A small but powerful tool.

When you are creating images or creating scripts to deploy operating systems the drivers can be *”##&%! to extract / find.

This is a nice tool…

DriverMax is a new program which allows you to easily reinstall all your Windows drivers. No more searching for rare drivers on discs or on the web or inserting one installation CD after the other. Simply export all your current drivers (or just the ones that work ok) to a folder or a compressed file. After reinstalling Windows you will have everything in one place!

http://www.innovative-sol.com/drivermax/

Microsoft is announcing the RC1 of the “new” SA named “Microsoft Deployment”

We are pleased to announce the RC1 release and new name for the fourth generation deployment Solution Accelerator, Microsoft Deployment. The current generation of automated deployment tools from Microsoft is increasingly unified; the same tools, utilities and products in many cases offer support and functionality for desktop and server deployment tasks. Following the trend of unified tools, the Business Desktop Deployment team has incorporated new functionality and guidance to support automated server deployment in addition to desktop deployment capabilities. This expanded feature set, with its guidance and ability to automate installation of Windows client and server operating systems – as well as applications – has effectively outgrown the current name, Business Desktop Deployment. Previous Beta releases have been using the code name “Deployment 4” to refer to Microsoft Deployment before the name was finalized.

Read more at blogs.technet.com/jasons/

Some of the nice features:

• Windows Server 2003 deployments
• LTI support for Windows Server 2008
• Multiple task sequence templates (XP, Vista, Server…)
• BDD 2007 and MD side-by-side upgrade

In a post yesterday there was a script to ping some node, the script uses WMI to ping.
Did some testing, and… Why did I write a script when you can use the built in WMI-support to do the same thing?

Why (not) a script?
OK, there is one thing that (afaik) you can’t do with WMI-queries… JOIN.
I would like to do some sort of query that puts out CSName from Win32_OperatingSystem along with StatusCode and ResponseTime from Win32_PingStatus, but… I can’t figure out how.

Ok?
Since you have the performance mapper to point out Object, Counter and so on you can’t make a simple WMI-query that allows you to get the name of the agent. And if you can’t get that to work you will get a mix of multiple agents performance-data on one counter…
The script returns serverToPingFrom, thats what I’m missing.

The solution
When I first looked at it… I only looked at the WMI-query and didn’t think about what SCOM and the performance mapper can do.
The solution is to name the Counter with use of some data that SCOM already know.

Yada yada yada… on to the script!
Go to OM-Console -> Authoring -> Management Pack Objects -> Rules -> New… -> Collection Rules \ Performance based \ WMI performance
A few next-clicks and then paste the following:

WMI Namespace
root\cimv2

Query

Perfomance mapper
Object = WMIPingRoundtrip
Counter = $Target/Property[Type="System!System.Entity"]/DisplayName$
Instance = $Data/Property[@Name='Address']$
Value = $Data/Property[@Name='ResponseTime']$

OK, so I did some more research and scripting last evning…

Here is a script that puts out some random perfomance data between the parameters to the script.

In the perfomance mapper, set Value to $Data/Property[@Name='Perfdata']$, and don’t forget the parameters.

'-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
' Script to write random perf-data
'
'                                         Rikard Rönnkvist / snowland.se / 2007-10-24
'-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
' --- Set up variables and objects
Option Explicit
Dim iMinRnd, iMaxRnd, perfData
Dim oArgs, oAPI, oBag

' --- Get parameters
Set oArgs = WScript.Arguments
iMinRnd = Int(oArgs.Item(0))
iMaxRnd = Int(oArgs.Item(1))
Set oArgs = Nothing

' --- Generate random number
Randomize
perfData = Int((iMaxRnd - iMinRnd + 1) * Rnd + iMinRnd)

' --- Create properies in SCOM
Set oAPI = CreateObject("MOM.ScriptAPI")
Set oBag = oAPI.CreatePropertyBag()

oBag.AddValue "minValue", iMinRnd
oBag.AddValue "maxValue", iMaxRnd
oBag.AddValue "Perfdata", perfData
oAPI.AddItem(oBag)
oAPI.ReturnItems

Set oAPI = Nothing
Set oBag = Nothing

I did use “500 1000″ as a paramreter and got this nice demo-view of performance:

Now, its time to play with alerts and baselining that data…

A while ago I wrote a script to ping some IP from MOM2005.

Made a small update to SCOM.

Go to OM-Console -> Authoring -> Management Pack Objects -> Rules -> New… -> Collection Rules \ Probe based \ Script (perfomance)
A few next-clicks and then paste the script…

Parameters
1: IP-adress to ping- 192.168.0.10
2: Timeout (ms) – 1000
3: Buffertsize – 4096
Example: 192.168.0.10 1000 4096

Perfomance mapper
Object = PingRoundtrip
Counter = $Data/Property[@Name='serverToPingFrom']$
Instance = $Data/Property[@Name='serverToPingIP']$
Value = $Data/Property[@Name='Roundtrip']$

'-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
' Script to write perf-data from a ping against some IP
'
'                                         Rikard Rönnkvist / snowland.se / 2007-10-23
'-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

' --- Set up variables and objects
Option Explicit
Dim serverToPingIP, serverToPingFrom, pingTimeout, pingBufferSize, perfData
Dim oArgs, oPing, oStatus, oAPI, oBag

' --- Get parameters
Set oArgs = WScript.Arguments
serverToPingIP = oArgs.Item(0)
pingTimeout = oArgs.Item(1)
pingBufferSize = oArgs.Item(2)
Set oArgs = Nothing

' --- Get computername
Set oArgs = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Network")
serverToPingFrom = oArgs.ComputerName
Set oArgs = Nothing

' --- Ping the host
Set oPing = GetObject("winmgmts:{impersonationLevel=impersonate}")._
        ExecQuery("select * from Win32_PingStatus where address = '" & serverToPingIP & "' and BufferSize=" & pingBufferSize & " And Timeout=" & pingTimeout)

For Each oStatus in oPing
        If IsNull(oStatus.StatusCode) Or oStatus.StatusCode<>0 Then
                perfData = pingTimeout ' Got no answer. logging maxTime
        Else
                perfData = oStatus.ResponseTime ' Got answer, logging responsetime
        End If
Next
Set oPing = Nothing
Set oStatus = Nothing

' --- Create properies in SCOM
Set oAPI = CreateObject("MOM.ScriptAPI")
Set oBag = oAPI.CreatePropertyBag()

oBag.AddValue "serverToPingIP", serverToPingIP
oBag.AddValue "serverToPingFrom", serverToPingFrom
oBag.AddValue "pingTimeout", pingTimeout
oBag.AddValue "pingBufferSize", pingBufferSize
oBag.AddValue "Roundtrip", perfData
oAPI.AddItem(oBag)
oAPI.ReturnItems

Set oAPI = Nothing
Set oBag = Nothing

According to Bernardo Sanchez there is a new (first) SP out for XianIO…

The stability of the Xian Io product has been improved, several enhancements have been made and the following management packs are now in a RTM state.
- IBM AIX
- VMware VirtualCenter

Bernardo Sanchez Blog

A small tool to calculate your database sizes…

This tool is put together based on data we got from MSIT DB and a couple of TAP customers. While the tool has been pretty accurate so far somethings to consider before using the tool are a) I gave a lot of buffer in the tool b) there maybe things I did not account for (such as AEM data) c) no one outside MS has verified the accuracy of the data with any other data sample.

Operations Manager Product Team Blog

The Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 management pack is designed to be used for monitoring Exchange 2007 events, collecting Exchange component-specific performance counters in one central location, and for raising alerts for operator intervention as necessary. By detecting, sending alerts, and automatically responding to critical events, this management pack helps indicate, correct, and prevent possible service outages or configuration problems, allowing you to proactively manage Exchange servers and identify issues before they become critical. The management pack monitors and provides alerts for automatic notification of events indicating service outages, performance degradation, health monitoring, and centralized management.

MS Download Center

Got to quote Stefan Stranger: Finally!

Woohoo… So today myself (and a some of my co-workers) are “Xian Network Manager Io Certified Engineer”

More info on the product: www.jalasoft.com

snowland.se is on the move.

I am changing webhost for snowland.se so if you get som 404 or any other error… you know why.

Why the change? I’m collecting all my domains to one host.

Changing to Surftown…