Introduction

Microsoft® Systems Management Server (SMS) contains a set of libraries, header files, online Help, and sample source programs with which you can create applications that extend the SMS system and take advantage of its resources.

With the SMS component of the Platform SDK, you can extend or use SMS in the following ways:

Add custom objects and groups to the SMS inventory

Provides instructions for extending the SMS inventory by using Desktop Management Task Force (DMTF) standard Management Information Format (MIF) files. By using MIF files, you can add objects with custom architectures (such as printers and routers) to the inventory, add a new object to an existing architecture, and add groups (such as device driver information, hardware peripherals, and monitors) to computers already existing in the SMS database.

Access the SMS site database by using the SMS API

Provides an application programming interface (API) to access objects in the SMS site database. This means you can write applications that:

• Access inventory data for SMS computers and other inventoried objects.
• Access or delete existing packages and create new packages that define software for distribution.
• Access or delete existing jobs and create new jobs that distribute software or run a command.
• Access existing machine groups, which serve as aliases for groups of target computers for software distribution.
• Access existing site groups, which serve as aliases for groups of target sites for software distribution.
• Access or delete existing queries and create new queries that specify criteria for searching for SMS computers and other inventoried objects.

The SMS API also provides a sophisticated filtering mechanism to retrieve the exact objects that you want to find.

Create applications that are ready to distribute with SMS

Provides guidelines for writing setup programs or scripts so that they will be easy to distribute and run with SMS. Information is also provided for reporting custom installation status information back to the SMS system (this is done by using a MIF file).

Instructions for creating Package Definition Format (PDF) files for software packages are also provided. PDF files are ASCII text files that define a software package for distribution as a server version and a local installation version, and define inventory information used to find the package on SMS computers. When you have software that you want to make easy to distribute with SMS, you can provide a PDF file with your application disks so that an administrator can easily load the package information into SMS. After importing a PDF file, the administrator only needs to specify the network location of the source files for the software.

Access the SMS site database by using existing applications, ODBC, and SMSVIEW

Provides samples for accessing the SMS site database by using other applications such Microsoft® Word, Microsoft® Excel, and Microsoft® Access. This access is provided through use of the SMSVIEW.EXE utility, Open Database Connectivity (ODBC), and the ODBC SQL Server driver. SMSVIEW creates SQL Server views. The samples access the data in an SMS site database by using those views.

Override and extend graphics in the SMS Administrator

Provides instructions and samples for extending the SMS Administrator user interface. If you create a custom object and add a custom icon to display for it (or if you want to change the icon for an existing item, such as a Macintosh computer), you can create a resource DLL that contains the resources for the custom icon.

Create protocol parser DLLs for Network Monitor

Provides instructions and samples for creating a protocol parser DLL for the Network Monitor.

Network Monitor displays protocol information for network administrators to use when viewing network traffic and troubleshooting problems. By writing custom protocol parsers, you can extend the set of protocols for which information is displayed.

Add third-party and ISV applications into the SMS console

Provides support for launching ISV applications from the SMS Administrator console.

SMS supports application launching from its Tools menu. The application information is added to the Windows NT Registry. SMS uses this information to launch applications based on the user selections in the SMS Administrator console. By adding this information to the Registry, you can integrate your applications with SMS.