In previous article i describe how can enable Monitoring in Microsft Deployment Toolkit 2013. But in Monitoring feature you can track progress and how many errors and Warnings has in the Deployment in realtime. Very good feature but you can't troubleshoot the errors if you don't have the logs to understand what is going wrong in the Deployment of Windows OS or any application.
Today i will explain how can enable and keep in Central Location the Logs of every deployment to can help you in troubleshooting.
Let's Start !!!
Before enable Logs in MDT read the article Building a Custom Windows ISO with MDT 2013 to understand where should be give access in Log folder that will be create.
Create Log Folder and give Right Permissions
- Create a new folder in MDT Deployment Share location and give read/write access in the user that has access in mdt deployment.
- For the Scenario i create a new subfolder in MDTBuildLab folder with name DeploymentLogs.
- Share the folder with $ to be hide in LAN (If you don't know how can do it read from the article Building a Custom Windows ISO with MDT 2013) .
- Give in the user that has access in Deployment Read/Write Permissions for Share and Security.
- Now verify that you can open the specific folder from client -PC that you want to Deploy App or Windows or from any other client-PC if the PC that you want to Deploy hasn't Windows OS yet.
Enable Logs in MDT 2013
If you have create the Folder with the appropriate permissions and has verify that can access it from client-PC then you can proceed with the following steps.
- Open Deployment WorkBench
- Expand Deploymet Shares and Right click in MDT Build Lab for the specific scenario. Probably your Deployment Share has different name.
- Select Tab Rules
- Add the following 2 lines in CustomSettings.ini
SLShare=\\mdtserver\ShareLogFolder$
SLShareDynamicLogging=\\mdtserver\ShareLogFolder$
As you can see in the Example
- Where
SLShare - - -> Copy all Logs at the end of the Deployment and are broker down into stages. Create a folder of the pc name and copy all the log files
SLShareDynamicLogging - - - > BBD.log created and logs the entire deployment from start to finish in real time. - When add the 2 lines click OK and with Right click in MDT Build Lab click Update Deployment Share. If you don't proceed with Update Deployment Share then the new changes wiil not affect in the Deployment.
- Select only the Optimize the boot image updating process and Click next.
- Click Next again
- Wait until finish. If you don't have do any other change it will not take more than 1-2 minutes.
- Click Finish when finish successful the update.
- Now go in client-PC open the Deployment Share and start the Deployment.
Read the article Deploy Office 2010 with MDT 2013 to find out how can do it. - While start the Deployment in clien-PC Open the Deployment Folder(DeploymentLogs) and you will see that log files will be created.
Read Log Files
Log Files is very important if you want to troubleshoot errors or monitoring. Event Logs has a good Interface to Read and Understand Warning and Errors but log files in txt is unreadable. So to understand these Log files yo can download SCCM 2007 Toolkit because include Trace32.exe which is Log Viewer
- Download System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager Toolkit from https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=50012
- Open the ConfigMgrTools.msi to start the Installation Wizard.
- Click Next
- Again Next
- Select Only the Common Tools if you want only the Trace32 Log Viewer. Click Next and Wait to Finish.
- When the installation completed successful go in C:\Program Files (x86)\ConfigMgr 2007 Toolkit V2 and open the Trace32.
- It will ask if want to be default viewer for log files. This is depends from you.
- Click File - - - >open and go in the Log Folder to open log files. In this scenario i open BBD.log file
- Now you can read much better and find errors and Warning from the Trace32.
- Most of the times the BBD.log is the file that can find the errors and troubleshoot your problem without means that you don't need to check and other log files base on your errors..
This feature you can help you a lot to reolve deployment errors that maybe not receive. For example maybe the deployment stuck and not contine without give you anything.From the logs you can find the error.
Now it's your turn. Try it and come back to give us your feedback and experience that you have with this feaure in our Commented System.. Maybe find something new from a discussion with another user.
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