Security & Management

Incident Management in SMS!?

I got some of the requirements from the customers and They always ask the same questions.

"Can I store the Printer/PC Support Maintenance Contracts?"

"Is it provide incident logging for my helpdesk?"

"Can I keep the Purchase Order together?".....

These are the common questions from SME customers. Because there are no different teams for handle Incident Management and Changes/Configurations Management for their organization.

For the Enterprise Customers, HelpDesk Handle the Incident Management tasks, and Infrastructure Team Handle the Changes/Configurations Management tasks.

However, System Center Service Manager addressed the needs for Enterprise Customers, But I don't think it is a good solution for SME customers. (Based on their $$$, scale and the required functions).

So, I developed a Windows Sharepoint Service 3.0 Site with the following features to address the needs from SME:

1. Single Interface
2. Incident Logging
3. Store the Purchase Order, Status Reports (XML with Infopath)
4. Inventory Reports (WebPart and SMS Reporting)
5. Remote Desktop (WebPart and RDP Web Connection)
6. Schedulling
7. Tasks Assignment and Notifications (Web, Email and RSS)

What other features i should add into this solution for SME?

Please leave your comments and suggestions to me. Any feedbacks are welcome.

My 13th Microsoft KB Released!

Inventory Tool for Microsoft Update unable to download the Update Catalog successfully

Microsoft Update Tool Sync Advertisement failed and unable to download the Update Catalog when you are using Proxy Server to access Internet. And you got the message ID 11456 in the Advertisement Status of Microsoft Update Tool Sync. Also, in WUSSyncXML.log, there are records like "User Account:NONE".

For the Solution, Please read: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/555926

My Integrate SMS 2003 with SoftGrid Step by Step Guide Released!

I wrote this guide in the last year, and finally, i can publish it on the web and share with everyone.

You can download it from here and it will be published on Microsoft WebSite Later

Enjoy it!

Operations Manager 2007 Scalability Recommendation

Microsoft System Center Essentials 2007 Evaluation Edition

Microsoft System Center Essentials 2007 is a proactive and unified management solution that enables IT professionals in midsize organizations to more efficiently secure, update, monitor and troubleshoot their IT environments.
Essentials 2007 provides:
• Proactive monitoring, troubleshooting and asset tracking to keep your IT environment secure and up-to-date
• A unified solution with a single console for managing your servers, clients, hardware, software, and IT services
• Efficient execution of complex management tasks like troubleshooting end user issues, monitoring, and server and client software deployment

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Systems Management Server 2003 R2 with Service Pack 3

Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS) 2003 R2 with Service Pack 3 (SP3) brings organizations full lifecycle support for Microsoft’s latest platform including software distribution, update services and inventory are available to the Vista client.

Adding optional capabilities to enhance the software and hardware inventory functionalities provided in SMS 2003, SP3 provides information to help organizations to make better business decisions about their IT assets. Through a new library of over 400,000 software titles, SMS 2003 SP3 provides an option to augment existing SMS inventory capabilities with deeper asset intelligence. SMS SP3 provides rich reporting about installed applications and hardware enabling better license reporting, software consolidation and upgrade planning.

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Some Notes for Operations Manager 2007

1. Local Management Group and Connected Management Group=2 Tier Only, CMG and CMG can't communicate. 
2. Raise the Domain Functional Level to other than Windows 2000 Mixed before deployment. No Limitation for Forest Functional Level.
3. Agent/Server mutual authentication is mandated in Operations Manager 2007 for all agent/server communication
4. The certificates used for untrusted Domain scenario must ultimately trust the same root certification authority (CA)
5. Install and add the Gateway Server in the Untrusted Domain.
6. Create a domain security group for the Operations Manager Administrators role before deployment
7. Windows Installer 3.1 required for Agent Installation
8. An agentless managed device must not be separated from its Management Server or proxy agent by a firewall because monitoring is performed over RPC.
9. The action account of the agent that is performing the monitoring must have local administrative rights on the device that is being monitored.
10. Operations Manager 2007 requires SQL Server 2005 Enterprise edition for Audit Collection Services Database
11. SQL Server 2005 SP1 and Cumulative Hotfix Package (build 2153) for SQL Server 2005 required
12. Required to use SQL Server Windows Authentication mode
13. To provide the best recovery experience, configure the OperationsManager database to run in the Full Recovery model
14. SQL Server Service Broker must be enabled
15. Keeping the OperationsManager Database relatively small ensures faster operations
16. SDK and Config Service Account should be Local System when install single Management Server in the environment.
17. Each ACS collector must have its own ACS database.
18. Run the ACS Installation on the ACS Collector.
19. A Gateway server should not be used as an AEM Collector except in the System Center Essentials configuration
20. Business-critical client monitoring allows business-critical clients to be deployed as watcher nodes and run synthetic transactions against IT services. In addition to event and performance data, business critical clients often require audit collection to ensure that compliance requirements are met
21. To use Active Directory to Automatically Assign Agents, Run MOMADAdmim.exe with the Appropriate Parameters to create the OperationsManager Container with the permission in AD. Create the Inclusion or exclusion rule on the management servers. And configure manual installed agent from reject to review