Telemetry Data collected by Patch My PC On-Premises Publisher

Applies to: Patch My PC On-Premises Publisher

In order to function and to help improve our product and services, Patch My PC (PMPC) On-Premises Publisher collects and stores the following telemetry data.

Data Type
Description
Helps us

.NET Version Number where the Publisher Software is installed

The version of .NET where the Publisher software is installed.

Understand if future releases of the Publisher and any code changes will be supported.

Alert Configuration

Boolean value showing if alerts (such as SMTP or Teams alerts) have been enabled within the Publisher.

Determine how customers can be notified of changes, actions, or errors within the Publisher.

Certificate Validation Errors

Reported as a string, the contents of any errors occurring if the Publisher encounters an error when performing certificate validation, which it does whenever it communicates with Patch My PC servers.

Ensure the security and availability of the connection between the Publisher and Patch My PC servers.

Cloud Attached

Boolean value of the status of the cloud connection, indicating if a connection between the Publisher and Patch My PC Cloud has been configured.

Validate the connection between the Publisher and Patch My PC Cloud to ensure the availability of cloud-enabled features.

ConfigMgr Application Creation Enabled

Boolean data type, which tells us if the Enable creation of applications in Configuration Manager checkbox is enabled.

Understand whether customers are using all the features they may be entitled to within their subscription.

Configuration Manager Site Version

Publisher reports back the Configuration Manager site version if the SMSProvider is defined as a string value.

Contact affected customers of compatibility or supportability issues with a specific ConfigMgr build we are aware of.

Device Counts

An integer of the number of devices in a ConfigMgr site or an Intune environment.

For ConfigMgr this is specifically the MemberCount from the ‘All Systems’ collection and the ‘All Desktop and Server Client’ collections.

For Intune, this is the count of devices returned by Graph when queried for Windows, MDM-managed devices that have synced within the last 365 days.

Determine the scale of usage for our products as part of product development and road mapping. Additionally, it is used as a data point for licensed device count evaluation,How Data is Transferred which is subject to our Terms of Service.

Error Description if Publishing an Update or Application Fails

A string value used by the Publisher to report the specific error returned if an update or application fails to be created.

This applies to the Updates, ConfigMgr Apps, Intune Apps, and Intune Updates tab.

NOTE: Error description reporting can be disabled with the following registry value:

REG ADD “HKLM\SOFTWARE\Patch My PC Publishing Service” /v DisableErrorReporting /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f

See any issues a customer has when applications or updates fail to be created. Our goal is to be able to proactively reach out to customers who are experiencing known publishing issues.

Feature Usage

Boolean values of features (such as the Pause Feature) being enabled.

Determine the usage of new features within the Publisher and contact customers if a bug affects them.

Heartbeat

Every 4 hours Publisher sends a heartbeat, which is simply an indication that the Patch My PC service is running.

Determine if an instance of the Publisher is active. This data is used in troubleshooting failed upgrades and understanding Publisher usage.

Intune Application Creation Enabled

Boolean data type, which tells us if the Enable creation of Win32 applications in Microsoft Intune checkbox is enabled.

Understand whether customers are using all the features they may be entitled to within their subscription.

List of Selected Products

Reported as a list of product identifiers and product types.

Understand the usage of our catalog and ensuring we can reach out to customers regarding specific products

Number of Products Enabled and Published

An integer of the specific number of products enabled within each of the following Publisher tabs: Updates, ConfigMgr Apps, Intune Apps, and Intune Updates.

Publisher also reports back as an integer the number of updates, applications, and CVE’s published.

See the percentage of enabled versus available products and how many products are being published.

Number of Times the Catalog is Downloaded

An integer we increment each time our catalog is downloaded via an HTTPS request. We also report the next scheduled sync time as a DateTime.

Get critical insights into understanding if a specific customer has been able to utilize our products and services effectively.

Preview and Self-Updates Updates Enabled

Boolean data types that tell us if the Disable self-updates and Install preview builds options have been enabled.

Understand which customers have enabled these options, helping us notify customers of any specific actions that may need to be taken.

Version Number of the Publisher Software

A string value representing the version of the Publisher installed.

Understand how our self-updates are progressing and if any notifications may need to be sent based on notices for customers running a specific build.

WSUS Build Number

A string value representing the WSUS build number.

Identify WSUS APIs we need to test, support, or depreciate.

WSUS Database Type

Publisher reports back the type of WSUS Database, whether WID or SQL.

Better understand how our customers use WSUS, which can impact how our software works.

WSUS Updates Cleanup Information

Integer values reported back during a sync of the number of updates, size of the updates, and folder count cleaned up by the Publisher when it performs WSUS cleanup.

Better understand Publisher's hard disk usage.

WSUS Maintenance Configuration

Publisher reports back the current WSUS Maintenance configuration from the respective tab in ConfigMgr, which includes:

  • Decline expired updates in WSUS according to supersedence rules

  • Add non-clustered indexes to the WSUS database

  • Remove obsolete updates from the WSUS database.

Better understand how our customers use WSUS, which can impact how our software works.

Note

Other notes:

  • All of the data listed above is is transported and encrypted using TLS 1.2.

  • Our installers collect Installer Analytics which is part of Advanced Installer – Installer Analytics (advancedinstaller.com). We use Advanced Installer to create the installers for both Advanced Insights and the Patch My PC Publisher. The data collected is:

    • Was the application installed or uninstalled?

    • The version of the app that is installed

    • Were there any exceptions during the installation?

    • The OS that the app was installed on

    • The version of .NET, IIS, Java runtimes

    • Is the device x64 or x86?

    • The geographic location of the installation (e.g. US, UK, Germany)

    • Were the prerequisites met?

Disclaimer and More Information

The list above is current through August 20, 2024. We try to keep this list updated, but it may not contain every instance of data collection. Please contact technical support with any questions or you can review our Terms of Service.

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