Understanding Installations on Windows 2000 TS in Application Mode
I have one general process which I use for installing unfamiliar applications, and it takes a great deal of the work out of the process if customization is needed. It ensures that applications Windows might not otherwise recognize as installers are correctly identified, and allows quick configuration for all users. It's very simple:
The reason for this process is that it gives you tight control over the mode you are in. Some applications may do bizarre things such as staging other application installs, so this technique makes sure that Windows always knows the mode you WANT it to be in. As a bonus, any per-user registry and INI settings made during the post-install first run will be captured and replicated to all future users.
Years of supporting applications which need to be installed on a per-user basis on each and every PC, which have poor collateral documentation, and which need to be deployed rapidly have given administrators bad habits for software installation. The following points are critical to remember.
Some custom tools can be useful. Microsoft includes some which it uses to automate application compatibility; you may find a few you prefer yourself for special purposes. Here are some "helpers" I have used to find out registry and file issues and to tweak installations.
In Control
Filemon and RegMon
WAssociate
Following are some suggestions for setting up specific applications. They presuppose you use the process I outlined above.
NT4 TSE and Windows 2000 Terminal Server include application compatibility scripts for a variety of OEM applications. These are typically inside the root operating system folder in the path Application Compatibility Scripts\Install.
Doug Wietbrock went to great effort to assemble a complete full-length set of instructions for installing Peachtree 8/9 on Terminal Services.
This is a great compatibility application; you can basically follow the install straight through.
Start the application; this will allow you to accept the EULA for everyone. Go into preferences and tweak options as necessary. I suggest setting it to use Windows colors (non-conforming PDFs will typically want to use color depths which Windows 2000 Terminal Server can't handle), set update to "Manual", and tell Adobe to NOT display the splash screen and NOT check browser settings when starting.
No known significant issues. The Acrobat Reader toolbar may have a greenish cast due to color reduction.
This one is a cakewalk to set up; it used to be difficult to install VNC for console access on a Win2K server, but the new install is a beautiful piece of work. Just remember: as you go through setup, you are installing as a service and you want to start it IMMEDIATELY. Do servicey stuff and start it immediately, and it will run exactly right.
I was immediately able to connect successfully to the console session with no one logged on and with one other user logged on remotely. Logging on to the console directly first and then opening VNC and connecting worked fine as well.
I powered the machine down completely, then restarted. VNC access was available moments after the Ctl-Alt-Del screen popped up on the VMware virtual console. Again, no issues with logging on.
Installing VNC for use ONLY when you need remote access to the console? Do this last: stop the service, and set its start mode to Manual. When you need console access, connect via TS, start the service, and log in.
GPL license. Uses a MindVision installer. Note that this version will not run on Windows in 256-color mode, so it can only be used successfully in .NET remote sessions or on the console of NT4TSE and Windows 2000. Not a generally useful application on Win2K TS.
I accepted defaults UNTIL the file type associations. At that point, you may want to reject any associations which are already mapped by Windows to something else. The Gimp will prompt you at each of these; it does not overwrite by default in case of conflict.
Was unable to configure the user home folders, but the Gimp correctly identifies users and offers to build the user home directory on launch.
The insufficient color-depth error messages on Windows 2000 when trying to launch remotely are correctly echoed to the session screen, not the server console.
Very Poor on Windows 2000 due to the lack for inherent 256-color support. Poor on .NET due the excessive CPU loads caused by script-fu during launch. This may be addressable. Has not been tested with 1.2.3 (released 2002-09).
Did standard configuration. It asks for a Hotsync connection type (I lied and said USB) and a username (I gave it Administrator). I chose to use the Desktop software instead of Outlook and did not configure email. Checked the Hotsync applet; set it to use Network, not use USB. Ran the desktop once, then exited Install mode.
Noncompliance issues
Added shortcut to desktop of the Administrator: Palm Desktop.lnk
It appears that the Palm desktop wants to open the last user's datebook; this produces problems for individual data folders. Possible workarounds:
Per-user installs
Use an add-on for synchronization instead of HotSync?
Yes, it does work. Haven't done it myself yet, though. Inferential evidence from browsing Goldmine's news server indicates that GoldMine 5 even works on NT4TSE - and secondary tools such as the internal Goldmine email work as well. Note that the Goldmine OEM is now known as FrontRange Solutions.
Another good secondary sign: within a few days of the Windows 2000 SP3 release, they had a discussion of interactions with Goldmine posted. I always expect interactions; having them addressed quickly is what set apart good OEMs.
ActiveX controls - meaning OCX and DLL files, as opposed to executables - are generally some of the easiest binaries to use successfully on Windows Terminal Services.
The reason is that the environment of the binary is usually created on an ad-hoc basis, and it is designed to be a "black box" application.
From Matthew Harris and the UC-Davis Crocker Nuclear Laboratory
When installing Perl, to prevent automatic execution by users, be sure not to add the perl directory to the path and do no associate the .pl extension with Perl files. Also, don't map .plx to PerllS.dll.
[Note that Perl scripts will need to be explicitly launched with the Perl engine and will need to make their own path adjustments. This can also be modified in a special-purpose profile if they are run under a special account. ALSO, recent versions of ActiveState Perl support WSH. If you do not want this to be a globally available resource, you will want to remove or adjust permissions on the registry keys for .pls files and any dependent keys they have.
The same issues will apply to Python, and most likely to the following well-known Open Source scripting engines: Ruby, Mondrian, and Haskell. Other tools such as ObjectREXX may require different treatment.]
MH/UCD-CNL
Should install OK. Note that file associations may overlap those for Adobe Acrobat.
MH/UCD-CNL
Cardfile and Winfile both appear to run fine if simply copied and made accessible. Note that you should use the NT4 version of Winfile.
You may wish to associate the .crd extension with the cardfile program for easy use.
Installation is fairly straightforward (as one would expect from an application targeted towards use on a Terminal Server.
Tested April 2002 release of the AppSense tools (Server-Based Toolkit 1.51, Application Manager 4.2, Performance Manager 1.0).
Disable Realmon from running at user logon.
As noted by Pavel, certain versions of QuickBooks have issues with long printer names, which will prevent them from showing up within QuickBooks. Ensure that clients use short names for printers if they need to print to a local printer from QuickBooks.
From a post by David Dawson:
Finally figured out how to add Quickbooks to a Terminal Server 2000 Server
and have normal Domain User accounts run it. I had installed it but no
regular users could run it but instead got the following error message:
"Your user account for Windows was created with Restricted access to system
resources. This will prevent QuickBooks from operating properly. Please
contact your system administrator and ask him or her to grant you Standard
user rights."
I'd found several postings referencing Sysinternal's Regmon and Filemon to
see what it was accessing but no details posted so thought I'd document it
here. Finding the files and keys it was accessing and loosening permissions
slowly gave them access with these minimum changes
I created a Quickbooks Users group, added my users, and gave the group Full
Access to the HKLM\Software\Intuit\QuickBooksRegistration Key
To let them run the update they needed Modify rights to the Program
Files\Intuit\Quickbooks Pro folder.
The data is stored in another place where permissions are controlled
differently. These permissions just let them run the program, not open the
data.