Reboot fixlet for a particular time of day (after applying baseline)

Usage and Config Patch
1

(imported topic written by SystemAdmin)

Hello -

For my patching via baseline:

  1. I would like to enforce a reboot deadline of 09:30AM. If the day is still young (prior to 09:30 AM) the PC should automatically reboot at 09:30AM that day. Ideally it the computer should prompt/warn the staff member of the deadline, however, if this warning is not possible … it is not a deal-breaker for me. (See Note:1). If the day is old, and 09:30AM has already past, the PC

should

“reboot” when the staff member shuts down for the close of the day. If the PC was left running or hibernated, I want to PC to automatically reboot at 09:30AM the next day (or at whatever time the PC is brought out of hibernation/sleep if 09:30AM has past).

  1. Should I instead force a reboot event after 1440+1 minutes (>1 day)?

  2. Should I instead force a reboot event after 481+1 minutes (>8 hours)?

Option #1 duplicates how I/we used to do this via WSUS. I understand TEM/BigFix is NOT WSUS, but still, I would like to use similar or comparable behavior (or improved!).

If you have a better idea, go ahead and mention it as I may be overlooking something.

Thanks!

Aaron

Note:1 The company and decided years ago, that staff should be prompted to reboot, but that reboot should not be automatically applied (unsaved work et al.) if possible. Company understands that patching/and/rebooting should be taken as a single quantum event. So some staff will need a deadline enforced, else some PCs may never be reboot (left on 24X7, only set to hibernate and never reboot, etc.). The compromise was 09:30. 9:30AM is late enough in the morning that staff have had enough time to login, check email, get a few things done, print things for meetings, etc. 09:30 is early enough in the day that the staff should not “have too much unsaved files/work open” so if a reboot is forced, and the if the PC is unattended, that a negligible amount of unsaved work is lost. PLUS … the staff are used to it by now – as this has been in effect by WSUS for a while (2006?).

2

(imported comment written by RolfWilhelm)

Aaron,

you could create an action based on the “pending restart” task, which is enabled to be executed (in the execution tab) every working day between 09:30 and 10:00.

Uncheck “End date” and check “Reapply” with appropriate values.

Also, do not force a restart with your patching actions - this will be done from your restart action.

As a result, the patch action is somewhat independant from the time it is allowed to run, e.g. in the afternoon, if the user was hibernated until then, but have the restart during the next morning.

It’s also possible to create a customer property with the uptime in days and use this one to analyse if some workstation have an uptime with is longer than the patch cycle you have, e.g. 40 days.

Regards,

Rolf.