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unattend.xml changes not applying

Unanswered unattend.xml changes not applying

  • Saturday, June 09, 2012 12:02 AM
     
     
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    when creating a new task sequence it asks for registered owner which i provided.  when trying to change the registered in owner in the unattend.xml file, that change is not applied on later deployments.  i would expect that any changes made to the unattend.xml file would be immediately applied to subsequent deployments.  is this not the case?
     

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  • Monday, June 11, 2012 10:42 PM
     
     
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    when creating a new task sequence it asks for registered owner which i provided.  when trying to change the registered in owner in the unattend.xml file, that change is not applied on later deployments.  i would expect that any changes made to the unattend.xml file would be immediately applied to subsequent deployments.  is this not the case?
    Can anyone confirm or dispute a similar experience?
     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 10:48 PM
     
     
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    I've not had this issue, however the only think I could suggest is that you also have the RegisteredOwner variable populated in your CustomSettings.ini file so it's overwriting the contents of your unattend.xml as soon as a ZTIConfigure is run.

    Check ZTIConfigure.log to see what the deal is. Alternatively press F8 when it's in PE to stop it rebooting and see what's in the unattend.xml that's been copied to your machine to make sure it's using the correct file.

     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 10:53 PM
     
     
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    I've not had this issue, however the only think I could suggest is that you also have the RegisteredOwner variable populated in your CustomSettings.ini file so it's overwriting the contents of your unattend.xml as soon as a ZTIConfigure is run.

    Check ZTIConfigure.log to see what the deal is. Alternatively press F8 when it's in PE to stop it rebooting and see what's in the unattend.xml that's been copied to your machine to make sure it's using the correct file.

    Not in my cs.ini.  I will try the F8 trick.  Where will I find the unattend.xml file?

    Did you actually try modifying your unattend.xml and run a deploy on MDT 2012?

     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 10:57 PM
     
     
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    C:\Minint\unattend.xml and/or C:\Windows\Panther

    I wouldnt say I update unattend.xml all the time, but sure, I've done it in the past. At the end of the day if you have value X in unattend.xml but the end result is Y then its a matter of finding out what's changing X to Y and at what stage.

    It is definitely a sysprepped image you're applying? I'd definitely suggest giving your ZTIConfigure.log a quick skim for the value RegisteredOwner and see what it says.

     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 11:14 PM
     
     
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    I will check it out.  These are all new installs and not from any sort of image.  If you are running MDT 2012 I would be interested in your experience by simply changing the RegisteredOwner in your unattend.xml and see what a quick test deploy produces?
     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 11:14 PM
     
     
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    Not sure if you found the solution to this, and somebody correct me if I am wrong. When you add the Org name, MAK Key, etc when creating a task sequence, it populates the unattend.xml found in your deployment share located in <DeploymentShare>\Control\<TaskSequence>unattend.xml. Editing this should change the value after the OS is applied unless you have it configured in your CS.ini. 

    Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread. ”

     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 11:18 PM
     
     
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    This is my understanding as well.  So what I am doing is going into the properties of the particular TS I am working with, and clicking on the Edit Unattend.xml button under the OS Info tab.  Changes I am making elsewhere seem to be applying.  However not to RegisteredOwner.
     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 11:21 PM
     
     
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    Could you try opening up the \{TaskSequenceID}\Unattend.xml file in Internet Explorer and check that the value is set there also (just in case something weird is happening when you click the "Edit unattend.xml" button - as unlikely as it is, its worth the 10 seconds it takes to check :)
     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 11:23 PM
     
     
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    yup!  just looked at it, and my edits are being applied as expected.  i am running a test deploy now.
     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 11:28 PM
     
     
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    I know this may not matter, but have you tried updating the deployment share?

    Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread. ”

     
  • Monday, June 11, 2012 11:58 PM
     
     
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    Not only did I update, I completely regenderated the boot image, and then reloaded that image on the WDS server.  So get this.  My unattend.xml in c:\windows\panther\unattend.xml shows a totally different RegisterdOwner that what is showing when running winver.  What is showing when I run winver is exactly what I typed during the creation of the MDT Share.  After creating that share, editing the unattend.xml saves on the share and is even copies to the deployed computer, but is not being applied to the OS.  This has to be a bug right?  Can anyone recreate this?  I wonder what other unattend.xml info is not being properly applied?
     
  • Tuesday, June 12, 2012 11:59 AM
     
     
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    When you ran sysprep, did you add the Org info anywhere, whether it be in an MDT task sequence or manually? Can you mount the wim and look in the sysprep folder to see if there is an answer file with the Org name?

    Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread. ”

     
  • Tuesday, June 12, 2012 7:00 PM
     
     
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    I did not run sysprep (at least not manually).  These are fresh installs.
     
  • Tuesday, June 12, 2012 8:47 PM
     
     
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    I dont know how to mount the wim or where the sysprep folder is located.  i would be happy to look with some instruction?  thanks!
     
  • Tuesday, June 12, 2012 9:27 PM
     
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    Changes made in the unattend.xml that’s used with the task sequence, should reflect immediately upon saving the file and any subsequent installation.

    Sysprep will only occur when you actually define a Windows installation to be captured, since you mention that you’re doing a fresh install, this will not be the case so I honestly won’t bother taking a look at this.

    However, using Imagex /Mountrw D:\Install.wim 1 C:\Mount would mount a install.wim file located at the root of D to the path of C:\Mount (this folder needs to be created beforehand and also has to be empty). The sysprep folder can be found at \Windows\System32\Sysprep

    I have updated my existing MDT2010 share to 2012, in which I had edited a lot of the unattend.xml files to enable audit mode. This change was still preserved upon running these task sequences from a MDT2012 environment.

    I also have a fresh 2012 dev environment, in which I changed the Registered Owner value (however I didn’t edit the unattend.xml for that since I crashed it from scratch, but it writes it to the unattend.xml during the wizard) which reflects correctly on the deployed OS as shown below.

    		<component name="Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup">
    			<ComputerName>Valkyrie</ComputerName>
			<RegisteredOrganization>HydraCorps</RegisteredOrganization>
			<RegisteredOwner>Windows User</RegisteredOwner>
			<DoNotCleanTaskBar>true</DoNotCleanTaskBar>
			<TimeZone>W. Europe Standard Time</TimeZone>
		</component>

    What I could advice to check, is to look at a deployed OS, in the C:\Windows\Panther folder and open up the unattend.xml file, this is the unattend.xml file that was used during the installation and you can verify all values that were processed.

    If this file does not match the changes you’ve made, you somehow still end up using or editing a wrong file.

    Kind regards,

    Stephan Schwarz

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    My Blog | Twitter: @Schwarz_Stephan | MCTS, MCITP, MCC.
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