Level: Introductory Sarah Naqvi, Rational Services and Support Team, IBM
15 Apr 2008 
from The Rational Edge: Read how administrators governing IBM Rational Software Development Platform version 7 product installations can now restrict end-user access to configuration or installation of products on their local machines.
From The Rational Edge.
As an administrator you may want to restrict the ability of users with administrative access to install, uninstall, modify, or update the IBM® Rational® Software Development Platform v7 products installed on their machines. These products require installation through IBM Installation Manager (IM), which allows users with administrative access to make changes to their installations.
The option to host IM remotely is available for IT administrators who are required to grant users administrative access, but do not want users to have the ability to modify their Rational Software Development Platform v7 product installations. If this approach is taken, IT administrators will need to ensure they are using the latest available version of IM, and will also be required to keep track of which version of IM is being hosted on the user's machine.
This article will guide managers through the steps necessary to govern product installation using the latest version of the IM utility.
Overview
With the former version of IBM Installation Manager (v1.0.x), all machines were required to have IM installed directly onto the hard drive in order to install Rational Software Development Platform v7 products. An end user with administrative access on the machine would install and modify installation packages directly. While this method ensured that the IM and the install Packages are always in sync, making it impossible for them to get into a mismatched state, it proved to be a limitation for administrators who did not want end users to have these installation access privileges.
The new version of IM (v1.1) has introduced the capability for products to be installed on end-user machines while hosting IM remotely. Care and testing is required to use this technique. If this approach is taken, IT administrators will need to ensure they are using the latest available version of the IM utility, and will need to keep track of which version of IM is being hosted remotely on the administrator's machine. You must also ensure that the resulting installation meets your requirements before final deployment.
While the Installation Manager is being hosted remotely, IM data is stored on the user's machine, in the following directory:
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\IBM\Installation Manager
It is important for IT administrators to be aware of this directory; in case they need to back it up, or ensure that it is not removed or modified. This directory includes information that is essential for trouble-shooting, such as log files and the installed.xml file that stores detailed information on what products, versions, and features are installed via IM.
Outlined below is a detailed example, including steps on how to allow a Windows IT administrator to silently install locally the latest version of IBM Rational Application Developer, version 7.0.0.6, and apply the permanent license activation kit without directly installing the IBM Installation Manager onto the user's PC.
Information is provided at the end of this article regarding where to obtain the software and the latest download information.
Instructions
Step 1: Download, extract, and install Installation Manager Installer
IBM Installation Manager, version 1.1.1, is available online at:
http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=0&uid=swg24018338
Using the IT administrator machine, download, extract, and install the latest available version of the Windows IBM Installation Manager Installer. It is important to note that installing IM onto the IT administrator's machine is solely for the purpose of recording the response file. The extracted IM Installer will be used to remotely install Rational Application Developer v7 onto the end-user machines.
Download and extract im.installer.win32-1.1.1.zip to a shared directory -- for example, C:\IM_ShareDir\, which can be accessed by the user's machine.
From the C:\IM_ShareDir\ directory double-click install.exe to begin the installation of the IBM Installation Manager.
The wizard will indicate when the installation has successfully completed. Click Finish to exit the wizard.
Step 2: Use Packaging Utility to create a repository
Packaging Utility can be used to combine multiple software package repositories into a single package. In this example, you will see how to create a single repository to package the Rational Application Developer version 7 installation images, the version 7.0.0.6 updates, and the license activation kit, RADlic.jar.
IBM Packaging Utility version 1.1.1 is available online at:
http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=0&uid=swg24018503
Packaging Utility 1.1.1 users can now open the repository for the license activation kit, RADlic.jar, directly when copying the package. (In previous versions of Packaging Utility, the license activation kit had to be present in the destination repository.)
Users must open the following repositories in order to create the package:
- Rational Application Developer version 7.0.0
- Rational Application Developer version 7.0.0.6 Update
- Rational Application Developer License Activation Kit (RADlic.jar)
Users then only need to select the Rational Application Developer version 7.0.0.6 and Rational Application Developer License Activation Kit and continue through the wizard to copy their packaged repository, as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: The Package Utility wizard allows you to copy the packaged repository.
Please note that Package Utility 1.1.1 allows users to directly log into Passport Advantage, via the Copy Packages wizard in Package Utility. The user will be prompted for their credentials and will then be able to directly open the Rational Application Developer version 7.0.0 and Rational Application Developer License kit repositories through Packaging Utility.
Step 3: Generate a response file to silently install Rational Application Developer v7
Next, you generate a response file that will be used to silently install Rational Application Developer v7.
Note: Steps to generate a response file are also outlined in the Installation Manager Information center, available online at:
http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/install/v1m0r0/index.jsp
From a command prompt, change the directory to
cd C:\Program Files\IBM\Installation Manager\eclipse
Specify the command to start recording the response file (note that both lines here constitute the full command):
C:\Program Files\IBM\Installation Manager\eclipse> IBMIM -record
C:\IM_ShareDir\ResponseFile.xml -skipInstall C:\temp\recordData
The repository created in Step 2 must be made available on a shared drive that the user's PC will be required to access during the silent installation.
From the File menu, select Preferences
>
Repositories
Add the repository created in Step 2 to the Installation Manager settings.
As shown in Figure 2, uncheck the option to Search services repositories during installation and updates. This will prevent Installation Manager from accessing the online update sites and will only use the locally downloaded updates included in the packaged repository.
Figure 2: Be sure to uncheck the option to Search services repositories during installation and updates.
As shown in Figure 2, click Apply then OK.
Select Install Packages to begin recording the response file.
Select IBM Rational Application Developer 7.0.0.6 and continue through the installation wizard.
Click Finish and exit Installation Manager.
The response file, ResponseFile.xml has now been generated and is located in the shared directory C:\IM_ShareDir\ along with the IM installer.
Step 4: Silently install Rational Application Developer on the user's machine
Silently installing Rational Software Development Platform version 7 products can be done without the user interface. Enterprise customers using a provisioning system can deploy such software by making use of software deployment tools such as Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS).
The IT administrator will likely want to create a script that will be used to deploy Rational Application Developer, along with the updates and the license activation kit, onto the end-users' machines.
Begin the script by mapping a network drive (eg. drive X:) to the shared directory on the administrator's machine. NOTE: Network sharing is not optimal for scenarios where there is a slow transfer rate. In such cases, the preferred method is HTTP.
Next, modify the repository tags in the ResponseFile.xml to point to the X:\ drive.
After recording your response file, it will contain repository tags similar to the ones below:
<repository location='D:\RationalAppDev7ORIG\Disk1\Disk1'/>
<repository location='D:\RationalAppDev7License\RAD-License\RADlic.jar'/>
You will need to modify these to point to the drive which you had mapped to above. If mapped to drive X:\
<repository location='X:\RationalAppDev7ORIG\Disk1\Disk1'/>
<repository location='X:\RationalAppDev7License\RAD-License\RADlic.jar'/>
Next, silently install Rational Application Developer version 7 on the user machine using the IM Installer and response file from the mapped drive X:
X:\>installc.exe --launcher.ini silent-install.ini -input X:\ResponseFile.xml
If the user chooses to script the installation to run the installc.exe from a directory other than X:\, the following command should be used:
installc.exe --launcher.ini X:\silent-install.ini -input X:\ResponseFile.xml
Conclusion
You should now have successfully installed Rational Application Developer version 7.0.0.6 on the user machine and activated the permanent license kit, without having installed the IBM Installation Manager directly onto the user PC. Consequently, end users are unable to modify the installation in any way.
If at any time updates, modifications, or uninstall are required, administrators can follow a process similar to the one outlined above.
Where to obtain the software
Please note that the links below are provided for the latest available versions of the products at the time this article was published.
Rational Application Developer version 7.0 and the license activation kit for Rational Application Developer, RADlic.jar, are available online at the Passport Advantage site.
Please note that this site requires logon information, and displays product images for only those products that have been purchased:
http://www.ibm.com/software/lotus/passportadvantage/
Passport Advantage can now also be accessed directly through IBM Packaging Utility (see Step 2 in the instructions above for details).
Rational Application Developer, version 7.0.0.6 update is available online at:
http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=0&uid=swg24018313
IBM Installation Manager, version 1.1.1 is available online at:
http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=0&uid=swg24018338
IBM Packaging Utility, version 1.1.1 is available online at:
http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=0&uid=swg24018503
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank Powell Quiring, Peter Manahan and Jian W Zhou for their review of this article.
Resources
About the author  | 
| | Sarah Naqvi works with the Architecture Management Technical Services Team at the IBM Toronto Software Lab. She works with clients to resolve Rational Application Developer and IBM Installation Manager related issues. Sarah holds an Honours Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Toronto, specializing in Software Engineering. |
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