Blog
26
Jul, 2017
Dear readers, are you ready for Friday? July is coming to a close, and that means it’s almost time to celebrate System Administrator Day! The holiday is on July the 28th.
We’d like to sincerely congratulate all admins on this wonderful day! You are the true heroes, quietly preserving the peace and order in corporate networks. May the force be with you!
We highly value what you do and hope that our products make your work a bit more pleasant. Therefore, once again, we are lowering the prices for all our licenses until August 11:
Total Network Inventory 3
Total Software Deployment 2
Total Network Monitor 2
The discount is applied automatically when you order from our site.
And what is a holiday without gifts?! Starting today (June 26) and during the next 7 days, we’ll be handing out Total Software Deployment 2 licenses for 25 devices to anyone interested.
To receive your license, send us an email!
-20%
Offer ended on August 11
TSD 25 node license
FREE until August 1
17
Jul, 2017
Hello to all!
The latest update for Total Network Inventory 3 is out. As we promised, it’s the reworked Active Directory synchronization module. The synchronization process becomes more convenient and informative, and more tweaks can be made.
As usual, before diving into details, we offer you the full list of changes and improvements:
In this window, you can browse the proposed changes and choose what elements should be updated. Don’t want to move devices? Uncheck it. Want to update information for specific computers? Select only those. Synchronize users only? Easy. All done quickly and conveniently.
- NewAbility to synchronize computers and users with a different domain.
- NewAuto-picking passwords for logging into the domain during AD sync.
- NewA window with preliminary results allowing to view and control the synchronization (when launching manually).
- NewSynchronization results are logged to a text file.
- NewAbility to schedule synchronization with AD.
- ImprovedAD synchronization algorithm.
- ImprovedSynchronization settings were optimized.
- ImprovedCorrect handling of renamed devices during synchronization.
- ImprovedDetection of the current and root domains at startup.
- ImprovedThe process of automatic synchronization at startup and on a schedule is invisible to the user.
- + Some other fixes and improvements.
Auto-sync on a schedule
As you probably know, synchronization with AD could only be initiated manually or when the program itself is started. Yes, we agree with you that this is sometimes not enough. And that’s why a new method was added: automatic synchronization on a schedule. Simply set up the Scheduler, and the program will synchronize with AD exactly when it suits you! We’d like to point out that synchronization at startup will be disabled after you update. But worry not, you can either enable this setting again, or switch to only using the Scheduler.Preliminary synchronization results
New capabilities will be available when you start the synchronization manually. You’ll be able to preview the changes as shown here:
In this window, you can browse the proposed changes and choose what elements should be updated. Don’t want to move devices? Uncheck it. Want to update information for specific computers? Select only those. Synchronize users only? Easy. All done quickly and conveniently.
Other improvements
Another new helpful feature is trying different logins for AD. If TNI fails to start the synchronization using the current user’s credentials, the program will automatically try to find the correct login from among those listed on the Edit – All logins tab. Also, all synchronization operations will from now on be logged to adsync.log which is located in the following folder: C:\ProgramData\Total Network Inventory 3 And another thing we ought to highlight: now it’s possible to synchronize with a domain that the current computer does not belong to. Update your TNI and enjoy the new features. See you next time!
06
Jul, 2017
Hello, dear readers of our blog! It’s been a long time since the last major Total Software Deployment update. But today we certainly have a big one! Since the release of the very first version, we knew that TSD would eventually gain this feature, and numerous feedbacks have confirmed that it’s essential.
As you may have guessed, today’s update is dedicated to the new remote MSI uninstallation module. There’s no need for any more scripts or parameters. A few mouse clicks – and the unnecessary program will be correctly uninstalled on just one, a few or all network computers. The new functionality is very convenient and gives complete freedom of action!
It’s worth noting that you don’t need its MSI package in order to uninstall a program. It’s enough to just to scan the computer and select the soon-to-be-uninstalled software from the list. Simple and easy. In the future updates, we plan to expand the list of supported installer types.
Another important feature of this update is the new MSI package deployment engine. This improvement will greatly improve the likelihood of successful deployment when using the Silent method. You will also have an opportunity to analyze any errors that may occur in detail. And most notably, now you don’t need to worry about the installation context. TSD works correctly with packages configured to be installed either per-user or per-machine.
If you go to program options in TSD 2, you will find new sections dealing with Deployment and Uninstallation. Now TSD can automatically rescan the computers where deployment was completed successfully. And as for those computers where errors have occurred during the deployment, TSD can automatically save them to a separate list of deployment targets. This will allow you to easily attempt deployment again after having identified and removed the cause of these errors. Also, on the deployment panel, we added buttons allowing to manually filter and save such lists:
In addition, several aspects of the network tree were improved to allow for better usability: the search engine, the filters, and the way the computers are displayed and selected. And these are only some of the improvements that you will encounter!
We love sharing good news with you, but it’ll be much better if you check out all the new Total Software Deployment features in action! You can download the update either by following this link or in the program itself, by clicking Help – Check for updates. Until next time!
P.S.: don’t forget to keep checking for updates to Total Network Inventory. As we’ve already mentioned, it will bring improvements to the AD synchronization feature.
- BIG FEATUREUninstallation of MSI packages.
- BIG FEATUREThe list of software installed on computers in the network storage.
- BIG FEATURENew technology for deploying MSI packages using the Silent method.
- NewSearch in the List of installed software. Allows to find any software on computers in the network storage.
- NewGroup of deployment and uninstallation settings.
- NewWhen the deployment is complete, you can now filter the results according to whether the deployment was successful, and then save the filtered deployment targets to a new list.
- NewOption to automatically save computers with deployment errors to a new list of deployment targets.
- NewOption to automatically rescan computers if the deployment was successful.
- ImprovedParameters for recording the Silent method for the MSI installer type were changed. The default command line was changed, and an information panel with recommendations was added.
- ImprovedBoth storages can now be searched using logical AND and OR operations (‘+’ and ‘,’ respectively).
- ImprovedMultiple selection in the network tree. It can now be used when working with computer properties, logins and the list of installed software.
- FixedErrors when adding computers with certain properties to the Deployment targets list.
- FixedErrors when halting deployment.
- FixedDeployment failure when the “Use network discovery” setting is off.
- + Many other fixes and improvements.
The full changelog can be found on the update screen in the program itself.
First off, we want to highlight the new Uninstall tab. Now nothing prevents you from removing programs from network computers as easily as installing them! Select one or more computers in the tree, and you’ll see a complete list of software installed on them. Using search, you can quickly find the necessary (or rather, unnecessary) programs in the list. What remains is to put them on the uninstall task list and press one button:
It’s worth noting that you don’t need its MSI package in order to uninstall a program. It’s enough to just to scan the computer and select the soon-to-be-uninstalled software from the list. Simple and easy. In the future updates, we plan to expand the list of supported installer types.
Another important feature of this update is the new MSI package deployment engine. This improvement will greatly improve the likelihood of successful deployment when using the Silent method. You will also have an opportunity to analyze any errors that may occur in detail. And most notably, now you don’t need to worry about the installation context. TSD works correctly with packages configured to be installed either per-user or per-machine.
If you go to program options in TSD 2, you will find new sections dealing with Deployment and Uninstallation. Now TSD can automatically rescan the computers where deployment was completed successfully. And as for those computers where errors have occurred during the deployment, TSD can automatically save them to a separate list of deployment targets. This will allow you to easily attempt deployment again after having identified and removed the cause of these errors. Also, on the deployment panel, we added buttons allowing to manually filter and save such lists:
In addition, several aspects of the network tree were improved to allow for better usability: the search engine, the filters, and the way the computers are displayed and selected. And these are only some of the improvements that you will encounter!
We love sharing good news with you, but it’ll be much better if you check out all the new Total Software Deployment features in action! You can download the update either by following this link or in the program itself, by clicking Help – Check for updates. Until next time!
P.S.: don’t forget to keep checking for updates to Total Network Inventory. As we’ve already mentioned, it will bring improvements to the AD synchronization feature.