Question
For Disaster recovery purposes or to migrate configurations (as a one off) from a Notification Server to another server customers can use the ImportExportUtil.exe located under '%programfiles%\Altiris\Notification Server\Bin'.
How can this export/import be automated and what are the pitfalls when running this for Software Delivery Solutions?
Answer
To export and import the relevant Software Delivery Solution items, it is important to understand the relationship between the configuration, task, and resources that make up the solutions in the Altiris console and what should or shouldn't be exported.
Items in the Configuration tab are created during the Software Delivery Solution's installation and are a mix of policies, collections, and packages. These items should not be exported. Exporting the items under Configuration > Solutions Settings > Software Management > Software Delivery will result in the solution agent package to be orphaned.
Software Delivery tasks created under Tasks > Software Management > Software Delivery > Software Delivery Tasks can be exported based on user configurations (only export items that have been created or modified by the end users).
For these tasks to work properly when imported on the second Notification Server, you need to ensure that the "Software Delivery Packages" created with the Software Delivery Wizard1 are also imported onto the Notification Server. All Software Delivery Package are stored under Resources > resources > Software Management > Software Delivery Packages2.
Now that you know what to export and what not to export from the system, here is how you do it:
The ImportExportUtil has three command line switches: "/?", "/Import" and "/Export".
To export the Software Delivery Tasks, here is the generic command line first, and the command line you would have to export tasks from Software Delivery 6.1 second:
ImportExportUtil.exe /export <Software Delivery Tasks folder guid> <Export Destination Path>To export the Software Delivery Packages, the generic command line and applied Software Delivery Solution 6.1:
ImportExportUtil.exe /export {3faa8b67-250b-42ad-8186-fe2f49a9e707} <Export Destination Path>
ImportExportUtil.exe /export <Software Delivery Packages folder guid> <Export Destination Path>
ImportExportUtil.exe /export {30574450-796d-4bdb-b5fd-c38b3592198b} <Export Destination Path>
[1] Sequential software delivery tasks are using a different resource model and cannot be exported/imported using the method described above.
[2] If the package created are stored locally, you also need to migrate the files between the server.