Microsoft: Windows Server PowerPack, version 114

Version 114 of the Microsoft: Windows Server PowerPack includes updates to Dynamic Applications and PowerShell commands.

  • Minimum Required SL1 Version: 10.2.0

Before You Install or Upgrade

Ensure that you are running version 10.2.0 or later of SL1 before installing "Microsoft: Windows Server" PowerPack version 114.

For details on upgrading SL1, see the relevant SL1 Platform Release Notes.

Installing or Upgrading to this Version

By default, installing a new version of a PowerPack will overwrite all content in that PowerPack that has already been installed on the target system. You can use the Enable Selective PowerPack Field Protection setting in the Behavior Settings page (System > Settings > Behavior) to prevent the new version of the PowerPack from overwriting local changes for some commonly customized fields.

If you are currently using the Dynamic Applications in this PowerPack to monitor devices, collection errors might occur for one or two polling cycles during the installation of a new version. To prevent collection errors during an upgrade, you can optionally disable collection for monitored devices before performing the following steps and re-enable collection after the upgrade.

To install this PowerPack:

  1. Search for and download the PowerPack from the PowerPacks page (Product Downloads > PowerPacks & SyncPacks) at the ScienceLogic Support Site.
  2. In SL1, go to the PowerPacks page (System > Manage > PowerPacks).
  3. Click the Actions menu and choose Import PowerPack. The Import PowerPack modal appears.
  4. Click Browse and navigate to the PowerPack file from step 1.
  5. Select the PowerPack file and click Import. The PowerPack Installer modal displays a list of the PowerPack contents.
  6. Click Install. The PowerPack is added to the PowerPack Manager page.

The "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Cache Trigger" Dynamic Application is disabled by default and needs to be manually enabled for systems using concurrent PowerShell collection

For more information about using the PowerPack, see the Monitoring Microsoft: Windows Server manual.

Features

This release includes the following features:

  • Dynamic Applications that collect configuration and performance data about Windows Servers
  • Event Policies that are triggered when Windows Server devices meet certain status criteria
  • Device Classes for each type of Windows Server

NOTE: The Device Classes include older device types that can be discovered but are no longer supported by ScienceLogic.

  • Run Book Policies and Run Book Actions that align a more detailed device class with each discovered device
  • A sample Credential for discovering Windows Server devices

Enhancements and Issues Addressed

The following enhancements and addressed issues are included in version 114 of the "Microsoft: Windows Server" PowerPack:

  • The "Windows Server Service Details - ICDA" PowerShell command was updated in the "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Process Service Cache" Dynamic Application to improve efficiency. (Support Cases: 00239385 and 00251075; JIRA ID: SOL-19010)
  • The Use Message-match option was disabled from each event in the "Microsoft: Windows Server Disk Performance" Dynamic Application.
  • The following collection objects were added to the "Microsoft: Windows Server Disk Configuration" Dynamic Application:
  • Disk Count
  • Total Disk Size (KB)
  • The "Windows Server OS Configuration" PowerShell command was updated in the "Microsoft: Windows Server Configuration Cache" Dynamic Application to support disk count and total disk size (KB).
  • Snippets were updated in the following Dynamic Applications to validate different calls to the cache in one place: (Support Case: 00237746; JIRA ID: SOL-18655)
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Interface Inventory
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Interface Performance
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Process Inventory
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Process Performance
  • The following Dynamic Applications were updated to improve the efficiency of data collection:
  • Microsoft: Windows Server Configuration Cache
  • Microsoft: Windows Server Performance Cache
  • The graph report in the "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Filesystem Performance" Dynamic Application was updated to display more accurate data. (Support Case: 00246169; JIRA ID: SOL-19206)
  • The code to retrieve interface performance data was updated from multiple PowerShell commands to a single "Windows Server Interface Performance PowerShell" command.
  • The code to retrieve interface configuration data was updated from multiple PowerShell commands to a single "Windows Server Interface Configuration PowerShell" command.
  • The code to retrieve process inventory and performance data was updated from multiple PowerShell commands to a single "Windows Server Process Details - ICDA PowerShell" command.
  • The "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Cache Trigger" Dynamic Application was updated to be disabled by default. This Dynamic Application should be manually enabled only for systems using concurrent PowerShell collection.
  • The "Convert-DiacriticCharacters" PowerShell function was replaced with a faster, more efficient function in the "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Process Service Cache" Dynamic Application.
  • The following Dynamic Applications were updated to run their parent PowerShell command when concurrent PowerShell is disabled:
  • Microsoft: Windows Server DCM+R Relationship
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Detail
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Filesystem Inventory
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Filesystem Performance
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Interface Inventory
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Interface Performance
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Port Performance
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Process Inventory
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Process Performance
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Service Inventory
  • Microsoft: Windows Server IC Service Performance
  • Microsoft: Windows Server Service Configuration
  • The "hyper-v counter request" was removed from the "Microsoft: Windows Server Performance Cache" PowerShell command in the "Windows Server CPU Performance" Dynamic Application was updated to improve CPU utilization metric data collection.
  • The "Discovery" collection object in the "Microsoft: Windows Server Disk Performance" Dynamic Application was updated to address an alignment issue.
  • The "64-bit support" collection object was added to the "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Interface Inventory" Dynamic Application to address an issue in which raw data was being captured incorrectly. (Support Case: 00197175; JIRA ID: SOL-16992)
  • The "Discovery" collection object in the "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Process Service Cache" Dynamic Application was updated to address an alignment issue.
  • An issue was addressed in which the "Microsoft: Windows Server Software Configuration" Dynamic Application would not automatically align during discovery.

Known Issues and Workarounds

The following known issues affect version 114 of the Microsoft: Windows Server PowerPack:

  • If the list of IP addresses assigned to an interface is longer than 235 characters, the "Microsoft: Windows Server Interface Configuration" Dynamic Application will strip the list of IP addresses after 235 characters and the following will appear in the logs:

    90.PoolWorker-2.Extended_Internal_Collection: Skipping IPv6 Address due to powershell collector characters limit of 235 chars. did: <did> app_id: <app_id> Interface: <if>

    90.PoolWorker-2.Extended_Internal_Collection: Skipping IPv4 Address due to powershell collector characters limit of 235 chars. did: <did> app_id: <app_id> Interface: <if>

     

    If an IPv4 address is invalid, the "Microsoft: Windows Server Interface Configuration" Dynamic Application will remove the address and the following notice will appear in the logs:

    90.PoolWorker-2.Extended_Internal_Collection: Skipping IPv4 Mask due to powershell collector characters limit of 235 chars. did: <did> app_id: <app_id> Interface: <if>

  • When updating the PowerPack, in the "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Interface Inventory" Dynamic Application, corrupted IPs with empty spaces, curly brackets ({}), or ellipses (...) will need to be deleted.

     

    The first step is to review the rows that will be deleted with the following query in the SL1 database:

    SELECT id, did, ip, netmask FROM master_dev.device_ip_addr WHERE ip REGEXP '(^([{])|([}]$)|([.]{3}$)|([...}]$)|(\\s))';

     

    (This step is very important because it will display all rows that will be deleted in the second step.)


    The second step is to delete the rows if the customer is satisfied with the results. Use the following query in the SL1 database:

    DELETE FROM master_dev.device_ip_addr WHERE ip REGEXP '(^([{])|([}]$)|([.]{3}$)|([...}]$)|(\\s))';

     

    (After running this query, it can't be reverted.)

  • Dynamic Applications will produce errors and data will not be collected if your language is set to anything other than English (i.e. Turkish, Portuguese).
  • For mount point paths, all instances of "\" have been changed to "/" in the "Windows: Server IC Filesystem Inventory" and "Windows: Server IC Filesystem Performance" Dynamic Applications. Drives that are hidden will not be loaded, but will be visible in the "Microsoft: Windows Server Disk Configuration" Dynamic Application.
  • The Collector Affinity setting for Windows Server IC Dynamic Applications changes to Default if there are any changes made under the Properties tab. To keep the setting as Assigned Collector, run the following query:

UPDATE master.dynamic_app SET cu_affinity=2 WHERE ppguid IN ('<PP-GUID>');

 

  • If you use the "Microsoft: Windows Server IC Interface Performance" Dynamic Application to populate interface performance data, then you cannot enable the Packets setting on the Interface Properties page (Registry > Networks > Interfaces > interface wrench icon) without causing an unhandled exception.
  • The "Microsoft: Windows Server Software Configuration" Dynamic Application cannot properly parse installation dates that are not in yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm:ss format, such as "Wed Jul 05 12:41:46 EDT 2017".

  • The Dynamic Applications with "Microsoft: Windows Server IC" in the name may not align to newly discovered devices until Nightly Discovery runs.