This book is organized into the following chapters to guide you through installing ZENworks, setting up ZENworks in NDS, and then leveraging the advanced features of ZENworks to reduce your network-management costs.
Chapter 1 provides a high-level overview of the ZENworks for Desktops system and its components. Additionally, it discusses the different types of packaging of ZENworks for Desktops that are available and what is new in this latest release.
Chapter 2 discusses the prerequisites and design considerations of installing ZENworks for Desktops. It also takes you through the installation of the server and client pieces of ZENworks for Desktops, thus helping you avoid any pitfalls that could result in later problems.
Chapter 3 identifies the steps that must be taken following the install to get your ZENworks for Desktops system up and functioning. In order to get the full effects of ZENworks for Desktops, you must deliver the proper agents to the workstations in your system and import workstations into your tree, allowing you to manage all of your desktops centrally from your NDS tree.
Chapter 4 discusses the ZENworks for Desktops 4 components that allow for Web-based delivery of ZENworks services through a Web browser. It discusses the client and server agents that you will use to enable the ZENworks for Desktops management features to distribute applications, maintain hardware and software inventory, create images, and remotely manage workstations that do not have a Novell client installed, whether they reside inside or outside of your corporate firewall.
Chapter 5 discusses the snAppShot utility and how to use it to create an application object template for later distribution. It discusses why and when you should use snAppShot and describes how snAppShot creates the application object template. It also discusses how to use snAppShot's advanced features, including preferences, special macros, and partial installation detection.
Once you have an understanding of application object templates from Chapter 5, Chapter 6 covers using the template to create application objects and setting them up for distribution. This chapter also familiarizes you with how to set up properties to customize your application objects and how the new application system incorporates Microsoft MSI.
Once you have set up the application object into your eDirectory, as described in Chapter 6, you need to set up the application distribution environment. This chapter covers using ConsoleOne to set up application users to receive applications, use application foldering, and automate application object distribution.
ZENworks for Desktops provides several policies that describe how the system should deal with users. Chapter 8 discusses the various policies that are associated with users of the tree, how to set them up, and the value that they can provide to your system.
Chapter 9 identifies the various workstation policies that are available in the ZENworks for Desktops system. These policies affect the behavior, security, and desktop of all the workstations in your network. This chapter tells you how to set up these policies and make them effective in your network.
Additional policies are available for ZENworks for Desktops that help in describing how the ZENworks for Desktops system can be most effective in your tree and network. Chapter 10 discusses these policies and how they affect the behavior of the agents that are doing the work of getting your settings to your desktops.
ZENworks for Desktops agents must locate several resources in the network in order to perform their jobs. These resources can be SMTP servers or databases. Chapter 11 discusses how you can use the Service Location Policy Package to identify where these resources are found by the agents.
ZENworks for Desktops has now introduced agents that are located on your NetWare or NT servers and are used to facilitate such activities as imaging and inventory. This chapter discusses how the policies in the Server Policy Package can affect the behavior of these server agents.
The inventory system in ZENworks for Desktops allows you to capture the hardware and software components on every workstation in the tree. This chapter discusses the inventory system of ZENworks for Desktops and how to best deploy the inventory system throughout the network and tree to get all of your information about your workstations in the right place.
ZENworks for Desktops allows you to take images of your workstations and apply them to any and all other workstations in the network. Imagine being able to fix a workstation by simply requesting that it re-image itself from your administration workstation. Can you believe that you can even include application objects into these images? This chapter defines how the imaging system works and how you can get those images to contain exactly what you want and the most efficient way to get them onto those workstations.
Chapter 15 identifies the other programs and systems that accompany the ZENworks for Desktops product that will help in identifying problems with desktops in the network and getting those problems fixed. These tools include Remote Control and Remote Diagnostics.
Chapter 16 discusses how to use the ZENworks for Desktops software metering features to give your organization the capability to manage software licenses and track software usage by using ZENworks for Desktops application management and Novell's Licensing Services (NLS). This chapter discusses how to create a license meter certificate and how to assign users to licenses.
Novell has introduced additional ZENworks type products. One of these is ZENworks for Servers, which allows you to perform tasks on the server much like you do for the workstation. ZENworks for Servers includes a function called Tiered-Electronic Distribution, which will move files efficiently through the network and place them on servers. ZENworks for Desktops can interact with ZENworks for Servers, making it easy for you to move your application objects and files throughout the network to your various application servers, and keeping all of them up-to-date with the latest software. This chapter discusses this interaction between these two ZENworks products.
Using Novell's eDirectory and DirXML products allows you to install ZENworks for Desktops 4 into a pure Windows network with minimal requirements on the network side. This chapter covers how to set up and configure your network to install and use ZENworks for Desktops 4 in your pure Windows environment.
ZENworks for Desktops is an extremely powerful tool that will save network administrators much needed time. However, because of the complexity of network environments, problems can occur that prevent ZENworks for Desktops from doing its job. Chapter 19 covers how to troubleshoot and diagnose those problems in the following areas: desktop management, distributed applications, policy packages, NDS, and NetWare errors.
Appendix A identifies all of the objects and attribute changes that ZENworks for Desktops performs on your Novell eDirectory tree.
Appendix B first explains a detailed example of using the snAppShot utility to create an application object package for distribution to other workstations. Second, Appendix B gives a detailed review of the application object template created. The purpose of Appendix B is to give you practical experience and knowledge of application object templates.
This appendix lists other places you can go to get more help with your ZENworks for Desktops implementation.