End to End Automation with MDT
Managing your reference images.
Fred Bainbridge
@FredBainbridge
fbainbridge@skylinetechnologies.com
Daniel Ratliff
@PotentEngineer
www.PotentEngineer.com
Fred Bainbridge
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Sr.
Infrastructure
Engineer
#MMSMOA
15+ years
experience.
MNSCUG, President
FredBainbridge.com
@FredBainbridge
Daniel Ratliff
@potentengineer
Louisville, KY
Technology
Architect
#MMSMOA
10+ years
experience
Co-founder
LouSMUG.org
Get Involved (Keep the internet awesome)
Join or Start your local user group.
Participate in forums
• Technet
• MyItForum
• Etc
Keep a blog.
What this is not How to build a reference image.
A ConfigMgr OSD deep dive.
See: Hacking the Task Sequence
How to write PowerShell
• Learn PowerShell in a Month of Lunches
What this is Solving a business problem.
Automating the reference image creation..…and all that
other crap.
Utilizing simple PowerShell to make life easier.
Why MDT? Simple
PowerShell friendly
Free
It just works!
Defining the Business Problem
What is impacted?
• Build Time, accuracy, etc.
Why is this needed?
• Security Requirements, Lifecycle, etc.
What is the $ Metric?
• Hours / Month? Hours / Build? etc.
Getting Starting
Identify what you need to automate. (
• There is more than just the OS image.
Example Crap -
• Setup a virtual machine
• Stage the device in WDS
• Start the reference image build
• Update a pilot or production task sequence
• Update Azure image
• Clean up
• Log your actions
)
Technical Lab Details
Hyper-V VMs
• Server1
MDT 2013
WDS w/ PXE
- Respond only to known hosts
- Not AD integrated
• Server 2
DHCP, DNS
• [TSID] – VM for the reference build.
- Pre determined MAC address.
MDT Details
Full CustomSettings.ini
Monitoring must be enabled.
The task sequence ID will match
the VM name.
Demo
Automate!
MDT Image automation with Orchestrator
Built off Fred’s scripts
• Same LAB setup
• Uses SCOrch for all automation
• Uses PowerShell for all runbook steps
• Leverages PowerShell 2.0 for native compatibility
• Modified to function with SCOrch
• Reference scripts included for testing
• Single runbook for simplicity’s sake
• Nothing left behind except captured .wim
MDT Details – CustomSettings.ini
Slightly modified CustomSettings.ini
• .wim is timestamped (TSID_MMDDYYYY.wim)
• Runbook parameter must match MAC
• Runbook parameter must match Task Sequence ID
SCOrch Details – Runbook
All steps return Result variable: Success or Fail
• Only continue on Success
Easily modified for value adds
• Send an email on success/fail?
• Add .wim to deployment task sequence?
Required parameters
• MDT server
• MDT deployment share
• MDT task sequence ID
• WDS server
• Hyper-V server
• Hyper-V switch name
• Hyper-V VM root path
• Hyper-V VM MAC address
SCOrch Details – Runbook
Demo
Automate with SCOrch!
Other ways to Automate
SMA
Azure Automation
Service Manager (any Service Management Tool)
Mostly Automated
Phase 2 / The next level
Incident / Request Management
• This one matters the most.
Self Service Portal
SharePoint/Collaboration
Notifications
Test Builds
Scheduling Logic
Discussion - Who said it?
“Building golden images is a bad practice – stop now”
https://twitter.com/hypervserver/status/659505395472441345
-Jeffrey Snover
References
PS Module and Example Scripts
http://1drv.ms/1NxyX9l
Credentials
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh849815.aspx
Invoke-Command
http://fredbainbridge.com/index.php/powershell/29-invokecommand-example
Johan
http://deploymentresearch.com/
PowerShell Function Outline (ctrl+j)
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/hh360993.aspx
References continued
Johan Arwidmark - Building references images like a boss!
http://deploymentresearch.com/Research/Post/357/Building
-reference-images-like-a-boss
Ryan Andorfer - MMS 2014 - Future of SCOrch
http://sched.co/1EkueSo
Hey Scripting Guy! – Use PowerShell to automate MDT
http://blogs.technet.com/b/heyscriptingguy/archive/2011/12/
31/learn-how-to-use-powershell-to-automate-mdtdeployment.aspx
Discuss…
Ask your questions-real world answers!
Plenty of time to engage, share knowledge.
Evaluations: Please provide session feedback by clicking the EVAL button in the scheduler app (also
download slides). One lucky winner will receive a free ticket to the next MMS!
SPONSORS
Session Title: Automating End to End Image Creation with MDT and PowerShell