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<div class="section" id="notes-on-possible-windows-support">
<span id="unsorted-windows"></span><h1>Notes on possible Windows support<a class="headerlink" href="#notes-on-possible-windows-support" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h1>
<ul class="simple">
<li>Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) should be used wherever possible; there is an excellent [<a class="reference external" href="http://tgolden.sc.sabren.com/python/wmi.html">http://tgolden.sc.sabren.com/python/wmi.html</a> WMI Python Module] available, which also comes with a [<a class="reference external" href="http://tgolden.sc.sabren.com/python/wmi_cookbook.html">http://tgolden.sc.sabren.com/python/wmi_cookbook.html</a> WMI Cookbook].</li>
<li>Before Windows 2003 SP1, on 64-bit machines there are [<a class="reference external" href="http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa393067.aspx">http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa393067.aspx</a> no API or WMI calls] to get to many 32-bit windows functions (such as the 32-bit registry) from 64-bit programs, and vice versa. There also is no (official) x86_64 native python distributions for Windows pre-Python 2.5. So the choice would be:</li>
</ul>
<blockquote>
<div><ol class="arabic simple">
<li>Only support Windows in Python 2.5+ (which wouldn’t be that bad because part of the build process would probably be to create stand-alone bcfg2 executables using [<a class="reference external" href="http://www.py2exe.org/">http://www.py2exe.org/</a> py2exe]). For 64-bit support there would have to be some kind of convoluted py2exe build process that built some things with 32-bit python and some things with 64-bit python.</li>
<li>Wrap external command-line programs such as winreg, which is part of [<a class="reference external" href="http://dmst.aueb.gr/dds/sw/outwit/">http://dmst.aueb.gr/dds/sw/outwit/</a> outwit], and screen scrape. Each external command-line program would need to be compiled into 32 and 64 bit versions. This approach might lead to licensing annoyances and having binary blobs in source control.</li>
</ol>
</div></blockquote>
<div class="section" id="services">
<h2>Services<a class="headerlink" href="#services" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2>
<p>With the exception of 32/64 bit issues, Windows Services support should
be pretty trivial; it would differ from *nix services in that it would be done via WMI API calls and not a 3rd party python module or wrapping a binary.</p>
</div>
<div class="section" id="registry">
<h2>Registry<a class="headerlink" href="#registry" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2>
<p>The best way of handling the registry may be to map it into a file-based representation on the server end. The Cfg plugin could then be used to set registry values as needed.</p>
</div>
<div class="section" id="files">
<h2>Files<a class="headerlink" href="#files" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2>
<p>For a first run there may be some way of utilizing [<a class="reference external" href="http://cygwin.com/">http://cygwin.com/</a>
cygwin] to make use of the existing *nix POSIX module for manipulating files. There would probably need to be some changes to deal with the fact that open files can’t be manipulated/moved/deleted at all in Windows (other than to do some registry magic that makes the changes on the next reboot).</p>
</div>
<div class="section" id="packages">
<h2>Packages<a class="headerlink" href="#packages" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2>
<p>Listing and removal of packages should be pretty easy via WMI. For installation in most cases the admin would need to figure out the correct silent install flags (there is a [<a class="reference external" href="http://www.appdeploy.com/">http://www.appdeploy.com/</a> web site] that catalogs a lot of this information), and include that in the bcfg2 server-side XML along with a URL (like with the RPM plugin); the bcfg2 client itself would need to take care of download, perhaps via the [<a class="reference external" href="http://linux.duke.edu/projects/urlgrabber/">http://linux.duke.edu/projects/urlgrabber/</a> urlgrabber python module].</p>
<p>Another option would be to utilize one of the existing FLOSS tools for dealing with Windows packages, such as [<a class="reference external" href="http://wpkg.org/">http://wpkg.org/</a> WPKG].</p>
</div>
<div class="section" id="prior-floss-art">
<h2>Prior FLOSS Art<a class="headerlink" href="#prior-floss-art" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2>
<ul class="simple">
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/">http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/</a> AutoIt] - For dealing with packages that don’t have a silent install option</li>
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://www.opensysadmin.com/trac/ticket/4">http://www.opensysadmin.com/trac/ticket/4</a> French Stuff]</li>
</ul>
<blockquote>
<div><ul class="simple">
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://ocsinventory.sourceforge.net/">http://ocsinventory.sourceforge.net/</a> Open Computers and Software Inventory - Next Generation]</li>
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://www.glpi-project.org/spip.php?lang=en">http://www.glpi-project.org/spip.php?lang=en</a> GLPI - Gestionnaire libre de parc informatique]</li>
</ul>
</div></blockquote>
<ul class="simple">
<li>Javascript thing a colleague of Desai’s at ANL wrote - Desai was going to see if this can be released</li>
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://sial.org/howto/cfengine/windows/">http://sial.org/howto/cfengine/windows/</a> Managing Windows with CFEngine and Perl]</li>
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://www.dmst.aueb.gr/dds/sw/outwit/">http://www.dmst.aueb.gr/dds/sw/outwit/</a> Outwit] - Small unixy utilities for Windows stuff like the registry and clipboard</li>
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://www.cfengine.org/docs/cfengine-NT/">http://www.cfengine.org/docs/cfengine-NT/</a> Porting cfengine to Windows NT]</li>
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://isg.ee.ethz.ch/tools/realmen/">http://isg.ee.ethz.ch/tools/realmen/</a> Real Men Don’t Click] - Tobi Oetiker’s stuff</li>
</ul>
<blockquote>
<div><ul class="simple">
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://isg.ee.ethz.ch/tools/realmen/res/index.en.html">http://isg.ee.ethz.ch/tools/realmen/res/index.en.html</a> More Prior FLOSS Art]</li>
</ul>
</div></blockquote>
<ul class="simple">
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://unattended.sourceforge.net/">http://unattended.sourceforge.net/</a> Unattended] - Bare Metal Installs, Package Management</li>
<li>[<a class="reference external" href="http://wpkg.org/">http://wpkg.org/</a> WPKG] - Package Management</li>
</ul>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#">Notes on possible Windows support</a><ul>
<li><a class="reference internal" href="#services">Services</a></li>
<li><a class="reference internal" href="#registry">Registry</a></li>
<li><a class="reference internal" href="#files">Files</a></li>
<li><a class="reference internal" href="#packages">Packages</a></li>
<li><a class="reference internal" href="#prior-floss-art">Prior FLOSS Art</a></li>
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