Ivanti Migration Manager

Although Migration Manager is still supported, as of DSM 2022.2, its functionality has been replaced with Ivanti Workspace Control Core Edition. For details, see the Ivanti Workspace Control Core Edition Quick Start Guide (PDF).

Areas of Application

The user state refers to the files and settings defined by the end user. There are few standards for the storage of user states. The lack of such standards means that considerable effort is required to backup and transfer user states. The resulting failure to make backups means that there is a considerable risk of data being lost. The complexity of the problem becomes increasingly apparent when operating system migrations like Windows 7 or computer replacements are undertaken. The effort required to provide users with their data following successful installations is often reason enough not to perform a migration or replace computers. In order to avoid restricting employee productivity and to protect important data, companies require a high-performance personality migration solution for user states.

By automating all necessary backup and restoring processes and integrating this solution into the superordinate software management system, IT administrators gain the necessary flexibility to react quickly to hardware and software malfunctions, malware threats, and internal company changes.

It is essential to maintain a detailed record of the application data and settings to be backed up in order to establish a basis for standardizing the environment. Particularly in enterprises, the extended functions for storage capacity reduction and data security are of central importance.

Reduction in Downtimes and Support Costs

Ivanti Migration Manager allows you to fully automate the backup and migration of user states for all users on a computer. Ivanti Migration Manager is deployed and executed in the background (‘silently’), so that users never need to interact with the program. The solution automatically records all user data and settings, for example desktop layout, personalized adjustments, document templates, network connections as well as files and folder structures. The Registry Selector also takes registry keys and values into account for proprietary applications.

You can choose between local, LAN, WAN or removable media as locations for saving the user state. Various file versions can be recovered. Personalized user environments can therefore be restored in no time at all in the case of malfunctions or in the context of migration projects, thus reducing productivity loses and keeping cost-intensive on site support to a minimum.

Focus on Enterprise Environments

Ivanti Migration Manager was designed to address the particular concerns related to enterprise migrations and continuity management. The solution features excellent scalability and can be fully automated by means of DSM scripts. In addition, Ivanti Migration Manager has extended functionalities predestined for use in enterprise.

These allow you to reduce the storage space required for the user state with delta backups which, particularly in large environments, are often essential. In addition, the HTTP support enables data to be stored on web servers without providing access to the company network. Sensitive documents and settings are encrypted at your temporary workstation and migrations to new systems can be restricted by password protection.

Standardization Through Rule-Based Migration

With Ivanti Migration Manager, complicated scripts for migrating user settings are a thing of the past. Even without expert knowledge, just a few mouse clicks are needed to select the users and applications to be recorded by Ivanti Migration Manager. Using predefined and configurable rules, IT administrators can decide exactly which files from the defined applications shall be migrated and where they shall be saved – even for migrations between different operating systems and application versions. Audit logs record the capturing or restoring of all files and settings. This enables you to achieve a standardized environment that is easier and more economical to maintain.

Additional Malware Protection

Owing to the ubiquitous threat of viruses, worms, spyware and the like, leading security experts recommend that companies automate processes for deleting hard disks and reinstalling operating systems. By combining Ivanti Migration Manager with its tools for malware analysis, you can achieve an increased level of security and, at the same time, ensure employee productivity.

As soon as a malware infection has been discovered, you can have the anti-virus scanner clean the stored data. With Ivanti DSM, the infected systems are patched in next to no time with a clean operating system and Ivanti Migration Manager automatically restores the personalized application environment. The scheduled backups provided also form the ideal basis for a routine reinstallation of all systems, which will stifle malware infections at their very outset.

Four Main Processes

After a period of time, a computer starts to reflect the personality and choices of the person using it. For instance, application settings, email, browser settings and favorites, custom Word dictionaries, and innumerable other settings are reflected in the overall state of the computer.

Migration Manager is designed to capture computer personalities, keep them organized, and then allow these personalities to be injected into a new computer.

Migration Manager also has the capability of performing personality backups and restoring individual files contained in a personality. Migration Manager was developed specifically for the IT professional who is responsible for multiple desktop computers. Using Migration Manager as a key component of a PC upgrade project saves time and increases computer user satisfaction.

Although very straightforward and easy to use, Migration Manager also contains advanced features required to manage multiple computer personalities. For details see the Migration Manager user's help.

Migration Manager uses four main processes to preserve or backup and restore personalities: Extract Personality, Inject Personality, Backup Personality Changes and Restore Files:

•Extract Personality lets you select the settings and data that comprise your computer personality and stores it in the location of your choice.

•Inject Personality lets you select and transfer the previously extracted personality data to a target computer.

•Backup Personality Changes allows you to perform incremental personality backups.

•Restore Files enables the user or Migration Manager administrator to search, examine and selectively restore the files contained in an extracted personality.

Source: Migration Manager User's Guide.