Testimonials
If you use WPKG, we would be glad to hear what you think about it.
Please specify on how many workstations you use it, with what type of network (Samba, Active Directory, mixed, etc.), and other information that you think could be useful.
Also, it would be interesting, although not necessary, to specify your name and/or country, company/university/school, with links etc.
Contents
Universities, colleges, schools, other educational
We love WPKG and use it to manage over 1500 workstations in 20 separate school networks (Windows 2008). WPKG takes care of almost every package we deploy. For imaging we use FOG (also a great opensource product) and love to see WPKG and FOG collaborate in the far future :-). We came from Novell ZENworks, and thinking that FOG and WPKG are at least as powerfull as ZENworks, but free and open. Thank you guy's for making such a great product!
SCOPE Scholengroep Alphen aan den Rijn - The Netherlands
We use WPKG for around 500+ computers running winXP. Really simple to use and maintain. The Auth on our network is AD2003 but all file and critical services are Debian + Samba + winbind + DRBD. -- http://www.woodcroft.sa.edu.au Woodcroft College Adelaide South Australia.
We are in the process of deploying WPKG on to a network of around 70 PCs: have been impressed by the flexibility that WPKG offers for determining which workstations get which packages. Very nice. -- Cancer Epidemiology Unit, University of Oxford
Openbare basisschool Jaarfke (primary school, the Netherlands) uses WPKG to distribute software packages to about 20 Windows 2000 workstations. The server is a Linux/Samba based domain controller. When a pc breaks down, we simply press F12 for a network service boot and after a few hours the pc is up and running again. Thanks to WPKG and Unattended maintenance efforts are minimized.
We are using WPKG in a Samba(Linux) based domain. We are deploying WPKG on about 250 worksations. It's really simple to use! Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon
I just finished a project for Schule Schongau in Switzerland. Here we manage about 15 computers using WPKG. All server-backend runs on Gentoo/Linux. In addition I implemented a linux-based RIS server (check out Linux-RIS for details, thanks to Sherpya). The installation is currently running on WPKG version 0.9.11-test1 directly accessing the configuration from WPKG-web. Through one single RunOnce entry it is possible to automatically install WPKG at the end of the setup process. After a restart it starts to deploy the software - very clean and smoothly.
At the University of Washington Biostatistics Department, we support over 100 computers using WPKG on a Samba network. WPKG has the flexibility to cater to the needs of several different classes of users, from students to research faculty to administrative personnel, all while reliably installing all of the software that each of those users needs.
We use WPKG in a Samba3+XP environment, on about 60 workstations. We are a secondary school, Kosztolányi Dezső Gimnázium
I also manage computers in few schools here in Canada, roughly 300 machines. I use WPKG and Unattended.sf.net. I can even fathom not to use it. Now, if I could just figure how to install legacy apps - like adibou - I would be the happiest man on heart.
And also, common, cloning is so 2000!
I work in 9 small schools that mainly use Win98 machines as "servers" and use it to deploy software installs in combination with Autoit scripts. Approx 300 computers in total.
Réseau des Bibliothèques de l'Ecole Normale Supérieure de Paris
We use WPKG to deploy software on about 120 workstations in our nine libraries. The file server is Samba.
We use WPKG on SambaEdu 3 networks.
An interface has been developed to administrate available packages on the server.
This interface is integrated within the interface of the SambaEdu server. It allows to:
- upload an upgrade packages from http://www.crdp.ac-caen.fr/forum/index.php.
- associate packages with groups of machines or individual hosts.
- display status of packages installed on the hosts.
http://www.haydonbridgehigh.co.uk
15 schools within the Haydon Bridge Partnership of Schools in Northumberland, UK, now use WPKG on their peer-peer networks to fully automate software installations and relevant system changes. With close to 1000 computers to support, WPKG has proved critical in delivering effective ICT Support with a very low number of staff (2 at the time of writing!) in the team. The schools span 700sq miles, a huge area.
WPKG is used alongside a Buffalo NAS or an existing Cachepilot firewall/web-filter/file server for storing the WPKG config files and software packages.
We use WPKG alongside LogMeIn Free (www.logmein.com) to provide remote software deployment which has recently been improved further through use of DropBox (www.getdropbox.com), a distributed file sharing program, which now allows me to synchronise the package files and relevant software packages across all schools without having to manually download them at each site - highly useful when remote support is used.
After being pointed to WPKG in early 2009, the rollout across all 15 schools has saved massive amounts of time - credit has to go to the developers of this completely free, but highly effective program, which previously I have only had access to comparable products on commercially available network management solutions.
The Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology at Linköping university, Sweden
We use WPKG on ~500 Windows XP clients running from samba on Solaris.
Before WPKG, sysadmins run around installing software manually, so this is saving us a lot of time which we can spend on more important things. Even if you don't want to use WPKG for automatic installations, it is perfect if you want to install the same setup of software on a lot of computers.
Institut Universitaire de Technologie d'Alençon, Université de CAEN, FRANCE
We use WPKG on ~300 Windows XP / Windows 7 clients, at shutdown ! (no wait for users)
Wonderful solution to easy deploy, better than Microsoft GPO / MSI...
Dundalk Institute of Technology, Department of Computing and Maths
We Use WPKG to manage software deployment, and registry changes for roughly 200 Windows 7 64 bit PCs. Once set up it is a very easy and simple system to use, with a wealth of silent installers already put together by the WPKG community waiting for you to use.
Kalamazoo Valley Community College
We use WPKG to manage software installs and updates. We also push out custom scripts that change system settings or program behavior. WPKG is installed on 2,000 Windows 7 computers, with a mix of 32 and 64 bit. We use to get countless help desk calls about outdated software on staff and faculty computers, because they are not re-imaged every year. Now we are able to keep the software updated without disrupting the users, either by manually installing the software or re-imaging the computer. We are able to push out scripts to make various changes at the next reboot. This is commonly used before the start of a semester to update the favorites bar for online learning resources.
Now that we have all of the packages created, installing updates is extremely easy. We put the new installer on the server and update the package with the new version number. It only takes a few minutes to push out a software update to the entire college.
Government
Mississippi Department of Archives and History uses WPKG for approximately 100 computers spanning multiple geographic locations and buildings. Almost all of our servers are CentOS Linux, with a few Windows 2003 Servers for proprietary applications.
CPTTM uses WPKG to manage hundreds of computers in its office and classrooms.
Camp Navajo recently started using Unattended and WPKG to maintain approximately 100 Windows XP workstations. Originally discovered when looking for a Norton Ghost replacement, WPKG has become our new choice for automated software updates. Our distribution point is an ancient HP Brio running OpenBSD with its Samba shares mounted on an internal SATA drive. It doesn't take much!
City of Rogers Arkansas uses WPKG to manage approximately 100 computers that are both domain and non-domain members. Distribution is easy with a set it and forget it approach at the client.
Companies
We use WPKG on about 200 workstations, both with Samba and Active Directory. It is very flexible and saved us a lot of work. We don't use AD's built-in software deployment capabilities, because they were too limited and allowed only MSI installation - we use WPKG solely instead.
We use it on about 80 workstations (no AD) in the publishing department of taz. WPKG is very good for also deploying and updating (not-MSI-)Software like Seamonkey, VLC and so on.
We use wpkg as part of an automated build process that installs Windows and all the required software. We don't have a Windows domain - it's all controlled via Samba - without wpkg we'd probably either have one great big mess of batch files or we'd have had to shell out for all the necessary parts that make up an Active Directory domain.
We use WPKG on about 50 workstations in a linux/Samba directory environment. We are a versatile engineering firm and we have to support numerous different configurations, sometimes with complex setting tweaks for different applications. We prefer WPKG since it supports all formats, not just .msi. Through the use of simple WPKG functions paired with .bat scripts for additional configurations, we are able to satisfy all needs. Try WPKG if you need any type of automated software deployment.
Boston Engineering Corporation
We use WPKG with Samba3.x(NT4 domain style) and <1500 Windows(2000,XP) clients. Samba has no any means for deployment software. WPKG was called to solve this task.
I'm deploying to 87 workstations (mixed 2K/XP) in the site under my administration. It beats manual install by a long shot...
Active directory don't work for me (only msi, need to make transforms..., etc...)
I'm currently using eleven packages (mainly office tools) and calling wpkg from active directory machine boot scripts.
WPKG is a great tool. We're using it on 20 workstations. It's really simple to use and installation was without any problems. We have tried to use some other tools but WPKG was the best solution for us. This tool is running on Linux/Samba based domain controller.
We took control about 110 work stations,placed in 19 cities (local workgroups), and 90 workstations is placed in headquater in Microsoft Domain with using WPKG. Before we started using WPKG, all users in remote offices was Administrator. Now, we are able downgrade user permissions and solve tasks as install/uninstall applications, control user settings. Summarize: we using the WPKG for the Impact, and Spiceworks to monitor our impact.
Before using WPKG we were using Software Distribution using Group Policy in Active Directory. Unfortunately we discovered when we came to roll out Office 2007 that this could not be done in Group Policy so we needed a scripted solution. We never would have guessed that WPKG would have been so much better! It's a fantastic product. Thanks to everyone involved!
Being a young German fashion startup, we want to use as many Open Source products as possible and give our own changes back to the community. The WPKG deployment for a few dozen machines (Desktop and Server) works flawlessly. We initially thought about using Empirum Software Depot from Matrix42 - but WPKG was not only free (0€ vs. several hundred), but also more flexible and easier to set up. WPKG is a real solid and KISS solution which operates without problems on top of Samba 4.
We use Samba4 AD and WPKG for ~50 work station. WPKG is more fast, customisable and easy for using solution than any other.
Other / unspecified
We use WPKG on about 100 workstations with Active Directory. It's really easy and flexible.
We use a Samba/LDAP Domain and for about 40 Windows XP PCs WPKG represents the software deployment tool. Its simple, reliable and efficient
Montreal, Quebec