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Backup and Restore database on MySQL using phpMyAdmin

linglom — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 02:44:54 +0000

MySQL is one of the most popular DBMS and widely used by many websites as back-end database for storing content. And many people use phpMyAdmin to manage their databases on MySQL because of its friendly user interface, perform many tasks easily, etc. But one of the important thing that most people forgot to do is to backup databases. I heard many people have lost their content on websites because they didn’t backup their databases. When some incident happens to the server (for instance, power failure, hard disk broke, malicious attack, etc.), there may be a chance that your data is damaged. So it is wisely to backup your databases regularly and keep it in a secure place.

This article shows you how to backup and restore database on MySQL using phpMyAdmin. You can choose to backup/restore tables in a database or databases so I have separate steps into different sections as below.

Section

Sample Database
If you want to learn by follow this article, you can download sample database from this section and follow article in restoration section first.
Backup tables in a database
Backup entire database(s)
Restore tables to a database
Restore entire database(s)

Step-by-step

Sample Database

You can download sample database for MySQL at http://dev.mysql.com/doc/index-other.html. In this example, I use “world” database.
There are 3 tables in world database as you see in the figure below.

Backup tables in a database

This section shows how to backup tables in a database. You can select which tables that you want to backup or all of them.

Select the database that you want to backup and click on Export. Notice I have selected “world” database on top (localhost -> world).
On Export page, there are many configurations that you can customize for export. By default, all tables in the database are selected for export which you can see that they are all highlighted in export section (city, country, countrylanguage). Also, you can select which file type that you want, for example, SQL, CSV, Excel, etc. In this example, I use default configuration and scroll down to the bottom of the page. Next, click Go button on the right. This will export all tables in “world” database including its records (data).
The popup window appears. Select Save File and click OK and the exported file will be saved to your computer.
Now you have backup the selected tables in “world” database. Here is sample content of the exported file in SQL format.

Backup entire database(s)

The previous section backup only tables in a database. This section will shows how to backup entire database. You can select one or more databases for backup.

On phpMyAdmin main’s page, click on Export. Notice that I haven’t select any database yet on top (localhost).
On Export page, there are many configurations that you can customize for export as similar to the previous section. In this example, select the database that you want to backup, “world” database. Next, scroll down to the bottom of the page and click Go button on the right.
Note: You can select more than one databases.
The popup window appears. Select Save File and click OK and the exported file will be saved to your computer.
Now you have backup the selected database. Here is sample content of the exported file in SQL format.

Restore tables to a database

This section shows how to restore (import) tables from a backup file into a database. If you have an exported file which derived from section backup tables in a database, you will have to create a database manually and select that database before follow steps below.

Select the database that you want to restore tables to. In this example, I have a “world” database which is an empty database (no tables). Click on Import.
On Import page, click Browse button and browse to the location where you keep the backup file. Then, click Go on the bottom right.
If there is no error while importing tables, you will see the green section display as figure below. Notice that the tables have been imported to the database on the left side.

Restore entire database(s)

This section shows how to restore (import) database(s) from a backup file.

On phpMyAdmin main’s page, click on Import. Notice that I haven’t select any database yet on top (localhost).
On Import page, click Browse button and browse to the location where you keep the backup file. Then, click Go on the bottom right.
If there is no error while importing database(s), you will see the green section display as figure below. Notice that the database(s) have been imported to MySQL on the left side.

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How to Silently Install Dot Net Framework 2.0 Using Batch File

linglom — Tue, 19 May 2009 06:57:12 +0000

Introduction

When you develop an application using Microsoft Visual Studio, it always requires Microsoft .NET Framework to be installed on clients in order to run the application but the required version may be vary depends on applications. Even third-party software around the world today are sometimes require Microsoft .NET Framework so you should install .NET Framework on clients at the first time you prepare them. But generally, there are computers which actively using by users and don’t have .NET Framework. Therefore, you should find a solution to install .NET Framework on clients without interrupt them. There are many solutions to solve the problem. In this post, I show how to silently install .NET Framework 2.0 SP1 on a local computer. The minimum recommend version is 2.0 Service Pack 1. Currently, the most updated version is 3.5 Service Pack 1.

Silently installation means that the software is installed in background so it doesn’t require any user interaction while it’s installing. It is a useful method for deploy software to clients without interrupt users.

First of all, you have to download .NET 2.0 SP1 from Microsoft. Then, I’ll show the command use to install in silent mode. After that, I create a batch file to run the command to make the installation easier.

Note: To install .NET Framework 2.0 SP1, it requires Windows Installer 3.1 to be installed first.

Step-by-step

Download Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 from Microsoft.
- Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 (x86) – 23.6 MB
- Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 (x64) – 46.9 MB
On a client, open command prompt by Start -> Run -> type cmd -> press Enter.
Use /q parameter to install .NET Framework 2.0 SP1 in silent mode. Type “C:\NetFx20SP1_x86.exe /q”.
Note: The path to file of yours may not be the same as the example.
You won’t notice any dialog or user input message. But you can check if there is any error on the installation in Application Event Log. This is the example of the successfully installation message.
Product: Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 – Update ‘.NET Framework CRT’ installed successfully.
Note: There are also other messages in the event log about the installation. This is just one of them.
You can also observe in Add or Remove Programs if .NET Framework has been installed or not. Click Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Add or Remove Programs.
Next, to make the installation more practical. I’ll move the installation file to a shared folder on \\192.168.125.12\MISC so you don’t need to copy the installation file to a target computer every time. Then, I create a batch file to execute the installation in silent mode so you don’t have to type the command every time.
The batch file will look as similar as below:
\\192.168.125.12\MISC\NetFx20SP1_x86.exe /q
Now I’ve tried to install the software by execute the batch file with a normal user credential. I have observed an error message below.
Setup discover the following problem:
You must have administrative privileges to run Microsoft.NET Framework 2.0 SP1 Setup. Please contact your system administrator.
The error message stated clearly that the current user doesn’t has privilege to install a software. To solve the problem, I use “runas” command to execute the installation as a domain administrator (virtual\administrator). Modify the batch file to be as below.
runas /user:virtual\administrator “\\192.168.125.12\MISC\NetFx20SP1_x86.exe /q”
Note: You can view the command reference by follow the link at the bottom.
Now try to run the batch file with a normal user credential again. It’ll ask for domain administrator’s password (the account which I’ve specified in the batch file). Type the password and press Enter.
Note: The password won’t show on the screen.
After a few minutes, observe the Application Event Log. You’ll see the message similar as the figure below.
Product: Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 — Installation completed successfully.
Note: In user column, the user is virtual\administrator which isn’t the current user logon but it’s the user that I’ve specified in the batch file.

Reference

Command-line reference – Runas

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Automate Backup Database on SQL Server, Part II: Create Scheduled Task

linglom — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 02:19:41 +0000

Create a Scheduled Task

From the previous part, I have created a VB Script that perform backup database task on SQL Server. Next, create a task schedule to execute the script on the specific time as I want. I want the script to be executed every day at 1:00 AM.

The article is divided into 2 parts:

Part I: Create VB Script
In this part, I’ll create create a VB Script for backup database.
Part II: Create Scheduled Task
This is the part which you’re reading show how to create a task schedule to execute the VB Script on scheduled time.

Step-by-step

Open Scheduled Task. Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Scheduled Task.
Double-click on Add Scheduled Task to create a new task schedule.
On Scheduled Task Wizard, click Next.
On Select Program to Run, click Browse and select the VB script file.
Define name of the task and select when to perform the task. In this example, I want to backup daily. Click Next.
Select time to run this task. I set to 1:00 AM every day. Click Next.
Enter the username and password. The task will be run by this user account. If you create a VB Script that using Windows Authentication mode, you have to enter the account that has backup privilege on the SQL Server.
Click Finish to complete creating a task schedule.
The task schedule has been created. Now when the time is 1:00 AM, the task will be run as the user account that you’ve spcified in the task schedule.

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Automate Backup Database on SQL Server, Part I: Create VB Script

linglom — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 02:30:56 +0000

Introduction

Last year, I wrote an article about backup and restore database on SQL Server with Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio. That article (How to backup and restore database on Microsoft SQL Server 2005) was simple and plain. But it will be inconvenience if you have to backup databases frequently. So I decide to write another article. This article, I show you how to backup databases automatically on scheduled time. Therefore, you don’t have to waste time to manually backup databases on SQL Server anymore.

Let’s me explain what I’m going to do to automate the task that I’ve mentioned above. First, I’ll create a VB Script file that perform backup database on SQL Server. Then, I create a Scheduled Task to execute the script daily. That’s it, the script will be executed according to the scheduled time without any user interaction.

The article is divided into 2 parts:

Part I: Create VB Script
This is the part which you’re reading show how to create a VB Script for backup database.
Part II: Create Scheduled Task
In this part, I’ll create a task schedule to execute the VB Script on scheduled time.

Create a VB Script

In the example below, I’m going to create a VB Script that backup a database Northwind on SQL Server 2005 (INSTANCE01). Then, I’ll create a Scheduled Task to execute the script at 1:00 AM daily. Sounds easy, isn’t it? Let’s see it in action.

On SQL Server 2005 server, open Notepad and type the following code:

On Error Resume Next
 
strComputer = "."
 
'Set objWMIService = GetObject("winmgmts:" _
'    & "{impersonationLevel=impersonate}!\\" & strComputer & "\root\cimv2")
 
Dim sDBUser
Dim sDBPwd
Dim sDBServer
Dim sDBName
 
sDBUser = "sa"
sDBPwd = "password"
sDBServer = ".\INSTANCE01"
sDBName = "Northwind"
backupPath = "C:\Test\"
 
Set oSQLServer = CreateObject("SQLDMO.SQLServer")
Set oBackup = CreateObject("SQLDMO.Backup")
 
oSQLServer.LoginTimeout = 30
oSQLServer.LoginSecure = True
'oSQLServer.Connect sDBServer
oSQLServer.Connect sDBServer, sDBUser, sDBPwd
 
oBackUp.Initialize = "TRUE" ' Means overwrite existing .bak file.
oBackup.Database = sDBName
oBackup.Action = SQLDMOBackup_Database
oBackup.Files = backupPath & sDBName & ".bak"
oBackup.SQLBackup oSQLServer
 
oSQLServer.Close()

Code Explanation:

Line 3: Specify server name. “.” means the local computer.
Line 5-6 and 24: Connect to SQL Server with Windows Authentication mode (Using current user credential). If you don’t want to specify username and password in the script, uncomment these line and comment the line 25 instead.
Line 8-11: Variables Declaration
Line 13-17: Assign values to variables.
- Line 13: Username for connect to SQL Server
- Line 14: Password of the username
- Line 15: The SQL Server. For SQL Server Express Edition, the value should be “.\SQLEXPRESS”.
- Line 16: The Database name. In this example, it is Northwind.
- Line 17: Define location where you want to keep the backup file.
Line 19-20: Create Objects to perform backup.
Line 22-23: SQL Connection attributes.
Line 24: Connect to SQL Server with Windows Authentication Mode (Doesn’t need username and password). See Line 5-6 and 24 for more detail.
Line 25: Connect to SQL Server with SQL Authentication Mode (Specify username and password). The code above is set to connect by this method.
Line 27: Set to True to overwrite the existing backup file.
Line 28-29: Backup attributes,
Line 30: Set location of the backup file.
Line 31: Perform backup operation.
Line 33: Close the connection to SQL Server.

Customize the code as you desired. You should change the configurations on line 13-17 to match your environment. Then, save the file to .vbs format. In this example, I save to Northwind.vbs.
Next, test the script by double-click the script to execute it. You should see the Northwind.bak file in the location where you have specified in the script.
If you didn’t see the Northwind.bak, check the Application event log to see if there is any error. The figure below is the success backup message.
For create a schedule task, I’ll write it soon.

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Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part IV: Finalize Cloned Disk

linglom — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 15:13:23 +0000

Finalize Cloned Disk

After I have cloned a disk from the sample disk. Next, I’m going to reboot the cloned disk on another PC. Then, Sysprep will regenerate the computer’s security ID (SIDs) and initialize Mini-setup to prepare the Operating System which is the topic I’ll cover in this post.

Note: Some steps in this post may not be the same with yours. It depends on the Answer file. If you have configure it in the Answer file, it won’t ask again at here. But if the configuration in the Answer file is error, it’ll ask you again. For instance, if you type wrong product key, it will show the error and let you enter again at this step.

You can see the index of this series at Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part I: Introduction

Step-by-step

When you boot the cloned disk first time, you’ll see the screen like the figure below.
On Windows XP Professional Setup, click Next.
On License Agreement, select “I acccept this agreement”. Click Next.
On Regional and Language Options, configure keyboard language and standards language. Click Next.
On Product Key, enter the an unique product key of Microsoft Windows XP. If you have single product key which can be used in many computers, you can configure the product key in the answer file and you don’t have to enter on each computer anymore. Click Next.
On Computer Name and Administrator Password, enter the Computer Name and specify the administrator’s password. Click Next.
On Performing Final Tasks, waiting Sysprep to process.
That’s it. The computer is finished cloning and ready to use in production.

Summary

This series may not be useful only in corporate. But it can be apply in home use, too. For instance, you can ghost your Windows operating system to an image file and store it on NAS (Network Attached Storage) so that next time you don’t have to re-install the operating system again if it fails. You can restore from the image file that you’ve stored in the NAS.
Remember, you don’t have to regenerate SIDs if the PC is stand-alone.

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linglom — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 15:12:25 +0000

Duplicate Disk with Norton Ghost

In this post, I’ll show you how to clone a disk to disk using Norton Ghost. From last post, I have run Sysprep tool to prepare the disk for cloning. This is just an example so I’ve attached another disk to this computer and I’m going to clone disk to disk. Then, I’ll get the cloned disk to attach to another PC and run Mini-setup which will be show in the next post.

If you’re going to apply this tutorial in a corporate, you should clone the sample computer’s disk to an image file and store it on a file server (or any place on the network). When you want a new computer, you simple restore image file from the file server through network without touching any hardware device.

You can see the index of this series at Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part I: Introduction

Requirement

Norton Ghost software

Step-by-step

Booting the PC in DOS and run Norton Ghost. Click OK
Note: You need Norton Ghost since it is a licensed software, I can’t distribute it. If you already have one, you can create an emergency diskette to boot into DOS mode.
Perform Disk to Disk operation. Select Local -> Disk -> To Disk.
Select Source Drive. Click OK.
Select Destination Drive. Click OK.
On Destination Drive Details, click OK.
The message notifies you that data on the destination drive will be overwritten. Click Yes.
The clone is finished. Next, I’ll shutdown the PC and detach the cloned disk to attach to another PC and run Mini-setup which I’ll show in the next post.

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Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part II: Prepare Source for Disk Duplication

linglom — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 12:47:32 +0000

Prepare Source for Disk Duplication

In this post, I’ll show you how to create an Answer file for using when setup Windows after a computer is cloned. And run Sysprep tool to prepare a computer to be a sample computer (source disk) for cloning.

The Answer file should contains only general configuration not unique value on each computer. For instance, if you’re going to deploy the image to all computers in the same time zone, it is good to configure time zone in the answer file so that you don’t have to set time zone on each computer after cloned them. But if you’re going to deploy the image in different time zone, you should not configure time zone in the answer file.

You can see the index of this series at Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part I: Introduction

Step-by-step

Install Windows XP, update patches and setup the basic applications on the sample computer.
Extract Sysprep tool. Insert the Windows XP CD. Navigate to “CD-Rom DriveSUPPORTTOOLS” and extract deploy.cab to C:Sysprep. If you don’t have Windows XP CD, you can download the Sysprep tool from Microsoft.
Note: You have to use the Sysprep tool version according to Windows version. For example, you should not use Sysprep for Windows XP on Windows Server 2003.
Run Setup Manager to create an Answer file. Double-click on setupmgr.exe.
On Welcome to Setup Manager,click Next.
On New or Existing Answer File, select Create new. Click Next.
On Type of Setup, select Sysprep setup. Click Next.
On Product, select Windows XP Professional. Click Next.
On License Agreement, select No, do not fully automate the installation. Click Next.
Now you can configure the general configuration in your environment. I’ll show sample configuration.
On Name and Organization, enter the Name and the Organization.
On Time Zone, select the time zone.
On Product Key, enter the Windows product key if you have Windows corporate key (one key can be installed on many computers). If you have an unique key on each computer, leave this empty.
On Computer Name, select Automatically generate computer name so that each computer after cloned and run sysprep, it’ll has unique computer name (Auto-generated name).
On Administrator Password, leave as default.
On Workgroup or Domain, leave as default.
On Identification String, give some name to identify this sysprep image. It’ll keep this information in the registry so you’ll know that this computer was cloned from which Sysprep image. Click Finish.
Save the .inf file. This is the Answer file that you’ve configured. Save it in the same folder and click OK.
After the Answer File has been saved, click Cancel to exit Setup Manager
You noticed the Sysprep’s Answer file has been created in Windows Explorer.
Next, let’s prepare this computer as a sample computer for cloning by run Sysprep.exe.
It shows a warning message. Just click OK.
To make Sysprep use Answer file after cloned, check on Mini-Setup. Select Shutdown mode to Shutdown. Click Reseal.
It shows a warning message again that after reboot the security identifiers (SIDs) will be regenerate. This is what we want after clone the disk. Click OK.
Sysprep is working.
The sample computer is shutting down. After the system shutdown, its disk can now be cloned to other disk now. Next post, I’ll show how to clone a disk to disk using Norton Ghost.

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Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part I: Introduction

linglom — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 02:00:17 +0000

Introduction

If you are a corporate administrator or an IT staff, you may have confront a situation that you have to install and setup Windows XP on many computers which all computers have identical hardware configurations. What will you do? Go to each computer, sit and manually install Windows XP? If only a few computers, it’s OK to do that. It would takes few hours to complete that. But what if there are more than 10 computers or 100 computers waiting you to install and setup. That would be painful to do that way.
Note: This topic isn’t a new technology but I think it may be useful to many people so I decide to post it.

The series is divided into 4 parts:

Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part I: Introduction
Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part II: Prepare Source for Disk Duplication
Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part III: Duplicate Disk with Norton Ghost
Clone Microsoft Windows XP using Sysprep and Norton Ghost, Part IV: Finalize Cloned Disk

The common way which is widely use to do this task is called Cloning, Imaging or Ghost (The name comes from Norton Ghost which is a popular Disk Imaging Software in the old days). Cloning, the name has already described what it does. It creates image file bit-by-bit from source disk and then restores the data on destination disk. So that the destination disk has the same data as the source disk. This can be done using Disk Imaging Softwares such as Norton Ghost, Acronis True Image, R-Drive Image, Paragon Drive Backup, etc. In this tutorial, I’ll use the popular one Norton Ghost.

But wait, don’t start cloning a disk now. There is one problem since Microsoft Windows 2000 has assigned a unique security ID (SID) to each computer when it was installed. If you cloned the Windows, they would have the same SID and may cause many problems when both computers are in the same domain. On stand-alone computer, this is not a problem. But you can’t join the cloned computer to same domain as the original computer.

So to prevent duplicated SID, Microsoft provides a tool “Sysprep” to handle this problem. Sysprep is a tool to deploy Windows XP on multiple computers. Sysprep prepares the sample computer for cloning. After cloned, Sysprep modifies the local computer security ID (SID) on the destination computer the first time the computer is restarted so that the SID is unique to each computer. The requirements for using Sysprep as part of disk duplication process are at the following:

The master installation and the destination computers must have compatible hardware abstraction layers (HALs). For more information on HAL compatiblity use the following knowledgebase article: Q309283 HAL options after Windows XP or Windows Server 2003 Setup.
The mass–storage controllers (IDE or SCSI) must be identical between the reference and destination computers.
Plug and Play devices such as modems, sound cards, network cards, video cards, and so on, do not have to be the same. However, any device drivers not included in Drivers.cab should be included in the master installation before you run Sysprep. Alternatively, make sure the uninstalled drivers are available on the destination computer at first run, so Plug and Play can detect and install the drivers.
Third–party software or disk–duplicating hardware devices are required. These products create binary images of a computer’s hard disk, and they either duplicate the image to another hard disk or store the image in a file on a separate disk.
The size of the destination computer’s hard disk must be at least the same size as the hard disk of the master installation. If the destination computer has a larger hard disk, the difference is not included in the primary partition. However, you can use the ExtendOemPartition entry in the Sysprep.inf file to extend the primary partition if it was formatted to use the NTFS file system.

Reference: How to Prepare Images for Disk Duplication with Sysprep

There are also some notes that you should know about Sysprep tool:

Sysprep runs only if the computer is a member of a workgroup, not a domain. If the computer is joined to a domain, Sysprep removes it from the domain.
You cannot run Sysprep on a computer that has been configured as a Cluster Service server, a Certificate Services server, or a domain controller. You can run Sysprep on a standalone server.
If you run Sysprep on an NTFS file system partition that contains encrypted files or folders, the data in those folders become completely unreadable and unrecoverable.
You can only use this version of Sysprep on Windows XP installations. You cannot use this version of Sysprep on a Windows 2000 installation.

For full information about Sysprep, see How to Use Sysprep: An Introduction and What Is Sysprep?

In this series, I’ll show you how to duplicate Windows XP by disk to disk only. But in the production environment, you can apply to clone through network so that you don’t have to touch any hardware device. But this way requires that the network should be fast enough (at least should be fast Ethernet – 100 Mbps). Otherwise, the network may be congested and resulting in slow down network application and cloning will takes too much time.

Summary

Now you have understand things to clone Windows XP. Here are summarize steps you have to perform:

Use Sysprep to prepare source disk for cloning.
Create Image file from a source disk and restore to destination disk. Or may be cloning by Disk-to-Disk.
Finalize the destination disk for production use. This will be automatically run by Sysprep tool.

Enough for chit-chat? Let’s do it now. See the next post – part II: Prepare Source for Disk Duplication.

Note: Windows XP is an example I’m going to use in the tutorial. But you can clone other Windows Operating System besides XP by this way, too.

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Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part II: Deploy MSI Package

linglom — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 17:47:35 +0000

Deploy MSI Package

From the previous part, I have make an MSI package from Windows Media Player executable file. Now I can use the MSI package file deploy from Group Policy to computers in my domain. This post will show how to deploy the MSI package through Group Policy.

This tutorial consists of 2 parts:

Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part I: Make an MSI Installer
Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part II: Deploy MSI Package

Step-by-step

On the Domain Controller server, open Active Directory Users and Computers.
I’m going to create a new group policy in an Organization Unit. First, create a new Organization Unit (OU), name as “TestOU”.
Open the TestOU Properties, select Group Policy tab. Click New and name the new group policy as “Deploy WP 10″. Click on the new Group Policy and select Edit.
On Group Policy Object Editor, expand Computer Configuration -> Software Settings -> right-click on Software installations -> New -> Package.
New Windows appears, you have to select to the MSI package that you have just created in the first part. But you need to place it on shared folder where other computers has access to it. Therefore, you must using UNC path, eg. \\Servername\Share Name\Target file. In this example, I place the MSI package in the UNC path as “\\BKKPDC010\PDC\mpsetupedp.msi”. Click Open.
On Deploy Software, select Assigned. Click OK.
Now you’ve finished create a software installation package on the group policy. Next, you need to move some computers to the group policy.
Select sample target computer. Drag a computer to the “TestOU” Organization Unit so that the group policy that you’ve just created will applied to the computer. In this example, the client is “BKKTEST01″.
Wait a few minutes for the group policy applied to all domain controllers (if you have more than one). Then, restart the target computer to take the effect of new group policy.
Note: You can run “gpupdate.exe” on the client to refresh the policy from the domain without restart the computer.
When the client is booting on Windows XP, it’ll load the group policy.
You’ll see that the status is installing Windows Media Player.
After the installation has finished, login on the client computer and open the Application event log by right-click on My Computer -> select Manage -> expand System Tools -> Event Viewer -> Application. Here, you can observe whether the installation is success or not. In this example, the installation was successful.
Note: If you see the error log about installation, I suggest you search on the Internet with the error message you see. You may get the answer faster than leave the comment in this post.
Let’s open new Windows Media Player, you’ll see it is version 10 now. Just keep click Next.
Now Windows Media Player 10 is installed and ready to use.
After you’ve tested that the first client computer was installed successfully, you can move more computers to this Group Policy to install Windows Media Player 10.

Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part I: Make an MSI Installer Introduction Microsoft Windows Media Player is a popular multimedia software...

Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part I: Make an MSI Installer

linglom — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 14:06:16 +0000

Introduction

Microsoft Windows Media Player is a popular multimedia software that comes with Microsoft Operating System. It can play various media formats such as .avi, .cda, .mpg, .mid, .mp2, .mp3, .mp4, .wav, .wma, etc. You can see the supported file formats at Information about the Multimedia file types that Windows Media Player supports. But even you have the latest version of Windows Media Player, it sometimes may requires you to download additional codecs on the Internet.

By default, Windows XP comes with Windows Media Player 9. Sometimes, it has a problem when playing media files. But most cases always be solved by update the Windows Media Player to the higher version. If you regularly play media files on the computer, you would need to update Windows Media Player to latest version.

If you’re going to install only a single computer, it would be fine. You can download the latest Windows Media Player setup file (.EXE) and then run on the computer and you are done. But what if you have to update more than 10 computers (in a corporate for an example). That would takes time and inefficient way to install Windows Media Player on each computer manually. To solve the problem, you can deploy Windows Media Player using group policy or SMS. But these ways require that all computers must be in the domain not workgroup environment. In this article, I’ll focusing on deploy the Windows Media Player using Group Policy only.

To deploy Microsoft Windows Media Player through Group Policy, you need to make the Windows Media Player setup file (.EXE) to Microsoft Installer (.MSI) package file. The advantage of .MSI package is that you can deploy it through Group Policy or SMS and also it can do silently installation which means that there is no user interface interaction show up when installing the software.

Microsoft already provided a tool to create Microsoft Installer (.MSI) package for Windows Media Player. It’s called Enterprise Deployment Pack (EDP) for Windows Media Player. But currently (the time I wrote this article), EDP is support for make .MSI package of Windows Media Player 9 Series and Windows Media Player 10 only. Windows Media Player 11 isn’t support yet. So I’ll show how to deploy Microsoft Windows Media Player 10 using Group Policy. And in this part, let see how to make an .MSI package file of Windows Media Player.

This tutorial consists of 2 parts:

Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part I: Make an MSI Installer
Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part II: Deploy MSI Package

Step-by-step

Download Enterprise Deployment Pack (EDP) for Windows Media Player from Microsoft.
Double-click mpedp.exe to run Enterprise Deployment Pack (EDP) for Windows Media Player. Click Yes to continue.
Click Yes to accept License Agreement.
Select path to install Enterprise Deployment Pack (EDP) for Windows Media Player. I leave it to default location (C:\MPEDP). Click OK.
The setup is complete. Click OK.
Before run Enterprise Deployment Pack (EDP) for Windows Media Player, go download Windows Media Player 10 from Microsoft and rename it to MPSetup.exe and place it in C:\MPEDP\Redist. This is going to be the source file for making MSI package.
Next, open Enterprise Deployment Pack (EDP) for Windows Media Player. Click Start -> Programs -> Windows Media -> Enterprise Deployment Pack. The Build Installation Package wizard starts up. Type Y to set Windows Media Player as a default player.
Next, it asks you to include custom settings in the MSI package. I don’t want any complexity for now so type N.
Now the wizard is making .MSI package. Wait a few minutes.
When the wizard has finished, it tells that the MSI Package is in \Release folder.
Open C:\MPEDP\Release folder, you’ll see the Windows Media Player 10 MSI Package. I’ll use this file to deploy it through Group Policy in the next part.

Deploy Windows Media Player using Group Policy, Part II: Deploy MSI Package Deploy MSI Package From the previous part, I have make...