Adobe Flash Player Auto-updates using Reg scanning

[waltkrao]

Hi,

Is there a way of scanning Auto-updates in Adobe Flash Player using Registry Scanning?
I'd like to enable Auto-Updates , so that people don't use older versions of Adobe Flash Player on their systems.

[esr · Accepted solution]

Adobe Flash uses a config file, "mms.cfg" to set auto update options. You can get a copy of the Admin Guide for v24 here:
http://wwwimages.adobe.com/www.adobe.com/content/dam/Adobe/en/devnet/flashplayer/pdfs/flash_player_24_0_admin_guide.pdf

The above guide will provide full details on using the cfg file. It sounds like you want to enable autoupdate and silent update so things are kept current automagically- Those settings would be:

AutoUpdateDisable=0
SilentAutoUpdateEnable=1

We have used Lansweepers deployment ability to copy the mms.cfg file to our pc's. You'll want to determine if 32 or 64 bit OS, then place the file accordingly. Flash on 64bit will only look at the SysWOW64 location so you may want to delete the file if found in the 32bit folder.
64bit - c$\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash
32bit - c$\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash

If you have a lot of flash to worry about you can also create custom actions that will open the flash folders to check the update logs or cfg file content, or to manually trigger the autoupdate process. Triggering the update via action would require a copy of Sysinternals ever so awesome PsExec in your Actions folder.

Description (name) - Action code
Flash Folder - {actionpath}shellexec.vbs "\\{smartname}\c$\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash"
Flash Folder 32bit - {actionpath}shellexec.vbs "\\{smartname}\c$\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash"

Flash Update - {actionpath}psexec.exe \\{assetname} -s -h "C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash\FlashPlayerUpdateService.exe"
Flash update 32bit - {actionpath}psexec.exe \\{assetname} -s -h "C:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash\FlashPlayerUpdateService.exe"

Below is a sample package XML you can adapt to check OS, set the xml file in proper location for OS and to remove extra cfg file if needed.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Package>
  <Name>Update - Flash mms.cfg file</Name>
  <Description>This package resets Adobe Flash Player silent update. </Description>
  <ShutdownOption>0</ShutdownOption>
  <ShutdownTime>0</ShutdownTime>
  <MaxDuration>300</MaxDuration>
  <Rescan>True</Rescan>
  <RunMode>2</RunMode>
  <Steps>
    <Step>
      <Nr>1</Nr>
      <Name>Check if OS is 32 bit</Name>
      <Type>5</Type>
      <ReturnCodes></ReturnCodes>
      <Success>2</Success>
      <Failure>3</Failure>
      <Path></Path>
      <Parameters></Parameters>
      <MSIParameters></MSIParameters>
      <MSIName></MSIName>
      <MSIVersion></MSIVersion>
      <Command></Command>
      <EditMode>False</EditMode>
      <Conditions>
        <Condition>
          <Type>3</Type>
          <SpecOne></SpecOne>
          <SpecTwo></SpecTwo>
          <Operator>5</Operator>
          <Value></Value>
        </Condition>
      </Conditions>
    </Step>
    <Step>
      <Nr>2</Nr>
      <Name>Set auto-update 32bit</Name>
      <Type>2</Type>
      <ReturnCodes>0,1641,3010</ReturnCodes>
      <Success>-2</Success>
      <Failure>-3</Failure>
      <Path></Path>
      <Parameters></Parameters>
      <MSIParameters></MSIParameters>
      <MSIName></MSIName>
      <MSIVersion></MSIVersion>
      <Command>COPY "{PackageShare}\Installers\Adobe Flash\mms.cfg" "%WINDIR%\System32\Macromed\Flash\mms.cfg"</Command>
      <EditMode>False</EditMode>
      <Conditions />
    </Step>
    <Step>
      <Nr>3</Nr>
      <Name>remove sys32 cfg if found</Name>
      <Type>2</Type>
      <ReturnCodes>0,1641,3010</ReturnCodes>
      <Success>4</Success>
      <Failure>4</Failure>
      <Path></Path>
      <Parameters></Parameters>
      <MSIParameters></MSIParameters>
      <MSIName></MSIName>
      <MSIVersion></MSIVersion>
      <Command>del c:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash\mms.cfg</Command>
      <EditMode>False</EditMode>
      <Conditions />
    </Step>
    <Step>
      <Nr>4</Nr>
      <Name>Set auto-update 64bit</Name>
      <Type>2</Type>
      <ReturnCodes>0,1641,3010</ReturnCodes>
      <Success>-2</Success>
      <Failure>-3</Failure>
      <Path></Path>
      <Parameters></Parameters>
      <MSIParameters></MSIParameters>
      <MSIName></MSIName>
      <MSIVersion></MSIVersion>
      <Command>COPY "{PackageShare}\Installers\Adobe Flash\mms.cfg" "C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash\mms.cfg"</Command>
      <EditMode>False</EditMode>
      <Conditions />
    </Step>
  </Steps>
  <SoftwareVersion>6051</SoftwareVersion>
</Package>

[waltkrao]

Hi Bruce,

Thanks a lot! If there is no registry entry as "icheck", can I create one ?

[Bruce_B]

There should be a registry value present that defines whether auto updates are enabled or not, so you could set up custom registry scanning to scan these values. I don't have any Adobe software installed here to verify this, but the values listed in the response to this Adobe post may be useful for you.

Once you've identified the computers that don't have auto-update enabled you could use the deployment module to mass change this registry value, using the REG ADD /f command.