Custom Apps configuration is where you can configure your 3rd party apps to work with dSupportSuite. Here you have two categories of apps:
- Custom Apps for Automated Maintenance – ALL of the apps appearing here are run as part of the maintenance routine, without exception.
- Custom Apps for Custom Buttons – These apps are configured for use only with the Custom Buttons system and are only visible/executable when they are configured for that button.
Having the two categories helps differentiate the custom apps between each other. For example, you may want to have the same app on a custom button that you also have in maintenance mode, but you would naturally want it to behave differently when run in each mode.
Download Default Apps – this will download a default set of applications that I have configured for usage or as examples in creating your own apps. They currently include:
- MBRCheck
- Emsisoft’s a2cmd command line virus scanner.
- Auslogics Disk Defrag (not recommended, installs ASK toolbar.)
- Piriform Defraggler
- Piriform CCleaner
- PatchMyPC
To get started, select an existing custom app name to view it’s configuration, or type a new name in the App Name field to create a new rule.
NOTE: It is HIGHLY recommended to fill out the download information BEFORE the App Path/Executable Name information, and click the TEST DOWNLOAD button as the app may not initially download/extract to exactly where you expected it to be! Once the test download is completed, then configure the App Path/Executable Name information using the Browse button to open to the 3rd Party Tools folder where you can select the downloaded application.
- App Name – Obviously what you want to call the app.
- App Download URL – URL to download the application (e.g.
- Download Filename – Required download filename of the app you are downloading (e.g. foo.zip)
- 64bit only App Download URL & Download Filename – These may contain secondary links to a separate 64bit version of the app which will be utilized if the OS detected is 64bit. Do not fill these out if your app is both 32/64bit compatible.
- Spoof Referring URL – (rarely necessary) some apps will only download if you started that download from a certain referring URL, for example a website may restrict download of a certain file only to people who visited a certain URL first. Here you can spoof that referring URL.
- App Website – Just a placeholder for the app’s website, great to put the URL to the online documentation so it is only a click away while configuring the app.
- Run Installer First – If the download is an installer/setup file, you can configure this box to launch the setup file before running the custom app path / executable name defined below.
- Installer Parameters – Put any command line parameters to pass to the installer here – with the idea that your installer likely includes a parameter to force it to install automatically without prompting and/or invisible to the user.
- App Path/Executable Name –
- If downloading is configured, BE CERTAIN to download the app first and use the BROWSE button to find the downloaded app, which will reside somewhere in the dSupportSuite3rd Party Tools folder.
- The syntax for this field expects the tool to be in the 3rd Party Tools dir, so that part is omitted from the textbox, (e.g. 3rd Party ToolsMy AppMyApp.exe becomes simply My AppMyApp.exe)
- You may also use standard Windows environment variables in this box to reference apps installed on the system outside of the 3rd Party Tools dir. (e.g. %windir%System32cleanmgr.exe or %programfiles%My Other AppMy Other App.exe)
- 64bit only App Path/Executable Name – use when you have a separate executable that is required to execute on 64bit systems. Do not fill this in if your app is both 32/64bit compatible. When filling in, same rules apply as they do to the 32bit fields.
- App Command Line Parameters – These are the parameters you want to specify to your app to automate it and/or specify it’s run time conditions.
- Copy Log File to Reports Directory – This will copy a log file you specify here (presumably created by your application) to the appropriate reports directory after the app has finished execution. Useful to gather logs from your apps for reporting purposes – this will also be emailed for example when maintenance reports are emailed and attach reports is enabled, and also in the event of Custom Errorlevel Rules (see further down.)
- Run App on These Platforms – if anything here is UNCHECKED, the app will automatically be ignored and not executed by dSupportSuite on that particular platform. Very useful when certain apps aren’t compatible with certain platforms. Choose from 32/64bit, Windows versions XP – 8, and Server OSes.
- Always Attempt to Download a Fresh Copy – when downloading is configured this item will ALWAYS download the app, even if it already exists on the system. This ensures the latest app will always be running on the system. Not recommended for large applications requiring a lot of download time, however.
- Force App Invisibility… – This forces the app to run invisible to the user if the app otherwise will not (maybe it’s command line parameters don’t allow that functionality, or whatever.) This option only takes effect if you have “Hide Status Window” under Config > Maintenance checked. CAUTION: This should only be used with applications that can be / will be automated 100%. If the app displays a prompt at anytime during execution, it will NOT be visible to the current user, and the app will never finish!
Import Config File(s) Before Running – Occasionally an app may not have the settings you want it to have when freshly downloaded. This function ensures that your custom app will always execute with the settings you specify for it.
- All 3rd Party Config files must be located in dir: dSupportSuiteConfig3rd Party Configs
- You may enter one or multiple config file names in this box separated by a comma. e.g. myconfig.ini,myconfig2.ini
- BONUS: May also be used to run custom scripts before running the app!!!
- When configured here, these file types will be executed: BAT, CMD, VBS
- When configured here, REG files will be imported.
- When configured here, any other file type not mentioned above (e.g. INI, CFG, DAT, CONF, etc.) these file types will be copied to the application’s directory after download
I will give two examples here. First CCleaner, which stores it’s settings in a CCleaner.ini file. If you save custom settings for that program, and then copy the CCleaner.ini file to the dSupportSuiteConfig3rd Party Configs directory and put CCleaner.ini in this box, it will be copied to the downloaded CCleaner directory every time before execution. Another example is PatchMyPC, which stores it’s settings in the registry. If you export HKLMSoftwarePatch My PC to a .REG file, put it in your 3rd Party Configs dir and specify the filename here, this reg file will automatically be imported before running the app!
Define Errorlevel Rules – Here you may specify a few actions to take place after execution of your custom app depending on the errorlevel it returns after completion. Your choices currently are to send an alert email and/or display a message box. You can optionally attach any log files from the custom app to the email if specified in the Copy Log File… config box mentioned above.
- If Errorlevel – the first step of the rule, and it is recommended to leave this as 0 even if you aren’t testing for 0. This errorlevel is typically returned by apps that execute and exit normally.
- Else If Errorlevel – if the first errorlevel (which should be 0) doesn’t match then this action is taken if a second defined errorlevel matches.
- Else – if neither condition above matches, this action is performed.
For example (in the picture above) this is used in Emsisoft’s a2cmd configuration. The application returns errorlevel 0 when it completes a scan without finding viruses/malware, however if it does find them it returns errorlevel 1. At that point you can configure dSupportSuite here to send an email alert on errorlevel 1, indicating that the system is infected.
I also insert a generic errorlevel to be used when the app cannot be found for execution, and that is 255 – so if you see errorlevel 255 warnings in your logs you will know the app isn’t found.