CASE STUDY

WINDOWS 7 MIGRATION

ZERO-TOUCH APP UPDATES FOR 12,000 PCs IN 70 LOCATIONS

Application Mapping automates and accelerates software reinstallation during Windows 7 migrations to deliver a better experience at reduced cost

Challenge With the End-of-Support for Windows XP deadline approaching (8 April 2014), a large auction company realized it needed a robust solution to deliver its Windows 7 migration. At the same time it wanted to rationalize and standardize versions of all applications used across its 12,000-seat estate in 70 locations, as well as remove any software that was not being used.

Solution Using 1E solutions AppClarity, Shopping and Nomad, combined with services from 1E consultants, the company was able to successfully migrate its entire estate to Microsoft Windows 7 in a few months. Users automatically got back only the applications they needed (based on their individual usage) in rationalized and updated versions resulting in satisfied users and reduced license costs.

Business benefits  Created software usage reports in minutes to become compliant  Able to standardize versions of software for users  Able to map applications based on usage  Reduced license costs  Completed work in a few months

Share this

1E.COM

ZERO-TOUCH APP UPDATES FOR 12,000 PCs IN 70 LOCATIONS

Rationalizing and standardizing versions for all licensed software across the enterprise
With the clock ticking towards end of Extended Support for Microsoft Windows XP, there was a growing imperative for this auction company to migrate its entire computer estate to Microsoft Windows 7. The timescales were beginning to matter, especially as the company wanted to take advantage of the Operating System Deployment (OSD) opportunity to rationalize the number of software licenses as well as standardize application versions for users. For example, we had more than 12 different versions of Microsoft Office including 2003, Standard, Enterprise, Home and Student in fact, every version of Office you can imagine, explains the Manager of Engineering. We do not have strict policies around who gets which applications. When we looked at it, taking two similar departments in different locations as an example, they do the same job, but each with different tools.

 Using a combination of Shopping and AppClarity has resolved the issue where we had a significant number of software licenses being unused across the company. During the OS migration process, users have been left satisfied by the speedy migration process as they are left with all the applications that they expect to see, the data they use, as well as the personality of their machines, all without the normal hassle in upgrading computers. Manager of Engineering, Auction Company
People in similar roles have different applications installed. We needed a way to reimage them and give them back their applications without having a defined list of what they should have. Coming out of this on the other side, we wanted everybody to have the right applications that they need to be productive in their job. We based this on what they already had and used, but during the OSD they would get standardized (in many instances, upgraded) and supported versions of the software. With 12,000 users across 70 locations the company needed an automated zero-touch solution that could handle the OSD and ensure users have the new Windows 7 image and the applications they need, as well as remove those that they are not using. 1E came to us with an Application Mapping solution which leveraged AppClarity and Shopping along with some customization for our environment to complete the task.

LEGACY OS BUILD

1E ANALYTICS

NEW WIN 7 STANDARD

Used Adobe Photoshop CS6 ($500) Paint.NET (Free) Do not install

Rarely used Adobe Photoshop CS5 AppClarity & Shopping Unused

1E.COM

ZERO-TOUCH APP UPDATES FOR 12,000 PCs IN 70 LOCATIONS

Automated rationalization
The ability for the company to be able to systematically rationalize applications using AppClarity was very important. AppClarity sits next to Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) which has a very rich data collection in relation to software, including software inventory, add/ remove programs, asset intelligence, software metering and similar data. It is a complex and laborious process to manually try to reconcile all that data into actionable information, even for a small subset of software.

Being the Adobe audit model citizen Adobe highly complimented the auction company during a recent vendor audit telling their software asset management team You are a model citizen. The company, who by that time had been using AppClarity for nearly a year, were easily able to run a report on all the Adobe products used in the company, and uninstall software that was no longer being used to ensure they were compliant. They were able to ensure that they had all the licenses they needed prior to the audit. In the past what would have taken more than two weeks to research now only takes a few minutes, says the Manager of Engineering, We are able to run a report that identifies the publisher, product, number of licenses, usage and estimated value. Before AppClarity we had a blind spot about usage, he asserts. Now not only is the company compliant, it has been able to save $70,000 through reclaiming unused Adobe software.

 The automation around the application side marries the automation that Nomad has enabled for zero-touch deployment of Windows 7 across our estate. Manager of Engineering
AppClaritys automated analysis and its extensive software catalog, normalize SCCMs data, so administrators can easily see what software is installed as well as how it is categorized according to usage. This way all the application migration activities can focus on the applications that are most important to the organization.Our goal was to give users the newest version of an application and focus on the software that they actually use for their role, says the Manager of Engineering. An Operating System (OS) migration is a golden opportunity to do aggressive rationalization and reclaim. Users expect to see a significant amount of change and a new user experience with the change in OS. And, adding usage to the mapping criteria means the organization can take advantage of this opportunity to reclaim unused software in order to save money.

Adobe Acrobat Professional 8 Publisher Adobe Systems Adobe Systems Adobe Systems Adobe Systems Adobe Systems Adobe Systems Adobe Systems Adobe Systems Inc Product Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional (Part of CS3) Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional (Part of CS3) Adobe Acrobat 8.1.3 Professional Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional (Part of CS3) Adobe Acrobat 8.1.2 Professional Adobe Acrobat 8.2.5 Professional Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional (Part of CS3) Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional (Part of CS3) Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional Adobe Acrobat 8 Pro Full Version 8.0.0 8.0.0 8.0.0 (Duplicate) 8.1.3 8.0.0 (Duplicate) 8.1.2 8.0.0 (Duplicate) 8.0.0 (Duplicate) 8.2.5 8.1.0 8.1.0

ACCURATE DEPLOYMENT COUNT

Adobe Acrobat 8

1E ANALYTICS ENGINE 1E APPLICATION CATALOG EXCLUDE JUNK RATIONALIZE VARIANTS FILTER LICENSABLE

1E.COM

ZERO-TOUCH APP UPDATES FOR 12,000 PCs IN 70 LOCATIONS

Mapping the right apps across

What we ended up with as core applications are the unlicensed apps like free Adobe Suite tools and the Office viewers. It was the licensed applications which were primarily the mapped applications that are not on every desktop. About AppClarity Software license optimization which reduces software costs, AppClarity gives you clear and simple visibility of your entire software estate, across servers and PCs. Identifying unused software enables an organization to remove excess cost and optimize its license position. We used a method subjecting to analysis any software that was present on 50 machines or more. So we were able to narrow down the list of supported applications very quickly, and understand what the workload would be to package these applications and get them ready for deployment as part of the migration, explains the Manager of Engineering. All this automation around the application side marries the automation that Nomad has enabled for zero-touch deployment of Windows 7. The company has been able to roll out an average of 300 / 400 deployments per week with the BAU team. We have found that its between 80 / 100 deployments per site with a 1-2% bypass rate where we need to deploy specific hardware that we cant find Windows 7 support for. We completed the migration for our entire estate in a matter of months. Without Nomad, AppClarity, Shopping, the Application Rationalization and Mapping functionality we would be nowhere near finishing the project.

Share this

About 1E 1E is the pioneer and global leader in efficient IT solutions. 1Es mission is to identify unused IT, help remove it and optimize everything else. 1E efficient IT solutions help reduce servers, network bandwidth constraints, software licenses and energy consumption.

Contact us US: +1 866 592 4214 UK: +44 20 8326 3880 India: +91 120 402 4000 info@1e.com

1E.COM

Copyright 2014 1E. All rights reserved. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. 1E shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.