Windows 7 – Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.5 Overview

Session Outline
Topics Covered
Points to look at when you are moving to Windows 7 from XP and Vista.
Quick Demos of these issues and mitigations
Overview of the Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.5
Topics Not Covered
Detail coverage of shims and its implementation
Creating Custom Shims

Windows 7 Builds on Vista
Few Changes: Most software that runs on Windows Vista will run on Windows 7 - exceptions will be low level code (AV, Firewall, Imaging, etc).
Hardware that runs Windows Vista well will run Windows 7 well.
Few Changes: Focus on quality and
reliability improvements
Deep Changes: New models for security, drivers, deployment, and networking

Top Focus Areas coming from Windows XP
Operating System Version Changes
Standard User / User Account Control (UAC)
Windows Resource Protection (WRP)
Internet Explorer® Protected Mode
Impacts of 64-bit Operating Systems (no 16 bit)
Windows Filtering Platform
Deprecations/GINA/Session 0 (High Impact/Low Frequency)

Top Focus Areas coming from Vista
Operating System Version Changes
Internet Explorer 8 (Compatibility View, LCIE)
Removal of Windows Gallery applications (Windows Mail, Movie Maker, Messenger, Address Book, Photo Gallery)
National Language Support (NLS) Sorting Changes
File Libraries (they are not folders)

Biggest Concern of Application Compatibility*

Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.5

What is ACT?
Collection of tools to:
Inventory for software, hardware, and device assets
Compatibility evaluation for all of the above
Get Vendor Support Statements, Logo data from Compatibility Exchange
Recommendations for fixing applications and Websites (Internet Explorer 8)
Tools to apply compatibility fixes or “shims” to applications

The App Compat Process
Collect
1
Which applications do I HAVE?
Analyze
2
Which applications do I WANT?
Test and Mitigate
3
Which applications WORK?

ACT Process

DCP Labeling
ERP Software
Demo Software
ERP Software
Financial Software
Finance Computer
Sales Computer
Tag: Sales
Tag: Finance

Data Collection Package (DCP) Internals
Installation
Agents (Runtime Evaluation)
Inventory
User Account Control
Windows Compatibility
Update Compatibility
Bucketizer
Compressor
Uploader

collect.exe: DCP Inventory Agent
Perhaps the best software inventory tool availablefrom Microsoft
Searches:
The MSI database
MsiEnumComponents API
Add/remove programs
Registry entries
Windows Shell
HKLMSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerShell Folders
HKU...SoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVerisonExplorerShell Folders
App paths
HKLMSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionApp Paths

collect.exe: DCP Inventory Agent
Searches
Path environment variable
ExpandEnvironmentStrings API
HKU...Environment
File extension handlers
HKLMSoftwareClasses.*ShellOpenCommand
HKU...SoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerFileExts
Run / RunOnce
HKLMSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRun
HKLMSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRunOnce
HKLMSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRunOnceEx

ACT 5.5 Data Analysis
demo

ACT 5.5 Online Sync
ACT 5.0 included:
Logo certification data
Votes from other enterprises
ACT 5.5 adds Windows Compatibility Center data
We do the research on vendor web sites
ACT 5.5 contains complete opt-out
Not only do you not share your vote, you don’t share that you even have the app
Means you don’t get any data in exchange
You can see EXACTLY the data you’re sending up

High Level Architecture
Compatibility Exchange
Desktop Topology
Finance
HR
Europe
North America
Log Processing Service and DB
Internet
Data Collection Package/Compatibility Evaluators
Application Compatibility Manager
Windows Vista
Update
Windows 7
Inventory
Ichiro
Greg

What is Standard User Analyzer?
A tool to help IT Professionals and Developers understand issues preventing an application from running with Standard User privileges
Based on Application Verifier

SUA Architecture
Application
AppVerifier Logs
XML
LuaPriv2
Windows

Internet Explorer Compatibility Test Tool
Collects web-based compatibility issues for IE7 and IE8 at run-time
Key Features:
Logs issues silently as you browse through websites using IE7 / IE8
Provides details and links to more information about discovered compatibility issues
List of issues detected is reviewed for each release of IE. We currently capture compatibility issues such as MIME Handling Exceptions, ActiveX Blocking, Codepage Sniffing and more.

What’s New in ACT 5.5?

Application
Windows
How Shims Work
Shimmed
Function
Import Function
Export
Function
Shim DLL

Shims and Layers
Application
Child Application
Shim
Layer
Windows

Demo
Windows XP Mode

Summing up..
AppCompat is a critical Process
Microsoft takes this very seriously
Lots of free tools available online to help with developers and IT Pros
With all the work and leveraging Windows 7, You will know that,
“ THE JUICE IS WORTH THE SQUEEZE !!”

References
Chris Jackson - http://blogs.msdn.com/cjacks/
AppCompat VRT - www.microsoft.com/springboard
Microsoft TechNet - technet.com/appcompat
My Technical Blog - http://www.msigeek.com
Follow me on Twitter at “msigeek”

Contact Me

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Windows 7 – Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.5 Overview

by Vijay Raj on Nov 28, 2009

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Windows 7 – Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.5 Overview — Presentation Transcript