I have been working with System Center Configuration Manager since the SMS 1.2 days.
My goal has always been to eliminate the impact to end user productivity. Now it’s possible to do so during an Operating System Migration with 1E’s Shopping.
Fresh off of Microsoft Ignite in Orlando, FL, I’ve learned all kinds of things. I saw lots of sessions on automating your Windows 10 deployments. Autopilot is going to be an excellent technology for customers to use once they are on Windows 10. But, for now, most environments will need to use traditional Operating System Deployment (OSD) methods to move over to Windows 10. They will still need to do a backup of the user data. They also need to format the disk to utilize GPT, convert from legacy BIOS to UEFI, drop Windows 10, and restore the user data. That’s a long list! You can imagine, the cost starts to become substantial.
Eliminating this impact to the end user can make a significant change to the customer’s the bottom line.
I have done more than my fair share of OS deployments. In the last 21 years, I’ve probably done over 1mm implementations. Even though deployments are pretty good and quick – I still have to impact my users. If you think about a typical OS deployment, the user cannot use their device during the actual migration. Regardless of how quickly I can drop that new OS, the end user is still impacted.
The only real way to eliminate the impact to the user is to allow them to schedule their migration for a future date – when they will not need to use their device for a time.
1E’s Shopping has this functionality. I can make my Operating System Deployment Task Sequence available for end-user self-service scheduling. The user can schedule for any time that suits them. As an admin, I still can control the time frame that I allow them to pick. My users cannot schedule their migration for two years from now, in the hopes that they will be overlooked and remain on their current OS. I can also set a deadline so that anyone who does not schedule by X date gets migrated automatically after that date. I also can control who many users pick each day.
If I configure Shopping to allow 100 migrations per day when that first 100 schedules for next Tuesday the next user that logs in will not have next Tuesday available to choose. I can also exclude days, for example, I may not want to have any migrations on Mondays, Fridays or holidays. I can configure those days for exclusion, and none of my users will be able to schedule their migrations on those days.
The ability for every end user to schedule their Operating System Deployment for a time of their choosing can be a game changer as you plan for your migration to Windows 10.
