SCCM Application Creation Automation – Patch My PC Review 1

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SCCM third-party software updates are discussed several times in this blog. In this post, you will learn how Patch My PC Publishing service can help to automate application creation and update in SCCM.

I will go through the features of Patch My PC Review.

Install & Configure Publishing Service Tool

Download the Patch My PC publishing service tool. Let’s check out the System Requirements for Patch My PC publishing tool:

  • This tool must be Installed on the top-most WSUS/SUP
  • Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5
  • Supported Operating Systems
    • Windows Server 2008
    • Windows Server 2008 R2
    • Windows Server 2012
    • Windows Server 2012 R2
    • Windows Server 2016
    • Windows Server 2019

Installation is straightforward, and I would recommend going through the default settings. I’m not going to go through the step-by-step configuration because it’s well documented in Patch My PC’s official documentation.

Patch My PC
Patch My PC publishing service tool
Patch My PC publishing service tool – Review 1

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Let’s Get Started

As I mentioned in the video review, the installation and configuration are straightforward.

Moreover, the UI is very similar to the SCCM console configuration UI; hence, it makes the SCCM admin’s life easier to configure the Patch My PC publishing service settings.

Patch My PC - Subscription Validation Succeeded
Patch My PC – Subscription Validation Succeeded 2

Video Review – Patch My PC Review

This video post is the Review #1

Adaptiva
Patch My PC – Review #1 (Patch My PC Review) 3

Product Selection Options – “The Search“

I like the update rules feature in Patch My PC publishing service tool. Mainly because of rich search options to select the products. I miss this feature in SCCM console product selection UI.

  • Select the products using the search option powered with SCCM rich inventory database.
  • Select the product using search options from the product menu in the tool. This is super useful to search and select products like Chrome, Java, Firefox, etc…
Patch My PC Review - Patch My PC publishing service - Selection Options using Search
Patch My PC Review – Patch My PC publishing service – Selection Options using Search 4

Automation – SCCM Application Creation

The most exciting tab in the Patch My PC publishing tool is Application rules. Application rules will allow you to create an application in SCCM automatically.

You can select the application that you want to create automatically in SCCM.

As you can see in the following screenshot, the Patch My PC tool will help you create the SCCM applications for the selected update packages from Application Rules.

More details are available in video review #1.

Patch My PC Review - Patch My PC publishing service SCCM Application Creation Automation
Patch My PC Review – Patch My PC publishing service SCCM Application Creation Automation 5

Critical Right-Click Customization Options

You can right-click “All Products” or specific “Vendor/Product” to select smart & useful options to make the SCCM admin’s life easy. Also, these options give us an excellent end-user experience.

Patch My PC Review - Set Run Times & Add the Executable name(s) in the Deployment Types Install Behaviour
Patch My PC Review – Set Run Times & Add the Executable name(s) in the Deployment Types Install Behaviour

Following are the twelve (12) package customization options available in the Patch My PC publishing service tool.

NOTE! – I feel these options are super useful tools for all the organizations using SCCM. These actions might help to avoid many tough packaging tasks.

  1. Publish updates using full content
  2. Publish updates using metadata only.
  3. Auto kill conflicting processes before installing the update
  4. Skip update installation if conflicting processes are running
  5. Delete desktop shortcuts created by this application
  6. Disable self-updater
  7. Manage update logging options
  8. Republish updates for these products during the next sync schedule
  9. Add Custom pre/post-update installation scripts
  10. Manage Update Logging options
  11. Modify the command line
  12. Add MST Transformation file
Patch My PC Review -Patch My PC Publishing Service - Critical Right-Click Customization Options
Patch My PC Review – Patch My PC Publishing Service – Critical Right-Click Customization Options 6

Scheduling Options

Patch My PC publishing service tool helps trigger SCCM software update point sync when the new third-part updates are published by Patch My PC. This option is advantageous for mitigating the risks immediately and eliminating the manual steps involved in syncing.

Click on the Run Publishing Service Sync button to get the Patch My PC products listing to appear under Software Update Point Component Properties.

Patch My PC Publshing Service- Scheduling Options
Patch My PC Publishing Service- Scheduling Options 7

Remaining Options

In the tab called Proxy & Notification, you can enable a Proxy in the Proxy and Notifications tab that will be used for content downloads. There is an extended list of URLs to allowlist through a corporate proxy.

The following link, “List of Domains Used for Downloads in Patch My PC Update Catalog,” will provide the list of the domain you want to allow list through proxy servers.

To be Continued

I will continue the Patch My PC publishing tool review in the next post.

In the next post, you will see more details about the SCCM part of configurations and tasks you need to complete for a successful third-party software update implementation via SCCM.

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