Uninstall of Application Metering plugin may cause other software failures

Products

• Altiris Software Development Kit (ASDK)
• Inventory Solution

Issue/Introduction

AM plugin uninstall removes specific registry key, which prevents some 3rd party software from normal operation. Steps for checking if issue existing on your client OS with 7.1 SP2 MP1 agent with AM plugin: 1) Check client registry key "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs" and make sure it has REG_DWORD value "1" 2) Enable the “Application Metering Plug-in for Windows Uninstall” policy, to remove the AM plug-in 3) Check same registry key. It will be deleted.

Resolution

Issue is known to Symantec. Solution for 7.1 environment is included in 7.1 SP2 MP1.1 Rollup v10. Solution for 7.5 environment is included in 7.5 SP1 AVAILABLE WORKAROUNDS: 1) Reinstall affected software to add back missing registry value "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs" 2) Prepare separate script for the same operation, which maybe then deployed to clients 3) Install back AM plugin.

Applies To
Issue was reproduced on 7.1.2 MP1 with Rollups up to v9 and on 7.5