Deploying apps via UDI - Issues!

[MorsePacific]

Hello all.

Firstly thanks for such a brilliant technical resource - this place has saved me a few times!!

 

Now it's time to add my own woes to the list and hopefully get a resolution to help others.

 

I've built an OSD TS on SCCM 2012 R2, with the latest MDT installed.

I wanted to use UDI to enable our techs to build machines with optional additional software installed. We currently deploy entirely pre-baked images via WDS and I'm looking to add some flexibility to this process.

 

Everything works pretty much flawlessly so far - the machine is built, named, joined to the domain to the selected OU and so forth. The only snagging point is the applications. They just DO NOT get installed!!

I stood watching a machine build for an hour yesterday, and it looks like the step is simply skipped right over.

 

Here's the hopefully useful information ...

 

- I have a computer collection setup called _UDI which is empty, and has all of my deployable applications deployed to. This collection is empty and is only used for the advertising of apps for UDI.

- My task sequence is deployed to All Systems and All Unknown Systems, to allow us to easily build and re-image without having to move machines into groups or pre-stage them in anyway. The applications are not advertised to these collections - all my reading leads me to believe that this is not necessary, but it's never explicitly stated one way or the other.

 

I have a UDI Task Sequence 'out of the box' with minimal reconfiguration. Under 'State Restore' section, I have an 'Install Software' step, which installs packages based on the variable name PACKAGES.

This appears to work, as the only two packages that run are the Configuration Manager Upgrade and a small script that I have to do some warranty information logging.

 

There is then an 'Install Applications' section, with 'Convert list to two digits' and 'Install Application'.

This uses a base variable name of COALESCEDAPPS.

 

This section appears to be skipped right over.

 

I looked at ZTICoalesce.log and can see it adding all of the apps I've selected to 'CoalescedApps01', 'CoalescedApps02' and so forth, so the ZTI script appears to be doing its job just fine.

 

 

The apps simply aren't installed after that.

I've looked in the SMSTS logs that are left (the C:\WINDOWS\CCM\Logs\SMSTS\ folder which the install-time logs are copied to gets deleted pretty quickly it seems) and can see no particular errors, but also no real mention of application install steps at all.

 

I also looked under C:\Windows\UDI to see what logs might be there.

 

Config.log shows the system trying to "Match" the apps I've selected, and saying that 'Match failed' at each one, but I'm not sure that matters?

It ends with 'Application Results' section telling me 'Failure while parsing SMS history.'

 

 

OSD_InstallAppsLookUp.log shows me all the apps again, but I'm not sure what it's doing.

 

 

 

 

To be honest, I'm stumped here.

As far as I can see, it's picking up the applications in the way it should, but then *something* which I can't seem to see is failing to do any installations at all. It's very frustrating!

 

 

One final thing - when the UDI Deployment Readiness screen comes up, the Application Discovery section has a Warning.

 

"Critical problems were encountered while processing the Application Master List. The appropriate applications may not be selected."

 

 

This also doesn't help - it appears in the Preview offline and when building. But the Application Master List, if it's what I think it is, appears just fine, and the logs appear to suggest that the applications are being picked up just fine .... just not installed!!

 

I'm happy to provide any information necessary to anybody that can help me out!

 

Thanks in advance!

[MorsePacific]

Anyone?

One of the suggestions I hadn't tried was to rename the Applications variable in UDI from APPLICATIONS to COALESCEDAPPS but that didn't seem to work either.

[MorsePacific]

OK this is getting incredibly frustrating.

 

I built a new TS using the default UDI config.xml file, and when I booted into the wizard, the Application Discovery showed as NOT error'd. Happyness!

 

So I reverted to the default .xml in my original TS, added just one application to it, and everything ran okay. However the machine didn't join the domain, therefore couldn't find the Management Point, and couldn't install the software.

 

Nevermind ... I added the relevant details into the TS to join the domain, created a new software group and added just one application to it ... and now I'm getting the same damn error all over again.

 

At this point I'm about to throw in the towel and give up because I've spent days going around in circles. Nobody can seem to tell me WHY this is happening. I pulled logs off a failed machine yesterday, and it just tells me that the ApplicationDiscovery.xml.app file couldn't be read - but I can't find a comprehensive enough explanation of how this file and the preflight process works to troubleshoot it.

[anyweb]

logs logs logs,

 

i know it's frustrating to have these issues but without logs what can we do, please attach zipped copies of your SMSTS*.log and app*.log

[doingIT]

Bringing this thread back from the dead. Anyweb, any chance you can help me out. I am having the exact same issue as op. What logs would you need? Anything related to the TS or are there actual MDT logs I should grab from somewhere.

[anyweb]

search for smsts*.log and app*.log and attach them here zipped (for starters)