SMSINST: Increment Variable Operation Does Not Work as Expected (212793)

SYMPTOMS

When using Set Variable Action with the Increment Operation in a Systems Management Server Installer script, the numeric variable will not increment as expected. It will remain at "1" and might never exit a loop if that value is being evaluated as the loop's conditional.

CAUSE

When writing a script for a loop in which a variable is needed to increment through each iteration of the loop, only the increment operation and the variable should be selected. This will not work properly unless a new value is given to increment. This can be thought of as a typical X = X + 1 type of operation where the first X is the variable and the second X is the new value.

WORKAROUND

To work around this problem, simply set the new value to your variable name surrounded with "%" symbols. The following is an example of such a script:

Set Variable COUNTER to

While COUNTER Less Than "10" do
  Display Message "Counter"
Set Variable COUNTER to %COUNTER%
End Block

Note that %COUNTER% should be defined as the message text in the display message script item. Also, the operation value within "Set Variable COUNTER to %COUNTER%" should be defined as increment.
In this example COUNTER is the variable and %COUNTER% is the new variable inside the Set Variable dialog box.