Quick points on users for Service Manager Beta 1:

1.  You can automatically populate users in Service Manager by creating an Active Directory connector.

2.  It may not be obvious, but you can view users in the Administration workspace under the Security node:

3.  You can also create a new user by selecting the “create user” task after selecting the Users node in the Administration workspace:

Early feedback on Service Manager Beta 1 has highlighted that many folks would like more information around administration of connectors, especially on how to track the progress of a connector.

TASKS

First, I would like to point out some of the tasks available for Service Manager Beta 1 for a connector:

The Sync Now task initiates an on-demand data sync for a connector.  However, contrary to what you might think, this sync will not be completed immediately as there are often many underlying processes that are involved with a connector sync.  I will touch more on the details around connector syncs later on in this post.

The Delete Connector task will do a couple of things, one of which may be surprising.  First the connector is deleted and removed from the Service Manager database.  What may be a surprise to you is that deletion of a connector will also delete any Configuration Items (CIs) it created, unless those CIs were also updated by another data source.  This capability can be very convenient if you need to remove a lot of data from the Service Manager CMDB.

The Disable task will prevent future connector syncs from happening for a particular connector.  In-progress syncs will complete even after this task is used.

The Enable task will re-enable a disabled connector and in Beta 1 at least, this will also initiate an immediate connector sync.

The Edit Connector task will pop-up a property dialog for the connector.

TRACKING SYNCS

As I mentioned above, each data sync for a connector is actually comprised of a number of smaller processes that actually run asynchronously. 

Each sync for the AD and SCCM connectors comes in 2 asynchronous steps – the first step extracts data from the source and puts it into a staging data cache; the second step takes data from the staging data cache and writes into the Service Manager CMDB.

You can follow the progress of these data syncs in Service Manager Beta 1 by looking at the Event Viewer under Administrative Tools:

If you click on the “Filter Current Log” action and pick the “Lfx Datacenter” “Lfx Service” and “Lfx Source Config” Event services, you will narrow down the events to those related to connectors.

If you are only interested in tracking the progress of a connector, you can filter to just the “Lfx Service” events. 

For an SCCM Connector, you will see a sequence that looks something like this – once all of these events are done, the sync is completed.

During the running of a sync, even if the connector has not completed all of the processes, Configuration Items might be created or updated & can be visible in the Service Manager console.  For example, you might see a number of computer CIs created during an SCCM sync.  However, if you were to look at the Software or Software Updates installed on that computer, you might find they are still missing if the sync has not completed.

In Service Manager Beta 1, you can create a Connector to a System Center Configuration Manager 2007 SP1 database.

The SCCM Connector brings Configuration Item data about computers managed by SCCM, including Hardware & Software Inventory, Software Updates, and Desired Configuration Management (DCM) data.

To create an SCCM Connector, you need to be a Service Manager administrator.  Connectors are found in the Administration workspace.

Start by clicking on the “Create Connector” task and choose the Configuration Manager Connector option.

That launches the SCCM Connector wizard:

After supplying a Name and Description, you are given an option to provide an SCCM database server and database instance as well an account to access the database. 

(Note: You cannot edit the database server name or database name for an existing SCCM connector – you have to create a new SCCM connector in this case)

TIP: The account must have rights for smsroledb_extract and databasereaders in SQL.

TIP: You should always check the validity of the credentials by pressing the “Test Connection” button.

Next you have provide the schedule for running the SCCM connector, which can run once a day or once a week.

You are then shown a summary screen and a completion screen when the connector is created.

I am going to write a series of posts about using Service Manager Beta 1, adding some tips that we have learned during our time leading up to the release.

For this post, I will start with a walkthrough of the Setup for the basic Service Manager server, without going through the optional Data Warehouse (DW) installation.

To run setup, the logged-in account must be an admin on the local machine running the install.

You start at the Service Manager Setup splash screen:

If you are going to do the DW install, you need to start with that first.  You are also able to install only the SM console on a client machine.  In this case, I will skip the options and go straight into the basic SM management server installation.

After a couple of screens of EULA and install directory, you get to the prerequisites screen:

You can look at the prereq check log for details by clicking on the “View log for more details” link:

(BTW, If your machine has 4 GB or less of RAM, you will get a warning).

On the next screen you specify the SM database details:

You then get an optional DW screen (which I am skipping), and then you can specify the Management Group name and Service Manager Administrators Management group/account. 

TIP: You must be sure to have the Service Manager Service account be a member of the Service Manager Administrators Management group (or the same account if using an individual account).

The next screen asks for the Service Manager Service account.

TIP: The SM Service account must be an administrator on the Service Manager Management server machine and must be a sysadmin on the SQL database.

Pressing the “Next” button takes you to a summary screen:

After hitting Install, you will get to a installation progress screen, which should run for only a few minutes:

And finally, success!

If some reason, there is a problem with the installation, you can find the setup logs here:

%homedrive%%homepath%\appdata\local\scsm\setup\*.log

(there should be 2 files there SCSMInstall.log and SCSMSetupwizard.log)