[wpkg-users] Deploy over Internet

[M. Jason Stewart]

On Tue, Apr 14, 2009 at 2:15 PM, Rainer Meier <r.meier at wpkg.org> wrote:
> Hi Jason,
>
> M. Jason Stewart wrote:
>> More like 200 separate DSL connections. We use Citrix as an
>> alternative to individual VPNs. If you're not familiar, just think
>> Teminal Services over HTTPS. Users get their applications via a web
>> portal, it's like remote desktop for individual applications.  As
>> such, the client machines are not joined to our domain- they are just
>> stand alone PCs.
>> Thanks for the links, looks like I have some more reading and
>> experimenting to do.
>
> The use case you describe is not fully clear to me yet. Citrix is well-known to
> me as a way to remotely access Windows environments. Personally I am using RDP
> quite a lot.
> But when using Citrix/Terminal services, then the software environment is fully
> located on server side (centralized). This is actually exactly the reason for
> such services - concentrate all data and environment on a centralized server.
>
> But in this case you don't need WPKG on your road-warrior clients but on the
> central server to install software on a central location. If your clients are
> using Citrix remote access then the whole software installation is located on
> the server.
>
> Well, you could deploy the Citrix client to your workstations using WPKG but I
> don't think it's updated very frequently.
>
> In any case WPKG is usually run from an SMB/CIFS share. If you don't have a VPN
> then it's unlikely that your clients will be able to access any share. So what
> you could do is to install WPKG locally on every client (wpkg.js installed
> locally). But WPKG by default reads its configuration (hosts, profiles,
> packages) from the same location where it's executed from. Alternatively you can
> provide these XML files on an HTTP server (which could be a web-server of your
> company which is available via internet).
>
> After you managed this hurdle you cannot fetch the software from CIFS share as
> WPKG usually does. However you could use the HTTP-download functionality to
> fetch the installer files from a public server (might be your company webserver
> too). But remember that licensing might not allow you to publish the packages on
> a public internet server (where actually everybody could download it from).
>
>
>
> If you really want to use WPKG for this kind of deployment have a look at the
> change notes where it's documented how to use the downloading feature....
>
> NEW: Added download extension as initially proposed by Tomasz Chmielewski (with
>     some changes). A download definition is specified as follows:
>     <download url="http://server.domain.tld/path/to/file.msi"
>     target="subdir/file.msi" timeout="7200" />
>
>     The 'timeout' attribute is entirely optional. It defaults to the value of
>     'downloadTimeout' as specified within config.xml (7200 if not omitted).
>     The value is specified in seconds.
>
>     The 'target' attribute specifies a path relative to the 'downloadDir' as
>     specified within config.xml (defaults to '%TEMP%' if omitted).
>     NOTE: You need to specify the full file path, including the file name, not
>     just a directory name!
>
>     So to install the package above could be installed by the following
>     install command definition:
>     <install cmd="msiexec /qn /i %TEMP%\subdir\file.msi">
>
> and
>
> MOD: Download XML nodes are now allowed as sub-nodes of any command (install/
>     upgrade/downgrade/remove). This allows you to specify a download which is
>     only downloaded for a specific command. This was implemented since it
>     usually makes no sense to download the installation package again right
>     before the remove commands are executed (which usually runs a local
>     uninstall command which does not need the original installer).
>     Specifying a download XML node on the global package level (not below a
>     specific command definition) is still allowed. Such downloads will be
>     executed regardless of the command to be executed. So you can specify some
>     global downloads which are executed in any case.
>     Note: If multiple install (or upgrade/downgrade/remove) commands are
>     specified WPKG will download the the files of all command nodes of the
>     same kind before starting to execute the commands in sequence.
>     Example:
>     <package...>
>     <donwoad url="http://example.org/package.exe" target="package.exe" />
>     <install cmd="%TEMP%\file.exe some arguments" ...>
>       <donwoad url="http://example.org/file.exe" target="file.exe" />
>     </install>
>     <install cmd="%TEMP%\file2.exe some arguments" ...>
>       <donwoad url="http://example.org/file2.exe" target="file2.exe" />
>     </install>
>     <upgrade cmd="%TEMP%\update.exe arguments" ...>
>       <donwoad url="http://example.org/update.exe" target="update.exe" />
>     </upgrade>
>     </package>
>     This definition will simply download "package.exe" (global). "file.exe"
>     and "file2.exe" right before the install commands are executed in
>     seuence.
>     In case of upgrade it will download "package.exe" (global) and
>     "update.exe" before executing the upgrade command(s).
>
>
>
> However I am not sure that you need it in case you really use Citrix
> remote-desktop solution.
>
>
> Please also remember that the downloading feature is quite uncommon and not very
> widely used, so testing and fixing would probably require some time.
>
>
> br,
> Rainer
>


Rainer,
Thank you for the info. You are correct about our apps being centrally
managed through Citrix, I was just illustrating why we don't/won't use
VPNs.  I'm looking at WPKG as a method to deploy applications that are
local to the client machines. Examples: Windows Defender, Antivirus
software, custom registry changes, Asset management client, etc.