Remove Legacy client and replace with latest new client?

Kiweegie

I have about 300 machines which were all imaged with an earlier FOG version (started using it back in late 0.2X days).

These machines have the legacy client on them and I’m keen to deploy the latest client in its place (0.9.9 I believe). I’ve searched the forums and can see that others have asked the question and can see some people mentioning GPO to remove the old one amongst other things. Is that the best accepted way or can the client update be done all through FOG itself?

I’m guessing the client itself is used during snapin deployment so we can’t snapin this? And I found the client updater within the FOG configuration window in the GUI can that be used in some way to update the client or is that just for things like GreenFOG etc?

When last I investigated this I think the client had to be built into the image itself though I’d prefer to just update the client rather than completely reimage.

regards, Kiweegie.

Wayne Workman

@Kiweegie I’m working on this myself now.

I’m figuring out some authentication issue before I can focus on it again.

Joe Schmitt

@Kiweegie GPO is your best bet. One msiexec to remove the old client, and then another to install the new one.

george1421

If you have a little time the following is well worth the effort to setup. Download and install PDQ Deploy (free). The free version will work for most needs. But I do have to say the paid for features are well worth the small cost.

But setup PDQ Deploy (you will need an admin account for each machine to do this BTW) but create a new package with the old MSI, the new MSI and a batch file. In that batch file run the uninstaller to remove the old client and then call the new msi.

The batch file would do something like this:

@Echo off
msiexec /x “oldclient.msi”
msiexec /i “newclient.msi”

and that’s it. For the package you will include all files and then for your deployment you can select all computers in an OU or add them one by one. Either way. When you execute the job you will get a list of successful completions and a list of failed units. You can address the issue with the failed units and reapply the package to just the failed systems. This way you know for sure what clients got upgraded and which ones you need to visit.

Wayne Workman

That sounds like a 100% legit method.

But if you’re patient, I’ll eventually post a script that will do it all.

george1421

Not to over emphasize PDQ Deploy here, but once you get it setup and create the first package (i.e. create a folder in the packages directory, drop in your MSI and if your install requires more steps create and test a cmd file to execute the multiple steps (only required for the free version) plus any additional files and save your package, then pick deploy select the computers out of an AD OU and hit deploy. You can’t do this with a script (well not as easy). You have a install trail with PDQ and can reissue jobs to failed systems all with the free version. The paid for version can do quite a bit more, no scripting required.

jmeyer

@george1421

I just made a .bat with this inside and it looks to work fine.

@echo off
msiexec /qn /x "FOG Service Installer.msi"
msiexec /qn /i "FOGService.msi"

Thank you.

jmeyer

@Wayne-Workman I don’t know what change in old client but I wasn’t able to remove it using the msi of the “old client” freshly downloaded from GUI.
I had to use the .msi stored by system.

Is there edit made in the last “old client” ?

Wayne Workman

@jmeyer I’m going to focus on this today - I’ll come up with something.

Wayne Workman

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Wayne Workman

This post is deleted!

Wayne Workman

@Kiweegie @jmeyer

I spent this Sunday morning doing this, I got it going on my Win7 machine here.

I’ve been unsuccessful in getting it to run as a snapin through the Legacy FOG Client in the current trunk. Not sure what’s going on there, but my plan is to push this out as a startup script tomorrow at work for my office computers and see how it goes.

This checks for the existence of the fog.ca file, if it isn’t there, it runs the code to remove the old fog client and then pull the new one from the specified server and install it.

0_1450028485260_UpgradeFogClient.bat

It’d be appreciated if folks fill out my survey below.

jmeyer

@Wayne-Workman Downloading the client from server wasn’t something I have think about. Nice one.
It’s not “fog.ca.cer” that we should look for instead of “fog.ca” ?
I don’t think to have %ProgramFiles(x86)% under my 32 bits OS !

I go lunch and I’ll look at this part this afternoon if you don’t do it before me.

edit :

IF %PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE%==amd64 SET programpath=Program Files ^(x86^)
IF %PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE%==x86 SET programpath=Program Files
IF NOT EXIST "%systemdrive%\%programpath%\FOG\fog.ca.cer" (
set FogServerIP=fog-server
set GetID=wmic product where "Version like '3.0.29' and name like 'FOG Service'" get IdentifyingNumber
for /F "skip=1 delims=" %%i in ('%GetID%') do if not defined ID set "ID=%%i"
setlocal
IF "%ID%" NEQ "" start /wait msiexec /x %ID% /q
start /wait bitsadmin /transfer FOGService /download /priority normal http://%FogServerIP%/fog/client/FOGService.msi %temp%\FOGService.msi
start /wait msiexec /i %temp%\FOGService.msi /quiet WEBADDRESS="%FogServerIP%"
endlocal
)

“set” doesn’t look to work when put after “setlocal” for me so I have moved it upper…
How are you sure that old client is version 3.0.29 ?

Wayne Workman

@jmeyer Very nice improvement!

I love how we collaborate here. The beauties of open source.

Wayne Workman

@jmeyer said:

How are you sure that old client is version 3.0.29 ?

I pulled the latest FOG Trunk on Sunday at home, and installed the legacy client.

Running this command will return all software installed on Win7: wmic product get > products.txt

and the legacy fog client reports that it is version 3.0.29.

Wayne Workman

So I’m not having any luck with either of the scripts, as a startup script or a shutdown script. $:-\$

They run if I just double click on them. But not as a startup script through group policy.

I’m about to just test a simple script to remove the old client by ID - and then install the new client through group policy.

Wayne Workman

I ended up going with just a one-liner to uninstall the old client with msiexec by ID, and then I used Orca to edit the new MSI to point to the correct address, and I used Group Policy Software Deployment to push out the new MSI.

My building is officially running the new client.

jmeyer

@Wayne-Workman I don’t know the use of “setlocal”. I did my best keeping it since script wasn’t working at all without but I start to think it’s messing somewhere.
Maybe the “start /wait” is ignored because of this ?
I haven’t test it via GPO since my simple one made before was working fine but had to put all msi with it.

jmeyer

@Wayne-Workman I’ll work a bit more on the script.
edit :

IF %PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE%==AMD64 set programpath=%programfiles(x86)%
IF %PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE%==x86 set programpath=%programfiles%
IF EXIST "%programpath%\FOG\fog.ca.cer" GOTO END
set FogServerIP=fogserver
set GetID=wmic product where "Version like '3.0.29' and name like 'FOG Service'" get IdentifyingNumber
for /F "skip=1 delims=" %%i in ('%GetID%') do if not defined ID set "ID=%%i"
IF "%ID%" NEQ "" start /wait msiexec /x %ID% /q
start /wait bitsadmin /transfer FOGService /download /priority normal http://%FogServerIP%/fog/client/FOGService.msi %temp%\FOGService.msi
start /wait msiexec /i %temp%\FOGService.msi /quiet WEBADDRESS="%FogServerIP%"
:END

This should works but I don’t know wwhy my download end in queue when there is nothing else to do and I can’t install client silently… I love computers…

Wayne Workman

@jmeyer That’s a lot cleaner, I like the GOTO END part. I haven’t seen that since I was studying a then-obsolete book on Visual Basic back in 1999 that I got for a quarter at a school library sale. It takes me back.

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