GPMC, wuau.adm "is not in a valid format", really missing

[Jeff]

When I'd select a GPO in the Group Policy Management
Console and choose the Settings tab to display the GPO's
content, I'd get this error message:

The .adm file "C:\WINDOWS\inf\wuau.adm" is not in a
valid format and must be replaced. . . .

In fact, the file simply did not exist.

What's odd is that copies of the wuau.adm file -did-
exist in the policies folders in c:\windows\SYSVOL, i.e.

domain\Policies\<GUID>\Adm
sysvol\<domain>\Policies\<GUID>\Adm

for each policy that was not displaying properly.

I copied wuau.adm to the c:\windows\inf area, and GPMC
was happy.

What's I'm curious to know is:

- if wuau.adm wasn't in c:\windows\inf\wuau.adm, how
did it get copied into the policies in the first place?

- is it likely that I did something wrong, or does the
installation of GPMC do something strange?

As far as I know, I'm the only person in my organization
modifying the policies, and I always do it from one of
the WinSrv2003 DCs, not an XP workstation.

~~Jeff

[Bob Qin [MSFT]]

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for your posting here.

I've not seen this problem before.

Does the problem occur on all the DC or just some certain DC?Also, where
did you obtain the GPMC you are using? There are some corrections to .ADM
file handling in the newest version which is located here:
<http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=C355B04F-50CE-42C7
-A401-30BE1EF647EA>

Wuau.adm is automatically installed in the <Windows>\Inf folder when you
install Windows Server 2003. When you create a domain group policy, it will
copy the relevant template file from inf folder to the sysvol\...\adm
folder.

The original one may be remove by accident.

Regards,
Bob Qin
Product Support Services
Microsoft Corporation

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

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[Jeff]

Post by Bob Qin [MSFT]
Does the problem occur on all the DC or just
some certain DC?

All 4 of them. Two of the DCs were clean-installed
forest root domain DCs, while the other two were
clean-installed WinSrv2003 boxes that were promoted
to DC status in a domain that had been upgraded from
WinNT->WinSrv2003.

Now I think I know what might have happenend.
Note that all 4 were unattended installations
from a CD-ROM, using a winnt.sif file . . .

Post by Bob Qin [MSFT]
Wuau.adm is automatically installed in the
<Windows>\Inf folder when you install Windows
Server 2003.

Normally. Our unattended installation explicitly
leaves out the Automatic Update Client:

[Components]
AutoUpdate = Off

I notice that while I see some wuau* files in
the system32\dllcache folder, I do -not- see any
wuau* files in system32\ itself, which seems
normal if the feature was not installed.

C:\>dir /b windows\system32\wuau*
File Not Found

C:\>dir /b windows\system32\dllcache\wuau*
wuauclt.exe
wuaueng.dll
wuauserv.dll

My guess is that since we omit the installation
of Automotic Update, some of the wuau* files do
not get installed to the normal locations, including
the wuau.adm file. The help files, by contrast,
-do- get installed:

C:\>dir /b windows\help\wuau*
wuau.chm
wuauhelp.chm

We have a couple of other Windows Server 2003
boxes (non-DCs) that were installed using a similar
procedure, and the wuau* file situation is exactly
the same for them--wuau.adm is not present in
windows\inf.

Note that I copy the CD-ROM content to a folder
on the local filesystem, so the original file
(i386\wuau.ad_) is available locally and might be
where it's getting picked up when needed. (?)

Am I missing something?

Thanks!

[Bob Qin [MSFT]]

Yes, you are right. If you did not enable "Automatic Updates", the
wuau.adm will not appear in \INF folder.

You can install the new WUAU.ADM from the following web.

http://microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=D26A0AEA-D274-42E6-8025
-8C667B4C94E9&displaylang=en

You can also copy the wuau.ad_ from the Windows 2003 CD to your hard disk
and run the following command:

expand wuau.ad_ wuau.adm

Have a nice day!

Regards,
Bob Qin
Product Support Services
Microsoft Corporation

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

====================================================
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