What’s new in Configuration Manager 1702 TP

Configuration Manager Technical Preview 1702 includes a lot of new features, amazing how much features that are put into each Technical Preview version of Configuration Manager. For a complete list of news in Configuration Manager 1702 TP see the documentation here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sccm/core/get-started/capabilities-in-technical-preview-1702

Here are some notes and screenshots of the new features.

Improvements to Software Center settings and notification messages for high-impact task sequences

This is one of the most voted for items on user-voice, and that is to be able to change the information to a user when starting a Task Sequence from Software Center. In Configuration Manager 1702 TP we got more than one new feature. The default message displayed when a Inplace upgrade task sequence is executed from Software Center is now changed and it doesn’t tell our users that all their data will be lost. 😀

We can also choose to customize the message in the properties of the Task Sequence.

Then it looks like this for the end-user when they start the Task Sequence from Software Center. Very Nice!

Configure Software Center properties

We can also configure the information show in Software Center for a Task Sequence, Restart required, Download Size and Estimated run time. This is also great, now we only need to train our users to use Software Center….

Check for running executable files before installing an application

This feature has improved since previous technical preview releases, now we can display a Friendly Name as well for the application, so it doesn’t say “Iexplore.exe” anymore.

It looks like this when launched from Software Center, which looks so much nicer! Now we want a “close my application now” and “retry” button as well and I am sure we will see a lot of new options in this new feature in the future.

We can also choose to close the running apps that are blocking the application installation if it is deployed as a “required” deployment. Note: this will not prompt the user to close the applications, they will be closed automatically when the deployment runs.

Create PFX certificates with S MIME support

We can now use the same feature that has been around for a while in Intune Standalone and that is to create and distribute .PFX certificates as well as SCEP as has been the case before. This is great news as a .PFX certificate on mobile devices can be used for S MIME support for instance. (It is also much easier to setup than NDES/SCEP)

Android for Work support

Android for work support, there have been traces of it in previous Technical Previews but not it is fully operational! 😀 With the same features that are available in Intune Standalone.

More Improvements:

There are even more improvements that I haven’t covered here, one I really like is the option to use Azure Active Directory Domain Services, great new feature that shows that Configuration Manager has a great future ahead as well!!

• New compliance settings for iOS devices
• Compliance assessment for Windows Update for Business updates
• Antimalware client version alert
• Conditional access device compliance policy improvements
• Use Azure Active Directory Domain Services to manage devices, users, and groups
• Peer Cache improvements
• Changes for Updates and Servicing