Pushing Files from 2008 R2 to Many PCs over LAN

Hi edugeek friends! I was wondering if any of you had any experience pushing a file or directory to many computers.

I am using a Windows 2008 R2 server and the client computers that will be receiving the updates are all running Windows 7 Pro and all are connected on a LAN. These are in a classroom environment using Intel Classmate PCs. I have in mind a few solutions such as SVN or something of that sort, but I want it to be a simple as possible... something as simple as a LAN-exclusive dropbox (with the client computers set to read only) would be ideal. People that will be adding the files that need to be pushed to the other client computers are not very technically savvy in this particular situation.

Any ideas or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Matt

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Originally Posted by mattcrum

Hi edugeek friends! I was wondering if any of you had any experience pushing a file or directory to many computers.

I am using a Windows 2008 R2 server and the client computers that will be receiving the updates are all running Windows 7 Pro and all are connected on a LAN. These are in a classroom environment using Intel Classmate PCs. I have in mind a few solutions such as SVN or something of that sort, but I want it to be a simple as possible... something as simple as a LAN-exclusive dropbox (with the client computers set to read only) would be ideal. People that will be adding the files that need to be pushed to the other client computers are not very technically savvy in this particular situation.

Any ideas or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Matt

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do they need to be pushed to or can they just be accesible from the server - eg can you redirect the desktop to a folder and drop them in their so they "appear" on the desktop?

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Originally Posted by jamesreedersmith

do they need to be pushed to or can they just be accesible from the server - eg can you redirect the desktop to a folder and drop them in their so they "appear" on the desktop?

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One of the concerns with this is one of the tools that's being used within a classroom is multicasting a video stream from one laptop to many. I'd prefer not to strain the router anymore by using the wireless network to both receive the video to be multicast and send it to the other machines if that makes sense.

And just an update to what I am thinking in terms of solutions, I am thinking to ask the folks installing the new content to copy the file to the 2008r2 in a specific directory and have the teachers that need the new content click a shortcut that runs a batch file that runs robocopy to copy the new content onto the client machines.

This is definitely not my ideal solution because I'm nervous of networking issues popping up and I'd greatly prefer the teachers to not have to click any files or do anything.

Does the Group Policy Preference Section allow you to deploy files via the GPO?

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Originally Posted by nickbro

Does the Group Policy Preference Section allow you to deploy files via the GPO?

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Yes. I use GPO with a WSUS installation although I don't have much experience outside of that.

I have read about using WDS and multicast to copy files to a folder on a computer but I have never tried it. This is additional files and not wiping the HD although I have never tried it. See here:

deployvista.com > Home - Multicasting - not only for operating system deployment

Thanks for the tips. My goal would be to be able to do this without setting up a domain network like active directory. It would be cool to just have an agent installed on the clients and the server just push to the machines with the agent locally... similarly to what WSUS can do with Windows Update. I use IIS and that may be an option potentially but I am new to Windows-based servers.

What about a script and drop it in startup folder on the machine so it automatically copies the contents of a folder from the source to the machine each startup with no user interaction

Do you have any classroom management software. I can think of at least two ways that Impero can do it.

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Originally Posted by jamesreedersmith

What about a script and drop it in startup folder on the machine so it automatically copies the contents of a folder from the source to the machine each startup with no user interaction

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That is probably what I will have to do... run something like robocopy to obtain any new files upon startup... I have a concern that the wireless network card will not be connected to the network before the script is ran. I could schedule it but I'd prefer not to...maybe if I have it to start running like a minute after startup or something.

Matt

Does anyone have any experience in performing these actions via Sync Center in Windows 7? This is looking to be a possible solution that would work out pretty nicely.

I was thinking of imaging the machines in a way that would sync to the server which would be on the network.