Registry System Requirements for exported AXT file are not readable

  • 3845822
  • 22-Dec-2007
  • 30-Apr-2012

Environment

Novell ZENworks 6.5 Desktop Management Support Pack 2 - ZDM6.5 SP2 Application Launcher (NAL)
Novell ZENworks 7 Desktop Management Support Pack 1 - ZDM7 SP1 Application Launcher (NAL)

Situation

ERROR: An error occurred while attempting to convert the file
When exporting an Application Object that has either a Legacy System Requirement or a Distribution Rule, that specifies a registry value that's a DWORD (i.e., not a string), the value that's stored in the AXT (or XML file in the case of Distribution Rules) is binary and doesn't appear to be readable.
For example
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\fred
regkey

ã
Note the value here is "ã" (Unicode E3, "Latin Small Letter A with Tilde")
With Distribution Rules, attempting to import the AXT results in the above error.

Resolution

To obtain access to a hot patch with the fix for this problem, follow the instructions in KB 3484245 "Updates to Novell ZENworks 7 Desktop Management" which can be found at https://www.novell.com/support
Important Note: Even after applying this patch. creating an AXT file with the distribution rules registry dword entry will still be incorrect, unless the Application Object is updated.
The app object the AXT came from has old values for the distribution rules registry dword entry. It is necessary to open the dialog as if editing the dword entry and then press OK to re-save using the updated snap-in from the patch. Then, when this app object is next exported to AXT, the XML file will be correct.

For Legacy System requirements, this is working as designed. The value is simply the binary value of the registry value, represented as ANSI (similar to ASCII) characters - in the above example, "ã" is ANSI character E3, which is 227 in Decimal. The value is interpreted correctly when imported into a new application object.

Additional Information

To interpret the characters as a number, take the characters and look up their ANSI value - if the value was shown as "?x" for example, the ANSI values for those characters are "?"=3F(hex) and "x"=78(hex): putting them together, we get the hex number 3F78, which is 16248 decimal.Some characters may not display correctly, and you would need an editor capable of viewing these.