KACE Product Support

Since you are using smart labels the only way to do it is to modify your existing smart labels to exclude other things (i.e. labels or machines) .
and MACHINE.NAME != 'mycomputer'
and MACHINE.NAME != 'othercomputer'
etc.

or
...
and MACHINE.NAME NOT IN ('computer1', 'computer2')

Problem: you are going to have to modify your smart labels any time your exclusion list changes:

The label way:
Let's say we have a label called "Exclude These" then you can permanently rewrite your smart labels to exclude this label. When you want to change which machines you are excluding you simply change membership in the "exclude these" label. To get more specific you could have separate exclusion lists like "exclude these from patching".

Here is what your other smart labels become:

...
and MACHINE.ID NOT IN (select MACHINE_ID from MACHINE_LABEL_JT ML JOIN LABEL L ON L.NAME='Exclude These' and L.ID=LABEL_ID)


Note: this is written for simplicity but not performance. You can add that above snippet to any label that identifies machines.
Note: If the "Exclude These" label is also a smart label then you must change the label order so that "Exclude these" runs first.
Note: when you change the membership of "exclude these" you must re-run an inventory on the affect PCs so they will update their smart labels.

You can create a label X in the wizard using the criteria "does not contain" label Y. If label Y in this example is also a smart label then you will have to reorder the labels. Home->label->smart labels->change machine order. X would need a higher order than Y here.

I like the SQL cuz I understand it then I don't have to worry about edge cases the wizard cannot handle. I would vote for this:
http://kace.uservoice.com/forums/82699-k1000

So if I change my "exclude from patching" label to 99, and then recreate new smart labels using two criteria; label name contains <existing smart label> and label name does NOT contain <exclude from patching>, I should get the outcome I'm wanting
Yes, that should work. But I would leave the existing labels as is and make your new label 200. tip: You could make it 101 but future needs might get in the way so I leave a sizeable gap. There is no performance penalty in the gap since it's just an order not an iteration. When you create your label do a preview (test) to see if the data looks right.

By the way, could you give tme the specific suggestion number that you would vote for? I'm not sure which one you are referring to. THX.
Sorry I thought I did post that link:
http://kace.uservoice.com/forums/82699-k1000/suggestions/1791921-exclude-based-on-label

Yes, assuming you have labels A and B and EXCLUDE then as tested it does work on multiple labels. The SQL bears that out too:

create new label called C with definition:
label names = A
and label name = B
and label name != EXCLUDE

Thanks for the reply, GillySpy (hey, that rhymes). Let me see if I understand this. Apparently the default order number is 100. So if I change my "exclude from patching" label to 99, and then recreate new smart labels using two criteria; label name contains <existing smart label> and label name does NOT contain <exclude from patching>, I should get the outcome I'm wanting.

By the way, could you give tme the specific suggestion number that you would vote for? I'm not sure which one you are referring to. THX.

Are you using a smart label to apply your labels? If so then perhaps you could modify the label to not include machines with another label attached.

For example, I have a smart label called Patch Production that applies to any machines that don't have "Patching" in their labels. This way I can apply either "No Patching" or "Test Patching" to a computer and they won't be included in the patch production schedule that is based on the Patch Production label.

Yes I am using smart labels. What I was hoping to do is just add an exclusion to my smart label that would leave certain machines out of the label. I really was hoping to not have to create additional labels.

That should work, too. In your where clause you should be able to add:
and MACHINE.NAME != 'mycomputer'
and MACHINE.NAME != 'othercomputer'
etc.

Personally I prefer using a second label as I can then easily identify which machines aren't going to be included in the patching schedule.

I also have this problem/issue. My organization has a very dynamic structure and uses the Kbox for inventory purposes, so the agent is on nearly all our 5000+ machines. HOWEVER, many are adamant about not wanting patching done on my schedule so they are requesting that I exclude machine A here, machine B there, this group of mahcines over here, etc. It's becoming an administrative nightmare. I have at least 25 smartlabels based on different criteria that encompass most of what I administer and have created an "exclude these" smart label. Alot of the machines share several different labels. I'm not at all versed in SQL, so my question is, can't there be something (like the old WSUS) where I can simply tell Kbox to exclude certain machines from patching without having to manipulate the SQL code? Has this already been addressed elsewhere? Or am I stuck learning SQL? Sorry to whine, but I like checkboxes that I can tick and be done with it!

OK GS, thanks. That seems to take care of excluding machines that are in a certain label, but as it stands, I'm still stuck with manually modifying SQL to add machines to the exclusion label, Outside of SQL, what do you think would be a good way to automate this process? I'm thinking a simple "Add To <label>" button on the inventory page. Thoughts?

On the inventory page you could:

• (optional) do some search to narrow it down
  
• then use the checkboxes on left to finalize your choices
  
• then in the menu choose action->apply label

OK! Now we're getting somewhere, just to clarify... if I have machines that can be in several different smart labels (domain name label plus subnet label plus building label, etc.) and I then add them to the "exclude from patching" label which has a lower order number (100, while the other labels have 200), they won't patch?

Let me take a look at what the wizard does there. I know how to do it in SQL.

WOOT! THX, take your time.

My setup is as follows:

Smart label with the following criteria:
If Label Name does not contain Patching apply "Patch Production"
You can make this with the wizard and not touch it.

I can then apply other labels to machines for various patching needs.
For instance:
No Patching is added to machines that Kace shouldn't update
Test Patching is applied to the machines that we apply patches to first
Lab Patching is applied to lab computers (different schedule from the rest of campus)
Special Lab Patching is applied to that special lab where the professor says we can only patch once a month
etc.

As long as the other labels contain the word Patching they will not get included in the default Patch Production label and will have their own patch schedule attached.

OK, GS thanks again. I ran into a liitle trouble in that my "exclude from patching" label is also a smart label and I wasn't able to search in Inventory and apply that label to certain machines (that label didn't show up in the APPLY THIS LABEL dropdown and DELL KACE support told me you cannot apply smart labels in that way). I do have enough descriptors on the machines I want to exclude (deep freeze, common txt file, etc.) that I can have it be a smart label and autopopulate (which is what I want). The DELL KACE guy was very helpful in helping me create a custom inventory rule that looks for the deep freeze path and I can push a text file to any other machine I want to exclude and add that to the inventory rule. Do you see a problem with this? That would make my final label something like this

Create new label C (order 100) with criteria of

Label name = A (order 100) AND
Label name = B (order 100) AND
Label name != EXCLUDE (order 50)

Patch using Label C (all are smart labels) and as long as a machine is in EXCLUDE, it won't patch even if it's also in A and/or B.

Steelc, thx for your input. I'm going to try and make this work unless it gets too complicated (too late huh?). Are your labels smart labels?

Looks good embryjim. Have your check-ins catch up a bit so that Label A , B and EXCLUDE are populated. Then your test results on C are more reliable to give you confidence.

ORIGINAL: embryjim
Steelc, thx for your input. I'm going to try and make this work unless it gets too complicated (too late huh?). Are your labels smart labels?




Some of the labels are smart and others aren't.

Someone (probably GillySpy) posted a great tip on how to "pre-populate" a smart label that has been very handy:
1. Create a normal label
2. Use an advanced search to find the computers you want to label
3. Apply the label from step 1 to computers found in step 2
4. Create a smart label that uses label created in step 1

The label will now be associated with the smart label from step 4, so you won't be able to manually add machines to it anymore, but those machines already labeled with it should retain it as long as they still meet the smart label requirements.