E.2 Novell ZENworks Configuration Management Imaging Agent (novell-ziswin)

The Novell ZENworks client (which includes novell-ziswin) should be installed on devices where you want to apply images. For information on installing the client on your devices, see the Installing the ZENworks Adaptive Agent in the ZENworks 10 Configuration Management Administration Quick Start.

Installing the Configuration Management client automatically installs the Novell ZENworks Configuration Management Imaging Agent (novell-ziswin). Therefore, every Primary Server is an imaging server.

After the ZENworks Adaptive Agent is installed, the ZENworks Imaging Windows Agent window indicating that the configuration files are being processed by the Imaging Agent is displayed during the device boot-up. During this process, the ZENworks Imaging Windows Agent restores the data from ISD so that the device can communicate by using its previous identity. Later on, the Imaging Agent automatically reboots the device.

The Imaging Agent’s purpose is to save certain device-unique data (such as IP addresses and hostnames) to an area on the hard disk that is safe from imaging. The Imaging Agent records this information when you install it on the device. Then the agent restores this information from the image-safe area after the device has been imaged. This allows the device to use the same network identity as before. This functionality is handled by the novell-zisdservice on Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008 devices, Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7.

If a device is new and does not contain a unique network identity, the default settings that you have configured for the Management Zone are applied when you image the device by using a Preboot Services Imaging bundle.

The data that the Imaging Agent saves to (or restores from) the image-safe area includes the following:

By default, novell-ziswin runs automatically when the device boots up.

The following table lists the task that you can perform using the novell-ziswin command line options on a Windows device:

Table E-1 novell-ziswin Command Line Tasks

Task

Commands

Delete the data from ISD

ziswin [/c | -c | /clear | -clear]

You can also delete the data from ISD using the ZENworks Imaging Windows Agent utility:

  1. Launch the ZENworks Imaging Windows Agent utility by double-click %ZENworks_Home%\bin\preboot\ziswin.exe.

  2. Click Edit > Clear Image-safe Data

Export the ISD to a file

ziswin -export complete_path_of_the_file.zis

For example, if you want to export the ISD to c:\isd_export.zis, use the following command:

ziswin -export c:\isd_export.zis

Import the ISD from a file

ziswin -import complete_path_of_the_file.zis

For example, if you want to import the ISD from c:\isd_export.zis, use the following command:

ziswin -import c:\isd_export.zis

Delete the ISD

ziswin.exe [/w | -w | /wipe | -wipe]

The hardware rule based image is restored when the device reboots the next time.