As we have seen in previous articles [1] or download [2] it is now very simple to add Patch Compliance trending to your Symantec Management Platform.
However the solution provided operates outside of the Symantec Management Console. So we will look at how to integrate the Patch Trending site and graphs into the Management Console, to further simplify management and increase visibility over the patch compliance trends.
In Part I we'll integrate the site full trending into the management console [3].
In Part II (this article) we'll integrate the charts into the Management Console right click options, so anytime you right click on a bulletin you can access the charts.
Part II: Integrating the Patch Trending charts into the Management Console
To integrate into the right click option we need to make use of a custom file, attached here [4] and provided by default as part of the Site Builder (from version 14 upward): webpart-fullview.html.
This file should be copied under the "Altiris\Notification Server\Web\PatchTrending" directory under your SMP.
Once the file is added in this location, you can navigate to the "Management Console > Settings > All Settings > Notification Servers > Right Click Menu":
As you can see above you are not allowed to create new entries at the right-click top level. However you can do this on the User Defined folder, so this is what we will do now:
Our right-click action need to be available anytime a right click is done on a row that contains a Software Bulletin resource, so we will select the "Software Bulletin" resource type in the drop down menu:
Once the correct resource type is selected we can add a URL action. The url action will call the page "/Altiris/NS/PatchTrending/webpart-fullview.html" with a single parameter "?%Name% (the %Name% is the name of the bulletin against which this right click action will be run).
You also need to select the action to run inside a virtual window.
Add a meaningful name to the right click action(I choose "Patch Compliance trends") and click "Save":
Once the tree is reloaded you will find the new entry under the User Defined directory. Drag and drop the entry to the "Right Click Menu":
This is it. You can now go to any report that reference Software Bulletin (provided the bulletin guid in the hidden column _ItemGuid) and right click on a bulletin to see its trending data if any is available:
