Don't bother users that are running presentations

Customizations
1

(imported topic written by SystemAdmin)

Windows Vista and 7 has a great, new feature: Presentation Settings. This little video describes the feature in Win7:

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Adjust-settings-before-giving-a-presentation

I want the BigFix agent to respect that setting, and not execute actions while the user is giving a presentation. I did that by adding a new property (not part of any analysis) that tests if the relevant registry key is set:

if (name of operating system = 
"Win7" or name of operating system = 
"WinVista") and exist value 
"Activity" whose (it = 1) of keys 
"Software\Microsoft\MobilePC\AdaptableSettings\Activity" of current user keys (logged on users) of registry then 
"Presenting" 

else 
"Normal operation"

I can then use that as a constraint in the “Execution” tab in the “Take Action” dialog.

Comments? Suggestions? :slight_smile:

Is there a similar feature in other operating systems, like Mac OS X?

2

(imported comment written by BenKus)

Very interesting… Does it work well for you?

Ben

3

(imported comment written by SystemAdmin)

Ben Kus

Very interesting… Does it work well for you?

I haven’t used it in production for very long, but so far, so good… We don’t have any Vista computers, so I don’t know if it works on those.

While testing, I found that the BigFix UI is not really prepared for constraints that appears while the action is “Pending Message”:

  • Admin creates an action with a message to the user and a deadline.
  • The message is shown, but the user is about to start a presentation, and does not take the action.
  • The user enters presentation mode, and the action is constrained.

=> The message to the user is still visible, with countdown to the deadline. Nothing changes, so the user won’t understand the the presentation mode is working.

=> The admin console reports “Pending Message”, not “Constrained”.

  • The deadline is reached during the presentation.

=> No action is executed until the presentation is over, as expected.

=> The client UI will show the countdown, and the action will disappear when the deadline is reached.

=> The admin console will show “Pending Message” as long as the user is presenting.