Overview on ZEN Works

Zero Effort Networks (Z.E.N. works) is a great new tool in NetWare 5, that makes the network administrator”s job a lot easier by allowing him to spend less time at each user workstation. To be able to use the Z.E.N. works these are the minimum hardware requirements:
Processor: 486/33 or higher
Memory: 16 MB (for Windows 95); 24 MB (for Windows NT)

Hard disk space: 4 MB (workstation; 24 MB (full station)
Z.E.N. works needs to be installed on the server and the client on the workstation needs to be updated.
During the installation process Dynamic Link Libraries (DLLs) are copied to the workstation. DLLs contain subprograms that are called by an application to perform certain operations. Another utility that is included in Z.E.N. works to help the distribution and management of applications is the Application Launcher, which consists of four major components:
Application objects in the NDS tree
Application Launcher Window and Application object
The snAppShot utility allows you take a “snapshot” of the Windows workstation before installing the application. The snapshot includes Registry settings along with the names of system and application files on the workstation. After the application has been installed, the snAppShot utility takes another picture of the workstation”s configuration and then uses the two snapshots to create an Application Object Template (AOT) file.
The Application Launcher uses the AOT file to determine what Registry settings and system files need to be copied to the workstation to run the application from the network. In addition to including configuration settings and system file names, the AOT file also contains the name of the Application object and the path where you want to store the AOT and installation files. Consequently, before running the snAppShot utility, you need to define the name you want to use for the Application object and decide where the application and AOT files will be stored.
The Application Launcher software consists of two components: the wrapper program and the launcher. The wrapper program determines which launcher program (NALW31.EXE, NALWIN32.EXE, or NAL.EXE) to run based on the client computer”s operating system. The launcher program then determines the Application objects to which the user has access and displays a window showing all applications the user has been authorized to run.
When the user selects an application, the launcher determines whether the application is installed on the workstation. If this is the first time the user has run the application from this workstation, the application will automatically be installed using the AOT file created by the snAppShot utility. If Application Launcher senses that the application configuration has been damaged, or files are missing or corrupt, it will automatically correct the application configuration and copy and damaged or missing files.