Global Deployment Process Settings for MECM

Application information settings are located on the Application Manager Settings page in your Recast Management Server.

Basic Application Information Settings

Application Name Format: The default naming format will display Publisher, Application, and Version information in that order (For example, Microsoft Office 365 v1.022.192).

To change the application name format:

1. On the Settings page, click the Deployment Processes and Basic tabs.

2. Under Application Name Format, remove any categories you don't want to display in the application name by clicking the X next to the category.

3. Add one or more categories to the application name by choosing them from the drop-down menu.

4. Drag-and-drop the categories into the desired order.

    To return the application name format to its default settings, click the Reset to Recast defaults icon.

Advanced Application Information Settings

On the Advanced tab, you can set an application category and add a description. You can also choose to feature a chosen application.

To select a category and add a description:

1. On the Settings page, click the Deployment Processes and Advanced tabs.

2. Select an application category from the drop-down.

3. Add a description. Maximum of 500 characters.

To return the category name or description to their default settings, click the Reset to Recast defaults icon.

To display the software as a featured application, enable Display as featured app.

Application Manager provides an option to add Installation or Uninstallation parameters for a deployment process. This setting could be used, for example, to force the Windows installer to write a verbose log file to a specified location.

Any additional installation parameters are appended to the default install/uninstall commands used by Application Manager. Additional parameters cannot be used to override the default installation commands.

All applications deployed by a deployment process where additional parameters are applied must be able to use the commands specified using this setting. We recommend creating an individual deployment process for each application that requires additional parameters, and then adding those commands to each of the newly-created deployment processes, rather than applying a global setting.

Application Manager offers two settings related to content locations:

• MECM Root Folder: Name of the folder that appears in the Applications section of the Configuration Manager console. All imported third-party packages will be placed in it.
• Distribution Point Group: Target distribution point group for application media. 

You can enable cleanup features for old application versions and set whether previous versions are automatically retired and/or removed when the deployment of a newer version begins. These settings can be applied to all deployment processes or to individual deployment processes.

To set deployment process cleanup options: 

1. In your Recast Management Server, navigate to Application Manager > Settings.

2. Choose to retire and/or remove old application versions. By default, all cleanup options are set to Yes.

• Clean up previous versions: Enables or disables cleanup functionality

You can also choose to enable two additional tasks:

• Retire previous versions: Automatically removes old application versions from Configuration Manager and removes files from the content location.
• Remove retired versions: Automatically removes retired application versions from Configuration Manager and removes installation files from the server.

To set the deployment process cleanup interval:

1. In your Recast Management Server, navigate to Administration > Settings.

2. Under the Application Manager Plugin, set the Cleanup Applications Interval. By default, cleanup is set to occur every 10 minutes.

Application Manager has the following settings related to content:

• Persistent content in client cache: Sets whether clients keep the application media in cache. Default is No.
• Download on slow network: Default is Yes.
• Allow fallback source location for content: Default is Yes.

Applications Manager offers a number of settings to configure the supercedence rules around application versions.

• Enable supersedence
  • Uninstall superseded applications before installation: Default is No. Application Manager can update previous application versions without the uninstall option. The automatic task sequence update feature will not work if this option is set to Yes.
• Select supercedence method
  • Active previous version (default): Supercedes all active previous versions that aren't retired
  • All previous versions: Supersedes all previous versions that aren't retired
  • Previous version: Supercedes only the previous version

Application Manager has a number of settings to adjust the user experience related to deployment processes.

• Running processes that must be closed before installation 
  • Add, Edit or Delete Process  (The Executable File Name must have .com or .exe extension)
• Allow application installations when 
  • Application package default: Follow default value defined in the Application Manager Catalog
  • User is logged in: Applications can only be installed when user is logged on
  • No users are logged on: Applications can only be installed when there are no users logged on
  • Always: Applications can be installed whether there is user logged or not
• Maximum Allowed Runtime: Sets the longest time the application install should run. Default is 120 minutes.
• Estimated Installation Time: Sets the estimated installation time. This value is visible to the end user in Software Center. Default is 0 minutes. Maximum value is 12 hours.

Reset All Deployment Processes to Default Settings

After the default deployment process configuration is set up, you might choose to set different options for other deployment processes. It's possible to return all deployment processes to default settings but doing so means that any custom settings will be lost.

To re-apply default settings to all deployment processes:

1. On the Application Manager Settings page, open the Deployment Processes tab.

2. Click Reset all to default and confirm the reset.

Reset Individual Settings to Defaults

To return an individual setting to its default, click the Reset to Recast defaults icon next to the setting.