How to stop SCCM from installing Files on System or C drive

* SCCM by default install site server role component on first available NTFS drive.

* In order to avoid the files being installed, we need to create a magic file on the drive so that SCCM understand and ignore me.

*The Magical file name is "no_sms_on_drive.sms"

* You need to create this empty file and place on the drive which you want SCCM to ignore.

How to Delete a SCCM 2012 r2 Site System role

How to Delete a SCCM 2012 r2 Site System role

You can delete a site system using the Configuration Manager console by performing the procedure described:

• To delete a site system, all previously administrator-defined site system roles must be deleted. The ConfigMgr site system role is automatically added to any new site system created by the site component manager. Depending on the site role added, the Site component server role might also be assigned to the site system. These two roles cannot be added to a site system by the administrator and cannot be manually removed using the Configuration Manager console.

• A site system can be deleted when it is still assigned the ConfigMgr site system server role, but it cannot be deleted if it is still assigned the Site component server server role.

• In the Configuration Manager console of the primary site server, navigate to System CenterConfiguration Manager / Site Database / Site Management / <site code> - <site name> / Site Settings / Site Systems / <site system name>.

• Verify that no site roles are currently assigned to the site system other than the ConfigMgr site system role.

• Right-click <site system name> for the site system that you want to delete, and click Delete.

• Click Yes on the Confirm Delete dialog box.

SCOM 2012 R2 Console crashes after October Windows Update -Hotfix KB3200006

SCOM 2012 R2 Console crashes after October Windows Update

• The SCOM 2012 R2 Console crashes after installing the Latest October patches.
• This is know issue and microsft has released a Hotfix KB3200006.
• https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3200006.
• Please downaload the hotfix and install to resolve the Console Crash issue.
• It affects all OS versions. So you need to install on App OS where there is SCOM 2012 R2 Console irrespective of the UR 

How SCCM 2012 R2 Client Communication Process Works

How SCCM 2012 R2 Client Communication Process Works

Once the agent is available on the network and the client is installed, the client goes through the following actions as part of the reporting process:

1. Client location services identify the site code and the MP it is supposed to connect to.
2. The client connects to the Management Point and downloads the policies.
3. Once the policies are downloaded it sends the heartbeat record to the server.
4.  Once the server receives this heartbeat record these are converted in to DDR and processed.  This will set the client flag to 1 which will make the client status display as Active in the console.
5.  On a regular basis the agent will send the heartbeat and if no heart beat or inventory shows up for a length of time then the client flag will be marked as 0 by the client flag maintenance task, setting the client status to Inactive.
6.  So only if this process is completed and it continues to happen will the client remain reporting to the server.  

How to restore a Corrupt SCOM Database in SCOM 2012 R2 Step by Step

How to restore a Corrupt SCOM Database in SCOM 2012 R2

• Sometimes the SCOM database gets corrupted because of disk issue.
• Restoring it from Backup is a very lengthy process and time consuming.
• Opening a ticket with Microsoft might help, but there default reply is to restore from last good backup
• So how you quickly recovery a corrupt SCOM database?. There is a way.
• First Stop all SCOM Services on your management server.
• Then Put the Corrupt SCOM database in SINGLE_USER Mode.

If you Operations Manager DB is corrupted Run the below command,

DBCC CHECKDB ('OperationManager', REPAIR_ALLOW_DATA_LOSS) WITH ALL_ERRORMSGS, NO_INFOMSGS

If you Operations Manager Datawhare house is corrupted Run the below command,

DBCC CHECKDB ('OperationsManagerDW', REPAIR_ALLOW_DATA_LOSS) WITH ALL_ERRORMSGS, NO_INFOMSGS

• Once completed you should be able to bring your database online

What is Azure resource group and how to create it PowerShell

What is Azure resource group and how to create it PowerShell

What is Resource group:

• Before deploying any resources to your subscription, you must create a resource group that will contain the resources.

Create a resource group:

• To create a resource group, use the New-AzureRmResourceGroup cmdlet.

New-AzureRmResourceGroup -Name CognosApp -Location "West US"

• Uses the Name parameter to specify a name for the resource group and the Location parameter to specify its location.

How to Login to your Azure from PowerShell

How to Login to your Azure from PowerShell

• To login to your Azure account, use the Add-AzureRmAccount cmdlet.

Add-AzureRmAccount

• The cmdlet prompts you for the login credentials for your Azure account. 

• After logging in, it downloads your account settings so they are available to Azure PowerShell.

• The account settings expire, so you need to refresh them occasionally. 
• To refresh the account settings, run Add-AzureRmAccount again.

How to find which servers are allowed to do DNS Scavenging

How to find which servers are allowed to do DNS Scavenging

To see which servers are currently allowed to scavenge, run the command 

DNSCmd /ZoneInfo

• If there is a section “Scavenge Servers” at the bottom of the output, then those DNS servers whose IP addresses are listed are the only ones that can perform scavenging on the specified zone. 

• If there is no “Scavenge Servers” section present, then any DNS server otherwise permitted can perform scavenging on the zone.

How to Enable Logging for Linux agent in SCOM 2012 r2

How to Enable Logging for Linux agent in SCOM 2012 r2

• Linux agent is one of the most challenging to monitor in SCOM. As is cross platform monitoring it does not give clear error when there is error.
• So you should enable Loging on Agent to see whats happening.
• Once loging is enabled you can see log created in /var/opt/microsoft/scx/log.log
• To see the current state of loging type scxadmin -log-list
• To set loging to Troubleshooting type scxadmin -log-set all verbrose

• This will set the loging to TRACE and will start recording all events.
• Once your troubleshooting is compeleted you have to reset the log back/
• To do this use the command scxadmin -log-reset
• This will reset the logs back to info level from Trace level

How to Remove SCOM Certificates Imported with MOMCertImport Tool in SCOM 2012 R2

How to Remove SCOM Certificates Imported with MOMCertImport Tool in SCOM 2012 R2

To remove a SCOM certificates imported with the MOMCertImport tool

• Log on to the computer with an account that is a member of the Administrators group.
• On the Windows desktop, click Start, and then click Run.
• In the Run dialog box, type cmd, and then click OK.
• At the command prompt, type <drive_letter>: (where <drive_letter> is the drive where the System Center 2012 – Operations Manager installation media is located), and then press ENTER.
• Type cd\SupportTools\amd64 and then press ENTER.
• Type the following:
• MOMCertImport /Remove, and then press ENTER.

How to get list of All commands for SCOM 2012 R2 Module in Powershell

How to get list of All commands for SCOM 2012 R2 Module in Powershell

• Today i am going to Show you how get list of all commands available in SCOM module.
• First Open the Powershell and Import the SCOM module

                    Import-Module OperationsManager

• This will load the SCOM module in Powershell
• Then to see all the commands in the OperationsManager Modulle type the below command

                   get-command - module OperationsManager | more

• This will list all the commands in SCOM.

Upgrading an Operating System from Windows 2003 to Windows 2008: How to Prevent Discovery Problems

Upgrading an Operating System from Windows 2003 to Windows 2008: How to Prevent Discovery Problems

• Before you upgrade the operating system on a monitored computer, uninstall the Operations Manager agent. After the upgrade, reinstall the Operations Manager agent.

Reason:

• The objects that the management pack discovers, such as logical disks, are hosted by a parent class that is not version-specific. When you upgrade the operating system, the order in which discovery occurs can result in duplicate objects being discovered.
• For example, you upgrade a computer running Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2008. 
• If the Windows Server 2003 discovery rules run first after the upgrade, the instance of the computer running Windows Server 2003 and its objects will be removed from discovery because the operating system base class has been removed. When the Windows Server 2008 discovery rules run, the computer and its objects will be discovered again.
• If the Windows Server 2008 discovery rules run first after the upgrade, the computer running Windows Server 2008 and its objects will be discovered. When the Windows Server 2003 discovery rules run, the instance of the computer running Windows Server 2003 will be removed from discovery, but the objects hosted by that instance will not be removed.
• So If you upgrade a computer without uninstalling the agent first and then discover duplicate objects, uninstall the agent to mark all hosted objects as deleted in the database. Next, reinstall the agent to only discover existing applications/objects.  

How to Install Zabbix on Red Hat Linux or Cent OS Step by Step

How to Install Zabbix on Red Hat Linux or Cent OS

Zabbix is the fastest growing monitoring tool today in market. Lot oc companies want to cut down the cost on monitoring and move to Opensource and Zabbix has emerged as the prefered choice.

Step 1: Installing repository configuration package

• Install the repository configuration package. This package contains yum configuration files.

Command:

# rpm -ivh http://repo.zabbix.com/zabbix/2.4/rhel/6/x86_64/zabbix-release-2.4-1.el6.noarch.rpm



Step 2: Installing Zabbix packages

Install Zabbix packages. This example  install Zabbix server and web frontend with mysql database on same server

Command:

# yum install zabbix-server-mysql zabbix-web-mysql zabbix-agent

If you want to install agent only for monitoring follow the below steps

# yum install zabbix-agent



Step 3:Creating initial database

Create zabbix database and user on MySQL. Import initial schema and data.

Command:

# cd /usr/share/doc/zabbix-server-mysql-2.4.0/create
# mysql -uroot zabbix < schema.sql
# mysql -uroot zabbix < images.sql
# mysql -uroot zabbix < data.sql

Edit database configuration in zabbix_server.conf

# vi /etc/zabbix/zabbix_server.conf
DBHost=localhost
DBName=zabbix
DBUser=zabbix
DBPassword=zabbix

You can give any complex password you want.

Step 4:Start Zabbix server process:

# service zabbix-server start

Step 5:Editing PHP configuration for Zabbix frontend

Apache configuration file for Zabbix frontend is located in /etc/httpd/conf.d/zabbix.conf. Some PHP settings are already configured.

# vi /etc/httpd/conf.d/zabbix.conf

php_value max_execution_time 300
php_value memory_limit 128M
php_value post_max_size 16M
php_value upload_max_filesize 2M
php_value max_input_time 300
# php_value date.timezone Europe/Riga
It's necessary to uncomment the “date.timezone” setting and set the right timezone for your location.

After changing the configuration file restart the apache web server.

# service httpd restart

Step 6: Done Your server is ready

• Zabbix frontend is available at http://ipddress/zabbix in the browser. 

Default username/password is Admin/zabbix.


Enjoy!

How to view the dependencies for a management pack

How to view the dependencies for a management pack

Many times you want to know what management pack are the current MP depend on,

To view the dependencies for a management pack

• In the Operations console, in the Administration workspace, click Management Packs.
• Right-click the desired management pack, and then click Properties.
• In the Properties dialog box for the management pack, click the Dependencies tab.
• The Dependencies tab lists any management packs that the selected management pack depends on and any management packs that depend on the selected management pack.

How to Create Custom Event ID monitoring using SCOM 2012 R2 - Step by Step

How to Create Custom Event ID monitoring using SCOM

• Many Times we get request to create new Event ID monitors which are not default available.Today we will create those Event  ID monitors to Monitor Custom Event ID.

• First Install the System Center Operations Manager 2007 R2 Authoring Console.This is the Tool that will help you create Custom Monitoring and very effective tool for developing Managements pack

Step by Step:

Once you Install the Tool open it and click on the Icon Below and select New Management Pack and give a name

• Then Click on "Health Model Tab" and right hand side click New-->Alerting-->Windows Event
• This will Open the Windows Event ID Custom Monitoring Pane

• Now give it a Name "Event ID 7040 Monitoring"

• Then Click on Target and Select "Browse All Classes"
• Now Check "List" and Search for "Windows Computers" and Select it

• In Category select "Alerts" and Click Next
• Now in The Log Name Give a Event Log where the event is logged. In our Case we Select "System". Then click Next

• Now Enter the "Event ID" and "Event Source" and Click Next

• Give the Alert the Name you want and click Finish

• Now Save the MP in Top and Import it in your Environment to Monitor this Event ID

SCOM 2012 R2 Data warehouse command to get information on Various Tables and how much space they are talking

SCOM 2012 R2 Data warehouse command to get information on Various Tables and how much space they are talking

• SCOM Data warehouse is the one where we store all data for longtime.
• Usually this will be in terabytes of data and will fill very fast if not confiureged properly
• Most offten you can see that the Datawarehouse if Full or going to be full and you want to find out what is the configuration and which Table is taking the most data
• Microsoft has pushed a command line tool in SCOM 2012 R2 called dwdatarp.exe
•  To get the list of tables using more space and configuration use the below command

dwdatarp.exe -s SQLServer\DatabaseName -d OperationsManagerDW > c:\dwoutput.txt

• This will give you the output with Space used and the How many days of data is stored.

How to Scope your Microsoft Operations Manager Suite Dasboard

How to Scope your Microsoft Operations Manager Suite Dasboard

• Dashoard is very useful place to see an overview of your enviornment.
• Sometimes you want to see how the error are are for last 1 hour or last 4 hours.
• For this can use the Scope feature in your Operations Manager Dashboard.
• Click on "My Dashboard" in MOM Suite.
• This will show data by defaukt for last 7 days.
• On Right hand Side Click on Scope and Change the Date and time that you want.

How to add new Solutions to your Microsoft Operations Manager Solutions Suite

How to add new Solutions to your Microsoft Operations Manager Solutions Suite

• To add new Solutions to your Microsoft Operations Manager Solutions,do the following.
• Login to Your Microsoft Operations Manager Solutions

• Now Click on Solution Gallery Tab

• This will take you to Solutions Gallery where you see Different Solutions on Right Side.

• Now Click on the Solution You want in This we click on "Security and Audit"

• Now Click "Add" and your solution will be added to your dasboard.

How to Activate Volume License pack for Office 2013

How to Activate Volume License for Office 2013

• Volume license editions of Office 2013 client products require activation.
• You need to install this Pack whenever you want to setup KMS or configure a domain for Active Directory-Based activation.
• All volume editions of Office 2013 client products are pre-installed with a Generic Volume License Key (GVLK) key, which supports automatic activation for both KMS and Active Directory-Based Activation, so you will not need to install a product key.
• When an Office 2013 volume edition client is installed, it will automatically attempt to activate via either Active Directory by using its existing domain pairing or a DNS-discoverable KMS host on your organization network.
• To set up Active Directory-Based activation, you must be running Windows Server 2012, Windows 8, or newer.
• This download contains an executable file that will extract and install KMS host license files. These license files are required for the KMS host service to recognize Office 2013 KMS host keys.
• Click here to Download

How improve performance of your Windows Server by 40 % with this simple tweak

How improve performance of your Server by 40 % with this simple tweak

• Many people see slugish performance of there server ,especially if your server is SQL server and its hosted on Windows 2008 R2.
• The reason is very simple and buy doing this small change it will give you 60 % better performance of your system
• The reason is because of Power settings. In Windows 2008 R2 the Power settings is set as "balanced". What this does it to save power it reduces power consumption to the server
• This wont be visible if you run and check some simple query.
• But as you server runs lot o transactions, you can see poor performance and complaint from your customers.
• Inorder to fix it change the Power settings to " High Performance"
• This will improve the PC perforamance by 40 %.
• This tweeks applies to all Windows Servers versions, but it is more siver in Windows 2008 R2