence during the creation of the selection profile (like the operating system, the drivers used, the applications that are installed during deployment/installation etc.) and then create offline media based on that selection profile.

    Then MDT will create an offline copy of your MDT environment suitable for use on a USB stick. From there you can modify your customsettings.ini and bootstrap.ini in any way you want regardless of the real 'online' MDT deployment share.

    To achieve automatic task sequence selection, just add the following to rules to your customsettings.ini, under [DEFAULT]:

    SkipTaskSequence=YES
    TaskSequenceID=<tasksequenceID>

    For more info about this, I have written a blog about it: MDT 2012 Settings for fully automated LTI deployment, Part II: Customsettings.ini

    Good luck!

    If this post is helpful please click "Mark for answer", thanks! Kind regards


     
  • Saturday, March 02, 2013 12:08 AM
     
     
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    I'm afraid I'm a bit new to the deployment game. I have a fairly okay grasp of CustomSettings.ini and Bootstrap.ini, so I guess my question is, when you say "and then create offline media based on that selection profile", how do I do that? And once I've done that, how do I edit CustomSettings.ini and Bootstrap.ini for that particular profile?

    Thanks

     
  • Saturday, March 02, 2013 10:52 AM
     
     
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    Basicly I would (and have) crated a linked deployment share for a number of reasons. One is that the main deploymentshare is heavily ZTI configured with database settings, which will populate the customsettings.ini. I really do not want my standalone media trying to query the database during installation if I am installing a tablet/slate without physical nic. True, each media content get a customsettings.ini, but it will as far as my tries has gone, always be based on the deploymentshare you crate it from and will contain information about doing querys to the MDT database, and fail, thus breaking the deployment.

    I mostly use the LDS to create new 'golden' images, since I want the stanard LTI.

    One of the great strengths about MDT is that you can choose a method that suits your scenarios and infrastructure the best. I have looked at your Customsettings Guides before,  and I have used similar setups before, but has moved away from them, mainly becuse it works better in our enviroment to use roles to ZTI configure your deployment and select tasksequences that way.