Iowa State University IT

Downloading and Installing Software for Windows

published by Information Technology Services

Handout WNG 231 - August 2007

Site-licensed network software is available to Iowa State University faculty, staff, and students at no charge. To enable you to easily install the supported network software on your Windows computer, the Scout utility was developed by Iowa State University.

Many packages available through Scout (including free anti-virus software) can be installed with little or no user interaction as Scout can personalize most of the software for you. Scout is designed to stay on your system; it keeps track of the version for each piece of software you have installed and can indicate when newer versions are available. Access to Scout requires an Iowa State Net-ID.

Available software includes McAfee VirusScan and Antispyware, Eudora (email), Cisco VPN client, and JMP (statistics package), among others.

1 Downloading and Installing Scout

  1. Go to http://www.it.iastate.edu/downloads/. Click "Download Scout for Windows..."
  2. Download the file and run it.
  3. A Winzip Self Extractor window will appear, click "Setup". Click "Next" twice and you should see some progress bars. Now click "Finish".
  4. Open Scout (Start -> All Programs -> Scout). A message will appear telling you it will install Kerberos. Click "OK", then click "Setup Kerberos Client".
  5. Another window will appear asking if you've installed Kerberos before. Click "No".
  6. When the New Application window appears asking for an installation location, click "Use recommended location". Click "OK" five times, and then reboot your computer.
  7. Once your computer has rebooted, you should have a yellow key with a red circle over it in the lower-right corner of your screen, next to your clock. Open Scout once again (Start -> All Programs -> Scout).
  8. In the white box next to Username:, enter your Iowa State Net-ID then press "Update". Sidecar will bring up an Initialize Ticket window with your Net-ID already entered as the username. Press "OK". Now enter your Net-ID password and press "OK".
  9. The Sidecar window should disappear and the gold key should now be uncovered. In the Scout window, press "Done".
  10. You will now be presented with a list of the "Current" packages offered through Scout. To install any of them, click that button and follow the steps.

2 Using Scout to Get Network Software

To start Scout, click Start -> Programs -> Scout.

2.1 Single-Package Installation

To install a software package, click on the program you want from the main screen and follow the prompts.

A robot installer fills in most of the installation information, stopping only a few times for input. If this is your first time using Scout, software is installed in default locations. If this is not a new installation, Scout locates the previous versions of all installed software and installs updates in those locations.

A computer with an Ethernet connection will download the software in a matter of minutes. A computer on a dial-up connection will take significantly longer to download, depending on the size of each software package.

2.2 Multiple Installation, an Easy Way to Get Software

  1. To install multiple packages (limited selection available), click Multiple Install. A list of software and checkboxes is displayed.
  2. Click the checkbox to de-select any software you don't want to install.
  3. Click "Install Selections" install the software you have selected.

2.3 Portable Scout Kits (Scout 5.2 and above)

Portable Scout kits allow you to download software available through Scout to a USB key. This is useful to install or update software without a high-speed Internet connection

  1. Start Scout (make sure you don't have mountable Scout kit media in any of your drives because you want to get the most current version from the network)
  2. Insert a formatted USB key.
  3. Press the Shift key and click the desired software package. Select the drive letter of the desired media and read the prompt panel for explanation.

You can switch to Mature and Advanced online kits and place any mixture on the USB key. When you exit Scout, you can mount the key in another system, start Scout, and install from the key. (To use from a CD, burn a copy to CD from the USB key.) Note: To use a Scout kit, download the kit from a computer with the same operating system as your computer.

If you have questions, contact the Solution Center by email at solution@iastate.edu, in person at 195 Durham Center or at 515-294-4000.