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Easy deployment of Omnicast and Security Center

Published Date
Author Jonathan Doyon

We have integrators that can upgrade 50 machines and validate the whole system in a single night.

In our lab, when a new build is ready to test, we have hundreds of blade servers to update. We don't install each server manually, we just push the installation wherever we need it. Omnicast and Security Center installation/upgrade scripts are designed to scale.

The ability to script the Genetec product installations is one of the most unused feature because most of us just start installation programs and click Next-> Next->Next... without thinking.

Silent Installation (Command line options)

If you have multiple machines to setup, it's very easy to create a small batch file that installs the software in the background without any user intervention.

The installation and upgrade guide describes all the different options available on the command line to script your client and server installation. Basically any options available during the manual install is possible through the command line. To get the latest documentation, go under to the document section of the Genetec Technical Assistance Portal (GTAP).

Standard IT Deployment tools

If you are in a production environment, why not leveraging the same tool you use to push Windows hot fixes. Omnicast installation scripts are standard MSI files that can be pushed with any off-the-shelf deployment tools such as Microsoft SCCM, HP Client Automation, Symantec Ghost, Altiris Deployment Solution or WPKG (free Deployment tool).

Advantages of MSI Installation vs EXE only installer

  1. MSI is the official way to create installation scripts with the recent version of Windows (Vista and more). EXE package installer are supported as "legacy application compatibility" feature in Vista.
  2. MSI provides built-in versioning which help reducing the Dll Hell where you see error like: "A Required DLL File, Z.DLL, was not found".
  3. MSI includes native rollback for clean uninstall if the installation is aborted.
  4. MSI is supported by any off-the-self deployment tools

Why Genetec doesn't build its own deployment tool?

Genetec focuses on its core competency, enterprise IP video and access control management software. So rather than reinvent the wheel, we leverage existing standards and our software can be remotely updated using a number of industry standard IT tools.