The Road to SCOM 2012

Top 10 Things To Consider

Writer: Cameron Fuller, Microsoft MVP (SCOM)

Are you considering deploying or upgrading to System Center 2012 Operations Manager? Benefit from the lessons learned by many other companies. This paper will cover some important topics to consider, help you outline your plan, and provide practical and useful pointers to save you time and frustration. In this white paper, Savision and Catapult outline the top 10 things you need to consider in preparing for Operations Manager.

1. Split Your Architecture

Plan on housing your production Operations Manager components on different servers, separating your Management Servers from especially heavy hitters like database servers. Splitting up your servers will increase your environments scalability and redundancy. Virtualization is supported for all components of OpsMgr, making it much quicker to activate the OpsMgr architecture. Also, with the new System Center 2012 licensing approach, there is no cost to license these management servers; The right to run Management Server software is included with the Server MLs and Client MLs. The exception to the rule of splitting your architecture is an all-in-one lab environment. These environments are useful to have available on a single virtual server and are installed with all OpsMgr components, which can be installed on a single system. You can now deploy SCOM 2012 in a distributed installation, where OpsMgr features are distributed across multiple servers. With this installation, an overall OpsMgr is built with various combinations of features consisting of different distributed management groups. These management groups can then relate to each other in whichever hierarchical fashion your business needs dictate. The main advantage of distributing features and services across multiple servers is to allow for greater scalability and availability. Your installation can include all OpsMgr server roles, and support the monitoring of devices across trust and untrusted boundaries through the use of the gateway server.

Q Why do you need distributed management

groups?

A Distributed management groups allow you to

monitor IT environments that:

Establish trust boundaries between domains and workgroups. Segment multiple network environments using firewalls. Provide greater availability. Deliver a scalable monitoring solution. You also can take advantage of partitioning, which separates services across multiple management groups. Multiple management groups are needed if you have more than one installed language, or to provide a single, consolidated view of your environment. You may also need to have separate groups according to function, such as preproduction for testing Management Packs and new servers or production for monitoring daily business processes.

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2. Design For The Future

How will you be using OpsMgr in a couple of years? Will you be scoping the OpsMgr console to specific user groups, using Distributed Applications, monitoring .NET applications and network devices, or building custom Dashboards? Build your systems to be able to meet additional needs in the future. Even if youre going to deploy the older Ops Manager 2007, consider the latest cumulative update with a 64-bit operating system. If you are going to install a SQL Server, go with SQL Server 2008 R2. Youll make things easier down the line when more major updates are needed. SCOM 2012 is perfectly suited to the needs of tomorrows businesses, both small and large. The challenge for your IT department is to ensure the performance and availability of critical services and applications in your computing environment. OpsMgr is the perfect software component to help IT monitor services, devices, and operations for many computers and devices from a single console, as well as identify and troubleshoot a problem to ensure continuity within the business. But the question is: How can you get the most out of OpsMgr to ensure availability in the future? To answer this, first understand that the OpsMgr infrastructure primarily consists of a management group that includes a management server, the operational database, and the reporting data warehouse database. Depending on the size of your computing environment, the core components of this management group can exist on a single server, or they can and should be distributed across multiple servers. Resource pooling balances the monitoring load of your management group as new management servers are added, and provides automatic failover for monitoring. Take advantage of all the advanced features of SCOM 2012, such as monitoring for networks, devices, applications, and web services that can be configured to be monitored by their own dedicated Management Resource Pool(s). These benefits are available as soon as you deploy System Center OpsMgr 2012 (or update from OpsMgr 2007 R2) with at least 2 Management Servers, and sophisticated enough for the future of your computing environment. For example, using two management servers in your environment allows for failover and easy restoration of services. Also, it is important to have a backup plan as part of your overall disaster recovery protocol. This plan should be thoroughly tested and documented in a simulated environment by using production backups.

3. Go With The Latest Version

Experienced managers know that adding cumulative updates often makes problems go away. By already having them in place, you will cut down on your problems proactively. If you have the choice, go with whatever version is the latest and greatest. Installing SCOM 2012, the latest version of OpsMgr, allows you to increase the operational efficiency of your organization. Monitoring a network or any application will make it easier to pinpoint the root causes of incidents. Using OpsMgrs new capability, you can discover and monitor network routers and switches, including the network interfaces and ports on those devices. You can monitor web-based applications, taking help from .Net application performance monitoring to have a deeper look into them as deep as youd like or need to. Typical issues that OpsMgr 2012 will show you include how frequently a problem is occurring, how a server and or entity was performing when the problem occurred, and the chain of events related to the slow request or issue that is raising exceptions. This is vital information for software developers and database administrators, who can now ensure the appropriate and reliable performance of applications. There are other useful features of SCOM 2012 that make the latest and greatest the way to go, such as resource pool creation and root management server removal, although there is a RMSe emulator for backwards compatibility needs, that is installed on the first Management Server. A resource pool helps you to distribute workloads across multiple management servers. In OpsMgr, there is no root management server and the workload is split among management servers, which are in fact peers. The main advantages of this approach are to ensure high availability and be able to dedicate Management Servers to specific monitoring needs. The benefits of OpsMgr can also be extended to UNIXbased and Linux-based computers. For example, to perform privileged operations on UNIX-based and Linux-based computers using unprivileged Run As accounts, you dont need UNIX or Linux root passwords; you can keep the privilege control entirely within the domain of the UNIX or Linux administrator.

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4. Tune With Groups

Tuning to a group of servers versus an individual server is more useful, and makes these changes portable to different management groups, as long as this group is auto populated. Tune OpsMgr to provide proactive monitoring and alerts to notify you before anything breaks. This approach improves service levels for servers and applications, and provides a better experience for your end users. In order to do this, OpsMgr should be tuned to identify potential errors and provide a notification when these conditions occur. However, if the OpsMgr is not tuned according to your particular environment, it can generate false alerts that are not truly an indication of a problem. Proper tuning of OpsMgr to match the requirements of your organization takes time; tuning through the use of groups is one way you can make the process more efficient. Consider the following best practices for group creation: Consider the following best practices for tuning: Target overrides to a group or class when possible, making overrides portable so that they can be moved between OpsMgr environments. Use dynamic groups instead of static groups to avoid added maintenance. Remember to populate by classes instead of specific names Create groups for entities that are relevant to your environment. Create groups for easier maintenance mode requirements Create groups for targeting use in user profiles Create groups for viewing requirements

5. Develop Standards For Overrides And Management Pack Names

Define standards before you start your deployments. It doesnt matter what you call them, as long as you have a documented standard that is easy to access from your Ops Manager environment. Also, follow a naming convention for your override packs. Microsoft doesnt suggest a particular best practice, but with a proper naming convention your override packs can appear in a contiguous area of the drop downs. This will help you to select an override pack to store your changes as necessary.

Proper tuning of OpsMgr to match the requirements of your organization takes time; tuning through the use of groups is one way you can make the process more efficient. Consider the following best practices for group creation: Use proper naming convention Create a group only when there is a business need Keep a reasonable number of groups Keep dynamic membership criteria simple Try avoiding the use of specific entity names in the dynamic group criteria

For example: Here are some examples of actionable alerts using groups:
Front-end web servers Mid-tier application servers Back-end SQL servers Alert when a website is offline Alert if the service doesnt start Alert for exceeding memory allocation

You can use a format such as Overrides - <MP Name>, so that the Management Pack used to store overrides for Windows 2008 should be named as Overrides Windows 2008 OS. You can put overrides at the end. You can append _Overrides to the Management Packs.

To include the Management Pack (MP) version in the name of your override MP; when creating the MP in the OpsMgr Console you will need to: 1) Create the MP, 2) Export this created MP, 3) Delete the MP from OpsMgr, 4) Rename the exported MP file Name, 5) Edit the MP in notepad and update the two MP named areas to match the file name, 6) Re-import this MP. Custom Management Pack naming becomes extremely important when providing OpsMgr as managed services

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and if you are managing OpsMgr in a multi-tenant scenario, it must be addressed. The right procedure requires a bit of thought to your particular situation. See section #7 below for additional details. A handy tip for uniform naming standards: Store your standards in a document library in SharePoint, make it centrally available, and put a link on your Ops Manager console called Ops Documentation. This makes it easy to find and use the standards you have defined for your environment.

and make them readily accessible. Store your standards in a document library in SharePoint, make it centrally available, and put a link on your Ops Manager console called Ops Documentation (see the figure below). This makes it easy to find and use the standards you have defined for your environment.

Using SharePoint allows you to: Enhance document management Promote better collaboration Improve reporting Automate business processes Incorporate any changes into the current change control and processes Integrate with existing tools: OpsMgr was not designed for multi-tenancy, making a multi-tenancy monitoring and management solution difficult. To avoid this situation, adopt a unique customer code for each customer. This makes the custom Management Packs purpose and target customer well known to the service provider. For example, choosing C01 for Customer 1 and C02 for Customer 2 will help you to identify a service provider easily.

6. Build A Test/Development Environment

Install a Development or Test environment to test updated Management Packs, build custom Management Packs, and test patches on the environment. If a full Test/Development environment cannot be built, the optimal configuration should closely mirror the existing production environment (such as the number of management servers and gateways); but an all-in-one environment provides most of the benefits. The first step in defining the environments for developing and testing is to understand each environments purpose and boundaries. Each environment should be isolated as far as possible from both the live system and other project environments. Developers and testers should use copies of the production system (including hardware) to avoid inadvertent changes to the production system. Some resources, such as configuration management, source code control, and bug tracking systems, should be shared between the environments. The environment used for testing updated servers and Management Packs should reflect the infrastructure used in the production environment. Information about the production environment is gathered while creating the logical and physical designs. When you develop the environment, in addition to determining any requirement for interoperability and management, you should define the hardware and software requirements to support it. With the help of developers and testers, you should be able to answer the requirements for network protocols, tools, etc. before starting any development and testing work.

8. Less Is More With Notifications

Just because an alert is created doesnt mean that someone needs to receive an email about it. Keep your notifications down to only those youd want to be woken up for - something critical - as opposed to receiving notifications for smaller items such as closed alert states. Pick what alerts are important, who they are important to, and send notifications based upon those criteria. A great and often used process to incorporate that works very well, is to obtain the notification receipts group, department, and application owners, along with their underlying tiered support structure to determine what there notification requirements are for after hours and business hours.

7. Document Overrides And Custom Management Packs

There is nothing more frustrating than trying to disassemble an existing environment and not having documentation on overrides and custom procedures. Put them in SharePoint (using the document library discussed in item #5)

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ensure a smoother transition. Levels of alert priority for OpsMgr: High (2) Medium (1) Low (0) Levels of alert severity for OpsMgr: Critical (2) - Red Warning (1) Yellow Information (0) Green When adding Management Packs, be sure to select the Replace Existing Management Pack option. This will preserve the integrity of the Management Pack and help prevent complications. For a smooth transition when phasing in a Management Pack, create a pilot testing report that includes test results and configuration changes. After importing the Management Pack, you should also verify that agents are installed and added to the appropriate computer groups. Also note that phasing in Management Packs should be preceded by the design phase i.e., determining the level of monitoring you need. For example, use Level 1 for minimum features, Level 2 for recommended features and Level 3 for advanced features. Gather and prioritize all of your customer requirements, and then write the functional and rules specifications. The two most important considerations are to 1) find the type of management instrumentation that will be used, including a summary of what could potentially monitor each of the software components in your product; and 2) evaluate the Management Pack Components contained within your Management Pack. For example, it might list the number of computer groups, computer attributes, processing rule groups, processing rules, public views, knowledge base content, and notification groups that will be included in your Management Packs. The rules specification includes a complete list of each of the Management Pack objects, and what is required to implement them.

OpsMgr provides alerts for each level based upon the state of the component or distributed application that OpsMgr is monitoring. For different levels of severity, OpsMgr uses colors to explain the state of a system. However, what OpsMgr sees as critical may not be critical for your environment. Determine for yourself what should be critical, warning or informational in your environment. For example, a Critical situation (e.g., a network is down) needs to be addressed immediately, while you wouldnt need to set aside your current work for a Warning (e.g., high processor utilization). Information alerts most likely wouldnt need any particular action taken.

9. Get A Win
Pick one group within your organization that can see the benefits to Operations Manager, and make them your starting point. Give them everything they need to log in and see only their servers and their customized dashboards. Empower them, and they become your OpsMgr advocates and internal reference customers, helping you secure additional groups and departments. A group review is a key component in understanding the benefits of OpsMgr. Since it is entirely voluntary, this approach depends on the willingness of your group to participate in the exercise. Once the review goal is set, the participants can exchange their experience on good practices that facilitate intended tasks using OpsMgr. Your group can provide a strategic assessment of their OpsMgr experience in terms of functionality, goals, and outcomes. Participating in an exercise such as using customized dashboards is fundamental in ensuring proper evaluation and credibly assessing outcomes for your business.

Summary:
We hope that our Top 10 list above has provided some tips that you find useful for your own OpsMgr deployment! For more good tips and tricks, check out our blog links: http://blogs.catapultsystems.com http://blog.savision.com

Credentials:
Paul C. Johnson, Senior Lead Consultant, Catapult Systems Cameron Fuller, Principal Consultant, Catapult Systems Dennis Rietvink, Lead Sales Engineer, Savision

About Savision
Founded in 2006, Savision is headquartered in the Netherlands and is privately held. Savisions founders and executives bring years of enterprise systems and application management experience from large IT service companies. Savisions software is currently used by over 500 enterprises worldwide, including many Fortune 500 companies. Key in their choice were Savisions experience with passion for, and knowledge about, Microsoft System Center.

10. Phase In Management Packs

Adding all the Management Packs and servers at one time can result in an overload of information and overwhelm your environment. By phasing in MPs, youll be able to

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