Deployment 4 - Using Your BDD 2007 Task Sequences as Templates

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So - Deployment 4 Beta 3 - very cool indeed...but I bet your thinking "how can I use the task sequences that I built in BDD 2007 as templates in Deployment 4 Beta 3?" - well that's a good question.

Deployment 4 Beta 3 stores it's task sequence templates in the Program Files\Deployment 4\Templates folder and come with three templates ready configured:

  • Client.xml
  • ClientReplace.xml
  • Server.xml

You can add you own templates to this directory by creating new task sequences in the Deployment 4 Beta 3 Workbench or by copying you task sequences from BDD 2007.  In the example below, I have copied two XML files (TS.vista.xml and TS.xp.xml) to the Program Files\Deployment 4\Templates location that I had previously configured in BDD 2007.

We now need to update the headers in our newly copied task sequences to give them a descriptive name. This is because BDD 2007 names all task sequences as SA Task Sequence.  Open each task sequence file in your favourite XML editor and change the Name and Description tags to give your files descriptive names (you will see why shortly)

Now that our templates are configured and in the correct location it just a case of creating a new task sequence based on our newly added template files. Open Deployment 4 Beta 3 and right click Task Sequence - choose NEW to start the New Task Sequence Wizard and give your new task sequence an ID, Name and Comments on the General Settings page:

 

On the Select Template page, the drop down should now show your new templates with the names as edited earlier, which you can now select to create the starting point for your new task sequence.

 

Once the wizard has completed you will have a new task sequence based on your imported file from BDD 2007 which is now a re-usable template in Deployment 4 Beta 3.

You can use this process to add as many templates as you need for your environment - you may want to merge some of the new task sequences from Deployment 4 Beta 3 with your BDD 2007 task sequences to ensure that you are taking advantage of some of the tasks delivered in Deployment 4 Beta 3 such as network card and disk configuration (see Ben's blog for more on this...). You will also need to ensure that any scripts, applications and custom code referenced in your BDD 2007 task sequencer are copied across to the Deployment 4 environment so that the tasks can find them.

For more information, check out Bens article on How to Create a Custom Task Sequence for some other great hints and tips on Deployment 4 Beta 3 task sequences and Michael Niehaus is running a great set of blogs on Deployment 4 Beta 3 New Features.