Ghost Solution Suite 3 utilizes a console to issue tasks and jobs to connected client machines. Without a registered client, the console is unable to run a task to a given machine. Installation of the client for the Ghost Console can be performed via the Remote Agent installer option on the Tools Menu in the Ghost Console, and a wizard will guide through the process. Credentials are supplied and we run an operation that copies a *.msi file to the client machine and executes it with the supplied credentials.
Once this is done, the agent on the client machine should check in with the Ghost Console and appear as a connected machine, like so:
The checkin of a client should happen within a minute. If a client does not check in, there are some things to check. First, verify that on the client machine, the Altiris Deployment Agent service is running:
If it is not running, start it. If it is not present, the agent installation needs to be performed again. As long as that service is present and started, then that machine can be assumed to be working as expected.
On the Ghost Console machine, if no clients are checking in, the port may not be open. To check to see if the port is open, launch an Administrator command prompt and type netstat -nab & click Enter:
This will display a large number of results; scroll back up and start from the top and look for Port 402:
Above we see axengine.exe listening on Port 402, and this is what should be seen. In some cases, there will be no entry for this port, like in this screen capture:
If this is what you see, the Altiris eXpress Service may not be running, like so:
If this is what you find, please restart the service. The clients should check in within a minute. If you find that the service is started, the clients may be set to communicate over a non-standard port. To check for this, open the Ghost Console. Go to Tools > Option.
Then go to the Agent Settings tab.
If the box for "Force new agents to take these default settings" box is checked, click on Change Default Settings. Here is what is expected in there:
The port listed is the port that the axengine should be listening on when running the netstat command above. The listening port may be changed. If you do change the port, you will need to reinstall the Agent via the Remote Agnet Installer.