PDQ.com headquartered in Salt Lake City offers PDQ Deploy, a software deployment tool used to keep Windows PCs up-to-date without bothering end users.
$500
per year
Puppet Enterprise
Score 8.6 out of 10
N/A
Puppet Enteprise is an IT automation and configuration management solution that enables users to manage and automate infrastructure and complex workflows. The vendor states Puppet Enterprise combines both model‑based and task-based capabilities in a way that enables organizations to scale their multi-cloud infrastructure as their automation footprint grows, with more flexibility from both agent-based and agentless capabilities.
PDQ Inventory is great if you have a local network of computers on or off a domain. As long as you have a way to log into them with common credentials. Great for large organizations, particularly ones interconnected with VPNs. PDQ Inventory isn't so great for PCs that aren't connected to the same LAN the server is on. (i.e. non-vpn remote users) They used to have a remote agent you could install, but it was removed after numerous issues.
Puppet is good enough to get the job done, you can use it to automate deployments and maintain files and configurations, if this is all you're looking for it's great. If you're looking for more control over your systems as a whole without having to write your own scripts or install multiple configuration management systems then Puppet is not what you're looking for.
The setup of Puppet is a nightmare compared to ansible. Anyone watching a youtube video can easily set up ansible with minimal IT knowledge. All one needs is the source IP addresses and we are good to go. Setting up Puppet is a more hands-on task and pushing the puppet agents to all the boxes is another issue. If the installation and setup were simplified like ansible that would attract a lot of people to this platform
The syntax of the code for Puppet is not as easy as ansible. Ansible simply follows a YAML format and it's like typing in normal English. Even complicated tasks can be written by just understanding YAML syntax. Perhaps Puppet needs to revisit the lanugage used and try to come up with a much simpler lanugage for writing code. This will make day-to-day usage easier.
The interface is straight forward and guides you through the process there. PDQ keeps track of the when new updates are made available writes the scripts and all l you need to do is push the button. (Mr George Jetson) Now with the download done you just sit back worry free and watch the software install in 1% of the time it would take to take care of the PC manually.
The built-in help menus and general ease of use render whatever systems support there might be almost irrelevant. There is stability in the system's simplicity; if you're in the position to use such a product, you're your own best friend. Simple web searches more often than not turn up the solution to any little niggles, such as what silent install switches specific applications require (a remarkably wide choice of options exist). System updates are timely and unobtrusive, installing in no time at all. Maybe I've just been lucky; if so, long may it continue!
Puppet has top class support. You can simply mail them with their query and they will respond to your query in a timely manner. We do have enterprise license for puppet. Also there is a vibrant community for puppet out there. So even if you dont purchase a premium support option you can simply google your queries and get answers
This software was referred to us by an IT professional. Previously, we were installing the software with the help of remote desktop applications but it was very time consuming; it was wasting the user's time since he could not use his computer. After testing PDQ Deploy, we just never looked back.
HPSA is a licensed product and incurs significant upfront investment costs due to COTS licensing. Puppet Data Center Automation has a significantly lower upfront investment and product documentation is more readily available. Chef is a very similar offering, however, at the time our decision was considered, the adoption of Chef vs. Puppet was significantly less in the community.
