1. MDT and PowerShell, Volume 2
Michael Niehaus
Director of Product Marketing
Microsoft
Andreas Hammarskjöld
Co-Founder
2Pint Software

2. Michael Niehaus Andreas Hammarskjöld @mniehaus @AndHammarskjold
Recovering developer
Coding addictive
Deploying Windows for 21 years
Deploying 19 years
Cookies
Wine

3. Back to the stone ages
Remember “state of the art” for deployment in 2004?
Business Desktop Deployment 1.0
Third-party imaging tools
Other random command-line tools
Kixtart scripts, batch files as “glue”
Windows 3.1, Windows 95, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000 moving to Windows XP
Needed minimal runtime footprint

4. Moving forward Shifting to new technologies in 2004-2005:
Business Desktop Deployment 2.0 and 2.5
Switched to ImageX (WIM) imaging tools
Other random command-line tools
VBScript as “glue”
“Monad” beta released in 2005, released as PowerShell in 2006
Required Windows XP SP2 (2004), .NET Framework 2.0 (2005)
Windows 95, Windows NT 4.0 to Windows XP

5. The Modern Age Solid foundation established in 2007:
Business Desktop Deployment 2007
PowerShell-based MMC console
Task sequencing engine borrowed from SMS 2003 OSDFP
Other random command-line tools
VBScript as “glue”
HTML-based Hypertext Applications (HTAs) for wizards
Windows 2000 to Windows XP, Windows XP to Windows Vista, Windows Vista to Windows 7, Windows 7 to Windows 10

6. Dabbling in PowerShell
PowerShell features added in MDT 2012
“Run PowerShell Script” task sequence action
Custom PowerShell host
Automatically captures script output into a CMTrace-friendly file
Uses the task sequencer progress dialog for first-level PowerShell progress
Task sequence variable provider
Exposes task sequence variables via TSENV: and TSENVLIST: PowerShell drives
Long-term vision was to slowly replace VBScripts with PowerShell scripts…

7. “Stagnation”: The excuses
No architectural changes from BDD 2007 to MDT 2013 due to:
Adding support for new operating system releases
Requirements for new features (UEFI, BitLocker pre-provisioning, SecureBoot, in-place upgrade, DISM, etc.)
Heavy use requires high quality, heavy testing
About 39,000 lines of VBScript code (includes comments, blank lines)
Limited personnel
“It still works”

8. VBScript vs. PowerShell
Language robustness
Minimal
Great
Extensibility
COM (ActiveX controls)
Cmdlets, COM, .NET components, dynamical code (C#)
Useful extensions
A handful built into Windows Scripting Host, a few available, fairly hard to create (e.g. Scripting.FileSystemObject)
Many built into PowerShell, additional available, reasonable easy to create
Debugging and diagnostics capabilities
IT pro knowledge
Declining
Growing
Windows PE footprint
~5MB
~125MB
Client-side requirements
A still-supported OS
Windows Management Framework (20MB), .NET 4.5 (60MB) on Windows 7, built into Windows 10

9. Tools vs. Cmdlets Tool(s) PowerShell Module Concerns or issues
DISKPART.EXE
Storage
Unable to use PowerShell cmdlets to completely set up UEFI disks
DISM.EXE
DISM
Somewhat fragile (e.g. must be loaded before MDT modules)
SCANSTATE.EXE/
LOADSTATE.EXE
(none)
No module exists
BCDBOOT.EXE
BCDEDIT.EXE
MANAGE-BDE.EXE
BitLocker
Don’t know yet…
MSHTA.EXE
.NET Framework
Dynamically execute XAML
PnpUtil.exe (MDT)
PnpDevice
Looks promising

10. Microsoft Deployment Toolkit: Components
Key Component
Primary Purpose
Suitability
Workbench
Gather all the content needed.
Good, PowerShell-based tools for maintaining content support lots of automation possibilities (although on top of an aging MMC UI).
Task Sequence Engine
Orchestrate the process, tracking the state from old OS to Windows PE to new OS, across reboots.
Good, overall capabilities meet the needs (with some enhancements, e.g. nested sequences, an easy possibility). Challenging use of state outside of task sequence.
Task Sequence Templates
Specify the steps to be performed to complete an OS deployment.
OK, legacy carried forward from SMS 2003 underpinnings, somewhat risky to make significant modifications.
Task Sequence Scripts
Do the real work.
VBScript with lots of Windows XP, SMS 2003, and other legacy “junk.”

11. Microsoft Deployment Toolkit: Theorems
Some pieces aren’t worth replacing (at least not yet)
Workbench, Task Sequence Engine
Some organizations want a fully-supported solution
Continue providing current, fully tested and supported task sequences and scripts
Some organizations are willing to use community content
Create new task sequence templates, scripts, and wizards that work with MDT, Workbench, and Task Sequence Engine
Maintained and tested by open source volunteers

12. Intro: PowerShell Deployment for MDT
Open source scripts, wizards, task sequence templates
Available via
Leverages Deployment Workbench, task sequence engine, and MDT PowerShell modules (task sequence variable, provider)
Creates a new deployment share, completely separate from any other deployment shares
Most definitely a work-in-progress
Proof-of-concept starting point
Enough to run simple task sequences, focusing on virtual machines (for now)
Months of work still needed

13. Setting up PSD for MDT

14. Setting up PSD for MDT Simple process:
Download zip file from and extract the contents somewhere.
Launch an elevated command prompt (or PowerShell ISE) and open the Install.ps1 file from the extracted Installer folder
Make sure the path and share names are to your liking, edit if needed.
Run the script to create a new PowerShell-only deployment share (no VBScripts used, although they are still there).
Import an operating system (only Windows 10 will work right now).
Create a task sequence using the “PSD Client” template.
Populate CustomSettings.ini as desired.
Update the deployment share to create an ISO.
Boot the VM from the ISO, type in your task sequence ID in the wizard.

15. A new development: Using a web deployment share
MDT has always used a file share for accessing content (via SMB)
But it doesn’t have to be that way – using HTTP/HTTPS could work too, and potentially opens up new options (e.g. peer-to-peer caching, cloud-based deployment shares, etc.)
The current scripts on GitHub support this:
Specify “DeployRoot= to use it.
Content needed is downloaded using BITS (when in the full OS) or individual file downloads (when in Windows PE)
All content-retrieval logic goes through one function, making it easier to add other methods too (if ever needed)

16. Using a web deployment share
Steps required:
Create a web app in IIS, with the path pointing to the deployment share folder.
Configure authentication as desired (Windows NTLM is suggested).
Configure WebDAV, file extensions
Configure CustomSettings.ini with the URL for the web site

17. Setting up PSD for MDT

18. Lots still to do Features Gather Partition and Format Apply Image
Configure (Unattend.xml)
Capture User State
Restore User State
Enable BitLocker
Inject Drivers
Inject Patches
Install Updates from WU/WSUS
Branding
Sysprep/Capture
Suspend
Static IP
Wizard
Orchestrator Runbook
OS Roles
Validate
Operating Systems
Windows 10
Windows 7
Windows 8.1
Windows Server 2008 R2
Windows Server 2012
Windows Server 2012 R2
Windows Server 2016
Windows Server 2016 Nano
Scenarios
Bare Metal
Custom Task Sequence
Refresh
Replace
Media
OEM Prestage
LTI
ZTI
UDI

19. Bare Metal Deployment

20. So how does this work? Additional people can contribute
Set up a GitHub account.
Create your clone.
Make your changes.
Submit pull requests to integrate changes into the main project.
The theory: New features can be added faster
Focus won’t be on migration/upgrade
Just create a new deployment share and start over

24. Using Visual Studio 2017

33. Using Visual Studio Code

34. Ideas or Suggestions? Some potential items to consider:
Integrating PowerShell DSC into a task sequence
Support for OneGet, Chocolately, etc. windows-10/
Remove built-in apps
Simplify start menu and task bar customization

35. Q&A