MicroStation Wiki MicroStation CONNECT - How to create a Deployment Image

MicroStation CONNECT - How to create a Deployment Image

	Product:	MicroStation
	Version:	CONNECT Edition
	Environment:	N\A
	Area:	Installation
	Subarea:	General

The following instructions are based on the MicroStation CONNECT readme:
Home > Installation > "Deployment Guide" and > "To create a Deployment Image"

Deployment Guide

About Deployment Image

The deployment image is created by the system administrators for installing the application with the same installation configuration on multiple machines. The installation configuration includes the installation location, features, shortcuts, additional packages, and so on. Once created, users will be able to double-click Setup_MicroStationx64_10.12.00.040.exe available in the deployment image to install the application with the set configuration without the need of any user interaction or internet connection for component downloads. The deployment image can be shared in the network as a UNC path or pushed using SMS/SCCM.

Advantages of Using a Deployment Image

Conceptually, the deployment image can be considered as a pre-configured offline installer. Following are the advantages of using a deployment image:

Internet connection is not required for installation from a Deployment Image.
Separate pre-requisite pack or set of packages before installing product are not required.
The installation location can be decided and set in deployment image. Once defined, the product will be installed at the same location on all the machines.
The components to be installed are preselected at the time of creating deployment image. This results in all machines having exactly same set of installations.
You can add custom packages with complete configuration (command-line parameters) that are executed at the end of product installation. This allows you to deploy more items along with the product on all the machines.

If different installation options are required multiple deployment images can be created. Examples of such variations could include:

Installation of Companion Features; currently Descartes and LumenRT are available, other Companion Features may be available in future updates.
Exclusion of new Technology Preview (beta) features
Different Custom Configuration locations

Contents of Deployment Image

The deployment image contains all the files that are packaged with the product as well as the downloadable files, including Companion Features and Applications. It may optionally contain external applications or packages that you add while creating the deployment image. The image does not analyze the system on which it is created. It simply saves all the components for installation. The deployment image also saves the installation configuration.

Before You Start

Using non-root drive:

If the installation drive set in the deployment image configuration settings is other than the root directory (usually c:\), make sure that the drive exists on the machine on which the application is to be installed.

These are the pre-requisites for creating a deployment image:

Internet connection - Since the setup is running in/layoutmode an internet connection is required to download all installable components.
Write access to the location where the deployment image will be created.
Currently a minimum 4 GB disk space at the deployment image location for each image that will be created, Companion Features will require additional space, currently 6.6Gb when both Descartes and LumenRT are included.
- Note that installation on each workstation will require at least twice this as we cache the installation files in "C:\ProgramData\Package Cache" to support install repair/modify operations.

Deployment Image Settings

The deployment settings are displayed when you run the setup in/layout mode. Following deployment image settings are displayed in the MicroStation Installation Wizard.

'Full UI Mode' - Displays all the installer windows when you install using the deployment image. 'Full UI Mode' is not recommended as full user interaction is needed to run the installation. This is only of value in an atypical situation where individual installations require different options.
'Passive UI Mode' - Installs the application in passive mode from the deployment image. In this mode, the installation wizard and the progress dialog are displayed but the installation takes place automatically. The installer takes the options selected while creating the deployment image and you cannot select any options in this mode. The user has full visibility of the installation process.
'No UI Mode' - Installs the application in silent mode and is for use with deployment tools as mentioned above, e.g. Microsoft SCCM. No dialogs will be displayed and successful completion of the installation will only be confirmed by reports back to those tools or local event log messages. If an error occurs during installation this may not be obvious to the machine user.

Note that the size of the Deployment Image will vary according to the options chosen. 'Full UI Mode' will be the largest as all available source modules must be downloaded to allow any combination of choices to be made during the installation.

Deployment Image Location

Click the Change button next to the deployment image location path to open the Browse For Folder dialog for selecting the location where you want to save the deployment image. This can be an existing location or a new folder can be created using the browse dialog. Typically this will be in a network location. Create a new appropriately named sub-folder for each Deployment Image, e.g.:

MCE_Update12_Standard
MCE_Update12_Descartes
MCE_Update12_NoTechPreview

The folder(s) created are portable. For example if a Deployment Image folder is initially created and tested on a local drive it can be copied to an appropriate network location for production deployments.

What if I do not have Internet access?

In situations where Internet access is not available, secure environments for instance, a Deployment Image can be created outside that environment and the Deployment Image folder can be transferred via an appropriate route into the secure environment.

To Create a Deployment Image

Follow these steps:

In the command line, go to the folder that contains the MicroStation setup executable and run the executable with the /layout command.
The MicroStation Installation Wizard opens. (Optional) Click MicroStation CONNECT Edition > Configure to change the installation options.
(Optional) To change the application installation location, click the Browse button next to the Application Path.
We recommend that you accept the default install location unless there is a particular reason not to:

In the Browse For Folder dialog that opens, browse to the drive and folder you want to install the product in, then click OK.
Note that help is available during installation from the icon at the top right.
In the following (optional) step we have an option which sets the location of the Custom Configuration during installation. This eliminates the need to run additional procedures to deploy customised configuration files to each installation. We recommend that deployment Images are created using this step.

Select the 'Custom Configuration (plus Delivered Configuration)' option. Browse to the folder where your Custom Configuration will be located, then click next:
The Custom Configuration location does not need to have been populated with content or even to exist for the deployment image to be created successfully. MicroStation will still run without them but only with the delivered configuration and the MetroStation example dataset. Obviously the Custom Configuration location and content will be required for production installation to be completed.
Note that this is a change from pre-update 4 versions where other options were offered at this point. Organization and Workspace settings are now applied in the copy of WorkSpaceSetup.cfg that will be located in the Custom Configuration.
Click Next to continue.
Select the installation mode, 'Passive UI Mode' is the default that applies to most situations as mentioned above.
Browse to and select the Deployment Image Location, creating a separate sub-folder for each deployment image:
In the Features stage the optional features that are installed can be modified. The most likely option to consider here will be to omit the Technology Preview Features in production environments where they may not be needed immediately.

Click Done to accept the choices made or back to review.
Check state of Companion Feature and Applications selections then click layout to create the deployment image. The usual installer dialogs will appear, required (or potentially required) components will be downloaded including the Companion Features and applications
Click Finish to exit the MicroStation Installation Wizard.

The deployment image is created at the selected location.
The resulting files created will be similar to this:

Observe that in addition to the 1.6Gb MicroStation installation file, there is also the 1.8GB LumenRT installation file and a 1.5Gb CONNECT Shared Content file that contains installation files for companion features and other shared content.
These files are included in the deployment image so that all required files are available on the local network during installation without the need for further online downloads speeding up the installation and avoiding repeated downloads of the same files.
Run Setup_MicroStationx64_10.0n.00.0nn.exe to install. This can be done:
1. Manually on the machine where the CONNECT Edition application will be installed by browsing to the deployment image location
2. Using installation management software as mentioned above.