Smarter Washing Machine Notifications

In this post, I show you how I use a Z-Wave Plug (Fibaro) to get more monitoring around power consumption and then use this to drive notifications.

Where we live now, our washing machine is a “utility room” and we keep the door closed from a noise point of view. With this setup it is possible to miss when the washing is complete and the washing makes no noise to indicate that the washing is compete and this can lead to issues. Have you ever smelled washing that was forgotten? 😖

So how did I do this?

Ingredients

In my case, I used z-wave as this is what I had, other technology can be used.

1. Z-Wave or other Power Monitoring Capable plug
2. Z-Wave Stick (Z‐Stick Gen5 USB Controller), if you are using a Sonoff device that connects to WiFi, a similar result can be achieved.
3. Node-RED
4. Home Assistant
5. Home Assistant companion app
6. Washing Machine use counter (optional)
7. Washing Machine running time (optional)

Process

I setup the Z-Wave Plug and started to plot the power usage over a few cycles to get a better understanding of how i could monitoring this. The challenge with the current washing machine is that there are “quiet periods” in the usage whether the usage drops really low. I originally tried to use node-red-contrib-power-monitor which I have used successfully in the past, however I could find the correct “on” and “off” count value. This emphasizes the importance of TESTING. Make no error, I will use node-red-contrib-power-monitor for other projects.

So how did I solve this?

I noticed that there was a distinct power usage of “0.4W” when the cycle was complete so I decided to use 2 Trigger State nodes in Node-RED.

1. For when the usage goes above 2.1W, based upon my earlier testing this was a guaranteed start point to start the washing cycle.
2. For when the usage drops to 0.4w, this signals that the load is complete and notifications can be fired.

So, we have a way to determine when the wash cycle started and take the appropriate actions. I get the current washing state in home assistant and change it to running.

Node-RED Flow

[{"id":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","type":"tab","label":"Flow 5","disabled":false,"info":"","env":[]},{"id":"fcb212f752a272ef","type":"trigger-state","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing started","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":2,"exposeToHomeAssistant":false,"haConfig":[{"property":"name","value":""},{"property":"icon","value":""}],"entityid":"sensor.fibaro_wall_plug_electric_consumption_w","entityidfiltertype":"exact","debugenabled":false,"constraints":[{"targetType":"this_entity","targetValue":"","propertyType":"current_state","propertyValue":"new_state.state","comparatorType":">=","comparatorValueDatatype":"num","comparatorValue":"2.1"}],"inputs":0,"outputs":2,"customoutputs":[],"outputinitially":false,"state_type":"str","enableInput":false,"x":120,"y":260,"wires":[["cefc03e9cf83886c"],[]]},{"id":"cefc03e9cf83886c","type":"api-current-state","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing machine status dropdown state","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":3,"outputs":2,"halt_if":"Completed","halt_if_type":"str","halt_if_compare":"is","entity_id":"input_select.washing_machine_status","state_type":"str","blockInputOverrides":false,"outputProperties":[{"property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"entityState"},{"property":"data","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"entity"}],"for":0,"forType":"num","forUnits":"minutes","override_topic":false,"state_location":"payload","override_payload":"msg","entity_location":"data","override_data":"msg","x":420,"y":260,"wires":[["681510ab0e10afd0"],[]]},{"id":"681510ab0e10afd0","type":"api-call-service","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing input to \"in progress\"","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":5,"debugenabled":false,"domain":"input_select","service":"select_option","areaId":[],"deviceId":[],"entityId":["input_select.washing_machine_status"],"data":"{\"option\": \"Running\"}","dataType":"json","mergeContext":"","mustacheAltTags":true,"outputProperties":[{"property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"data"}],"queue":"none","x":770,"y":260,"wires":[[]]},{"id":"770b1d5b.f27204","type":"server","name":"Home Assistant - Node-red User","version":2,"addon":false,"rejectUnauthorizedCerts":true,"ha_boolean":"y|yes|true|on|home|open","connectionDelay":true,"cacheJson":true,"heartbeat":true,"heartbeatInterval":"30"}]

So, we also have a way to determine when the wash cycle completes and take the appropriate actions. I get the current washing state in home assistant and change it to completed, I increment a washing counter and send notifications.

Node-RED Flow

[{"id":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","type":"tab","label":"Flow 5","disabled":false,"info":"","env":[]},{"id":"5511b05f64f5f5b1","type":"trigger-state","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing Complete","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":2,"exposeToHomeAssistant":false,"haConfig":[{"property":"name","value":""},{"property":"icon","value":""}],"entityid":"sensor.fibaro_wall_plug_electric_consumption_w","entityidfiltertype":"exact","debugenabled":false,"constraints":[{"targetType":"this_entity","targetValue":"","propertyType":"current_state","propertyValue":"new_state.state","comparatorType":"<=","comparatorValueDatatype":"num","comparatorValue":"2.0"},{"targetType":"this_entity","targetValue":"","propertyType":"current_state","propertyValue":"new_state.state","comparatorType":">=","comparatorValueDatatype":"num","comparatorValue":"1.6"}],"inputs":0,"outputs":2,"customoutputs":[],"outputinitially":false,"state_type":"str","enableInput":false,"x":110,"y":220,"wires":[["f313351b2dce9a05","125dfa81092d0b75","d2f6fdb914f820b7"],[]]},{"id":"f313351b2dce9a05","type":"api-current-state","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing Machine status dropdown state","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":3,"outputs":2,"halt_if":"Running","halt_if_type":"str","halt_if_compare":"is","entity_id":"input_select.washing_machine_status","state_type":"str","blockInputOverrides":false,"outputProperties":[{"property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"entityState"},{"property":"data","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"entity"}],"for":0,"forType":"num","forUnits":"minutes","override_topic":false,"state_location":"payload","override_payload":"msg","entity_location":"data","override_data":"msg","x":440,"y":220,"wires":[["c68cb6e8d6955af9"],[]]},{"id":"125dfa81092d0b75","type":"api-call-service","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"+1 to washing count for the day","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":5,"debugenabled":false,"domain":"counter","service":"increment","areaId":[],"deviceId":[],"entityId":["counter.washing_machine_use_count"],"data":"","dataType":"jsonata","mergeContext":"","mustacheAltTags":false,"outputProperties":[],"queue":"none","x":410,"y":280,"wires":[[]]},{"id":"d2f6fdb914f820b7","type":"link out","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Notification","mode":"link","links":["5bef9c598f188374","fc3b25d4ede64aa2"],"x":350,"y":340,"wires":[],"icon":"node-red/bridge.svg","l":true},{"id":"c68cb6e8d6955af9","type":"api-call-service","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing input to \"Completed\"","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":5,"debugenabled":false,"domain":"input_select","service":"select_option","areaId":[],"deviceId":[],"entityId":["input_select.washing_machine_status"],"data":"{\"option\": \"Completed\"}","dataType":"json","mergeContext":"","mustacheAltTags":true,"outputProperties":[{"property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"data"}],"queue":"none","x":790,"y":220,"wires":[[]]},{"id":"770b1d5b.f27204","type":"server","name":"Home Assistant - Node-red User","version":2,"addon":false,"rejectUnauthorizedCerts":true,"ha_boolean":"y|yes|true|on|home|open","connectionDelay":true,"cacheJson":true,"heartbeat":true,"heartbeatInterval":"30"}]

I also keep a track of the running time and the washing machine status (Running or Completed) in Home Assistant.

Node-RED Flow

[{"id":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","type":"tab","label":"Flow 5","disabled":false,"info":"","env":[]},{"id":"e0bdee88550c7508","type":"switch","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Running or completed","property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","rules":[{"t":"eq","v":"Running","vt":"str"},{"t":"eq","v":"Completed","vt":"str"}],"checkall":"true","repair":false,"outputs":2,"x":500,"y":260,"wires":[["47ac4140392aca83"],["1d8755cc067d138e","3bfc582ffa71c935"]]},{"id":"8a46dbae7a037860","type":"api-current-state","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing machine stauts dropdown state","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":3,"outputs":1,"halt_if":"","halt_if_type":"str","halt_if_compare":"is","entity_id":"input_select.washing_machine_status","state_type":"str","blockInputOverrides":false,"outputProperties":[{"property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"entityState"},{"property":"data","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"entity"}],"for":0,"forType":"num","forUnits":"minutes","x":380,"y":380,"wires":[["e0bdee88550c7508"]]},{"id":"14b07d39cf05c174","type":"server-state-changed","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing machine status changed?","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":4,"exposeToHomeAssistant":false,"haConfig":[{"property":"name","value":""},{"property":"icon","value":""}],"entityidfilter":"input_select.washing_machine_status","entityidfiltertype":"exact","outputinitially":false,"state_type":"str","haltifstate":"","halt_if_type":"str","halt_if_compare":"is","outputs":1,"output_only_on_state_change":true,"for":0,"forType":"num","forUnits":"minutes","ignorePrevStateNull":true,"ignorePrevStateUnknown":false,"ignorePrevStateUnavailable":false,"ignoreCurrentStateUnknown":false,"ignoreCurrentStateUnavailable":false,"outputProperties":[{"property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"entityState"},{"property":"data","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"eventData"},{"property":"topic","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"triggerId"}],"x":180,"y":200,"wires":[["e0bdee88550c7508"]]},{"id":"5402cfbb2fbac174","type":"poll-state","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing machine status","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":2,"exposeToHomeAssistant":false,"haConfig":[{"property":"name","value":""},{"property":"icon","value":""}],"updateinterval":"60","updateIntervalType":"num","updateIntervalUnits":"seconds","outputinitially":false,"outputonchanged":false,"entity_id":"input_select.washing_machine_status","state_type":"str","halt_if":"","halt_if_type":"str","halt_if_compare":"is","outputs":1,"x":150,"y":260,"wires":[["e0bdee88550c7508"]]},{"id":"47ac4140392aca83","type":"function","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Milliseconds to Minutes","func":"time = msg.data.timeSinceChangedMs;\nrunningTime = (time / 1000 / 60);\nmsg.runningTime = parseFloat(runningTime).toFixed(1);\nremainingtime = 110 - runningTime;\nmsg.remainingTime = parseFloat(remainingtime).toFixed(1);\nreturn msg;","outputs":1,"noerr":0,"initialize":"","finalize":"","libs":[],"x":770,"y":180,"wires":[["7f3b7cbded7ce6be","c693594518abd80a"]]},{"id":"1d8755cc067d138e","type":"change","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Not running number","rules":[{"t":"set","p":"runningTime","pt":"msg","to":"NaN","tot":"str"}],"action":"","property":"","from":"","to":"","reg":false,"x":760,"y":300,"wires":[["7f3b7cbded7ce6be"]]},{"id":"3bfc582ffa71c935","type":"function","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Milliseconds to Minutes","func":"msg.runningTime = 0;\nreturn msg;","outputs":1,"noerr":0,"initialize":"","finalize":"","libs":[],"x":770,"y":360,"wires":[["c693594518abd80a"]]},{"id":"3ecffe436de5790c","type":"inject","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"","props":[{"p":"payload"},{"p":"topic","vt":"str"}],"repeat":"","crontab":"","once":false,"onceDelay":0.1,"topic":"","payload":"","payloadType":"date","x":120,"y":380,"wires":[["8a46dbae7a037860"]]},{"id":"7f3b7cbded7ce6be","type":"ui_gauge","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Washing Machine Running Time: ","group":"7e2e840297e6ff32","order":4,"width":"3","height":"4","gtype":"wave","title":"Running Time: ","label":"min","format":"{{msg.runningTime}}","min":0,"max":"80","colors":["#00b500","#e6e600","#ca3838"],"seg1":"","seg2":"","className":"","x":1140,"y":300,"wires":[]},{"id":"c693594518abd80a","type":"api-call-service","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Update running time","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":5,"debugenabled":false,"domain":"input_number","service":"set_value","areaId":[],"deviceId":[],"entityId":["input_number.washing_machine_running_time"],"data":"{\"value\":\"{{runningTime}}\"}","dataType":"json","mergeContext":"","mustacheAltTags":false,"outputProperties":[],"queue":"none","x":1100,"y":240,"wires":[[]]},{"id":"b51f0aee106afbd0","type":"comment","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Multiple triggers","info":"Multiple triggers to ensure as much accuracy as possible.","x":120,"y":160,"wires":[]},{"id":"7e26df45e8227dfe","type":"comment","z":"c7ac9c26b4b3750d","name":"Manual trigger","info":"","x":110,"y":340,"wires":[]},{"id":"770b1d5b.f27204","type":"server","name":"Home Assistant - Node-red User","version":2,"addon":false,"rejectUnauthorizedCerts":true,"ha_boolean":"y|yes|true|on|home|open","connectionDelay":true,"cacheJson":true,"heartbeat":true,"heartbeatInterval":"30"},{"id":"7e2e840297e6ff32","type":"ui_group","name":"Utility Room","tab":"e35fd0e6d6776633","order":1,"disp":true,"width":"6","collapse":false,"className":""},{"id":"e35fd0e6d6776633","type":"ui_tab","name":"House","icon":"home","order":34,"disabled":false,"hidden":false}]

For the notifications, I also use Node-RED and the “notify service” that is from Home Assistant. I have tried to make the flow as modular as possible and I use changes nodes to control the message and which device is notified.

Notification Flow

Change Nodes

Node-RED Flow

[{"id":"1a53b6dd316fd626","type":"tab","label":"Flow 8","disabled":false,"info":"","env":[]},{"id":"b3e4a5624ac9d518","type":"link in","z":"1a53b6dd316fd626","name":"Washing Machine Notifications","links":["ca506a1b0dfe8ba1","e63c199b1210c601","2acc791d40d9f113","b713589b6fc1fa2a","5daafecdbf09105b","d2f6fdb914f820b7"],"x":85,"y":180,"wires":[["142cfc8c024d98d0"]]},{"id":"142cfc8c024d98d0","type":"change","z":"1a53b6dd316fd626","name":"Washing Machine Notification","rules":[{"t":"set","p":"domain","pt":"msg","to":"notify","tot":"str"},{"t":"set","p":"service","pt":"msg","to":"mobile_app_fkapp","tot":"str"},{"t":"set","p":"message","pt":"msg","to":"ACTION - Time to take out washing","tot":"str"}],"action":"","property":"","from":"","to":"","reg":false,"x":310,"y":240,"wires":[["7e2b772ba33565d7"]]},{"id":"7e2b772ba33565d7","type":"api-call-service","z":"1a53b6dd316fd626","name":"Washing out - Action And Text","server":"770b1d5b.f27204","version":5,"debugenabled":false,"domain":"{{domain}}","service":"{{service}}","areaId":[],"deviceId":[],"entityId":[],"data":"{\"message\":\"{{message}}\",\"data\":{\"actions\":[{\"action\":\"{{action1Action}}\",\"title\":\"{{action1Title}}\"}]}}","dataType":"json","mergeContext":"","mustacheAltTags":false,"outputProperties":[{"property":"payload","propertyType":"msg","value":"","valueType":"data"}],"queue":"none","x":630,"y":240,"wires":[[]]},{"id":"770b1d5b.f27204","type":"server","name":"Home Assistant - Node-red User","version":2,"addon":false,"rejectUnauthorizedCerts":true,"ha_boolean":"y|yes|true|on|home|open","connectionDelay":true,"cacheJson":true,"heartbeat":true,"heartbeatInterval":"30"}]

Have fun automating!!! 😄

New features–Cireson IT Asset Management

I have previously done a post on CIreson IT Asset Management. However the people at Cireson have been very busy with new features to be added to their ITAM (IT Asset Management) tool.

Cireson Asset Management: New Feature Highlights

After recently releasing the newest version of the Asset Management app for Microsoft System Centre (Features Press Release), this post goes a little more in depth to explain some of the amazing features included in this latest release. Always striving to make life easier and more productive for those who use and implement SCSM, they put a lot of thought into the features clients asked for and updates everyone was clamouring for.

Highlighted below are a few of notable enhancements, including the Cireson full Asset Catalogue, Location to IP Awareness, Contract Management and Reporting.

The full Asset Catalogue found within the Cireson Asset Management app allows users to define standard hardware types, as well as information such as model, manufacturer, and price. With access to a comprehensive yet simple and informative page view with all the relevant information in one place, users can better manage the standardization of asset types no matter what the scale of the organization.

Location to IP Awareness is now also an incredibly exciting feature. This function tracks where hardware assets exist, and also allows for hardware to location awareness based on IP address – information which is provided by System Centre 2012 Configuration Manager. This is a great example of how Cireson works to utilize all System Centre components in order to provide the most insightful and rich experience possible.

Expanding on the extensive Contract Management capabilities of the Asset Management app, the new version boasts the ability to perform full contract management with different types of contracts that relate to various software and hardware assets under management. Support and maintenance contracts, leases, and warranties represent the main areas of contract management. Highly unique to the Cireson app is the ability to manage contract status via a built-in SLA engine, with notifications upon near breach or expiration of a contract’s end date.

In addition, the superior reporting functions of this new version allows for comprehensive reporting based on asset data from the data warehouse and cube reporting engine within Service Manager. These rich out-of-the-box reporting solutions cover contract, hardware asset, license, and software asset reports, amongst others.

Other enhanced capabilities of the Cireson Asset Management app now include, app metering data tracking against software asset types to understand installation vs. utilization vs. purchased count, and over 250 brand new features that make the System Centre Service Manager experience better than ever before.

For more information, videos, and overviews relating to Cireson Asset Management for System Centre, visit the app store at www.cireson.com.

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Cireson Risk Calculator

When looking at Change Management, usually the most difficult to decide on, is the “Severity” or “Impact” of the Change. This has been addressed by Cireson with one of their many applications. This one is called the SCSM Risk Calculator and as the name suggests, it is an application to help establish “Change Risk” by asking simple questions. It is designed to ask any set of questions, this is of course configurable. Based on the answers provided by the person logging the change, the “Risk is calculated and nicely added to the Change Request.

The import process and configuration aspect of this application is very nicely covered in the Installation Documentation provided.

Once imported, the settings for this application can be found in the “Administration” Wunderbar under Settings, as like all Cireson applications I have tested thus far.

As seen below, the questions are easy to configure and can be presented in "User” English making this an easy application to present to end-users. The application allows for the configuration of up to 10 questions. A toggle to count “No” instead of “Yes’ is also provided.

The next step is to simply configure the count of “Yes” or “No” answers respectively to qualify as “Low”, “Medium” or “High” risk changes

Ok, so now the configuration is done, now to see the SCSM Risk Calculator in action

Lets create a Change Request

Example of “Low Risk” as per settings

Example of “Medium Risk” as per settings

Example of “High Risk” as per settings

When you click “OK” the information entered above including questions and answers is copied d into the Risk Assessment Plan

All the information is saved in the same place all the time. At the same time you have a tool that can relate to end users and provide an accurate Risk Assessment.

Thank you Cireson, get more information here.

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Service Manager–Are my changes to management packs taking effect?

 

Okay,

So now onto some “basics” or nice to know about Service Manager.

Some of these I have learnt the hard way and some have been given to me as valuable information to avoid some mishaps if you will.

1. Management Packs, so just about everything you do with Service Manager involves the modification of the Management Pack that the item is contained in. For example, you create a workflow and you then modify the “Enabled” value of the workflow to enabled/disabled in the console. How do you know for certain that the workflow or just about anything you modified has taken effect.

Simple, the event log is your friend and the Event IDs to look out for are the following.

Event ID:1201

This indicates that a change has been made.

Event ID: 1210

This indicates that the change is now in effect.

 

So, if you are not seeing these 2 Event IDs some more investigation is needed.

Hope this helps,

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Service Manager 2012 Management Server (Upgrade)

So, for the Management Server.

This was very easy and quite painless for me.

1. Backup Encryption Key (for Disaster Recovery Purposes)
2. Install Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 (This is a pre-requisite for SCSM 2012)
3. Remove Operations Manager Agent if this is installed, as the installer WILL stop you from continuing if the OpsMan Agent is installed.
4. Run the Upgrade, PLEASE NOTE that if the Portal is installed on your Management Server, it will be REMOVED during the upgrade.
5. Successfully completed the upgrade.
6. Restart all 3 System Center services

So, now to upgrade the console

1. Upgrade the Management Console, there are some pre-requisites that are needed. I will focus on the three most common ones that we needed in our environment.
   1. Dot Net Framework 3.5 SP1 (configured using Roles and Features) download , redist
   2. Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Management Objects download
   3. ADO.NET Data Services Update download

You can now use the new Console of the freshly upgraded Management Server and you can now check a few things.

1. Ensure that the Data Warehouse & Reporting Buttons are present in the console. These can take a few seconds to load. Once loaded, you know that the Data Warehouse Registration is complete and carried over from SCSM 2010. Mine takes an average of 5 seconds to populate the additional buttons.

2. You can now ensure that all the System Center Services are started on the Data Warehouse Server and finalize all post installation tasks

3. If you are expecting to find CUBES immediately, it is unlikely to happen. They will appear after some of the additional Data Warehouse jobs have run. Please remember that you will also need to “Process Cube” before they can be used.

Hope this helps,

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Monitoring the Environment

 

So, a little while ago I had a post about documenting the environment.

Now, i am in the process of “Monitoring the Environment”. No worries, I have Operations Manager 2007 R2, Great!!!

So now I log into the Operations Manager Console and see a whole bunch of agents, great stuff! I am also seeing Alerts (not to great, but it appears to be working). Yes, I use the word “appears” quite deliberately. I start drilling into some of the views and enhanced reporting and I see that a lot of information is missing. Um……………

So, now it is time to start digging around and I find the following error on the Operations Manager RMS Server.

Event ID 21042

Operations Manager has discarded 1 items in management group (managementgroupname) , which came from $$ROOT$$. These items have been discarded because no valid route exists at this time. This can happen when new devices are added to the topology but the complete topology has not been distributed yet. The discarded items will be regenerated.

NOT GOOD!!!

I now also realise that the agents are not actually communicating properly with the RMS.

DAMN!!!!!

So, I do some searching on the internet, using the search engine of your choice ( ) and find the following article.

http://anandthearchitect.wordpress.com/2009/12/02/scom-2007-r2-%E2%80%93-rms-server-not-seeing-the-agents-or-agents-are-not-talking-to-the-server/

Whoever wrote this, Thank you!!!!

Following the steps of updating the Management Packs worked like a dream. Now, all of a sudden I see a whole bunch of new activity and new configuration are being sent to the clients and a lot of new activity.

Yay, and now I see a lot of new active agents and more valid alerts.

Hope this helps,

 

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Some more trick and things I have learnt with Service Manager 2010 SP1

1. When creating a new Self Service portal, ensure that you log onto on the server using your “Service Manager” Account, the account configured when first creating the Service Manager Server. The portal will install and seem to work. However, when you open the Portal, you will get HTTP 500.

2. When configuring your Data Warehouse, ensure that the Database name has no “–“ in the name as this is NOT supported by the Reporting Component of Service Manager 2010.

3. If you are having any issues with DataWarehouse Jobs, the first steps is to restart all System Centre services.

4. When working with Activities, ensure that you update the Activity before the “End Date and Time” or even though you completed it in time, it will show up as “not completed”

 

Just a heads up when making some changes and what i have learnt thus far.

More to come!!!

Hope this helps.

I am sure of that

 

“EMBRACE YOUR INNER GEEK AND

ROCK ON”

Service Manager 2010 SP1 Custom Portal

It has been a little bit of a busy while for me. However, I finally found the time to complete the Custom Service Manager Portal, I have not as yet implemented custom graphics. The end result is great, it has a far cleaner look and like the post says, feels a lot more like SharePoint. Finally you can see a shot of it, NOT in a document . If i can do it, so can anyone.

The Article here, is exactly what I used, hope you find it as rewarding as I did.

 

Thanks Travis.

“EMBRACE YOUR INNER GEEK AND

ROCK ON”

The joys of DPM and the pains of SQL

Just recently, as in the weekend just gone, I had a change for an upgrade of SQL 2008 to SQL 2008 R2. The one half went like a dream.

However the other half, revoking names on purpose, was not so easy. Let’s just say  that Reporting Services is not always the easiest thing to upgrade. My upgrade went TERRIBLY wrong. It was however a great learning exercise and at the same time reminds we why i LOVE DPM so much, SQL backups through DPM are the king. Again, i will scream this “ I LOVE DPM!!!!”

In this process of the upgrade I ended up with some “Suspect” databases. I found some scripts that MIGHT allow the recovery of the data. PLEASE NOTE THAT IS A LAST DITCH EFFORT. The scripts below should only be used as a final resort as there MIGHT be DATA LOSS.

 

They should be used in the following order

1. SETEmeregency.sql (put database in emergency mode and attempt repair, PLEASE NOTE AGAIN THAT THERE MIGHT BE DATA LOSS

2. FindSPID.sql (find which SPID is locking the database)

3. KillSPID (kill the connection that is locking the database.

4. SQL SetMultiUser (put database in multi-user mode and check, and hope that there is no data loss.

In case the files do not upload correctly.

SETEmergency.sql

   1: USE master;

   2:  

   3: GO

   4:  

   5: ALTER DATABASE ReportServer SET EMERGENCY 

   6:  

   7: GO

   8:  

   9: ALTER DATABASE ReportServer SET SINGLE_USER 

  10:  

  11: GO

  12:  

  13: DBCC CHECKDB (ReportServer, REPAIR_ALLOW_DATA_LOSS) WITH NO_INFOMSGS;

  14:  

  15: GO 

  16:  

  17:  

  18:  

  19: USE ReportServer;

  20:  

  21:  

  22:  

  23: DBCC CHECKDB WITH NO_INFOMSGS;

  24:  

  25: GO

FindSPID.sql

   1: use master

   2: go

   3: sp_who

KillSPID.sql

   1: kill <SPID>

SQLSetMultiUser.sql

   1: ALTER DATABASE ReportServer SET MULTI_USER

   2:  

   3: GO

 

I can stress enough that is not a replacement in any way for a proper backup plan.

 

“EMBRACE YOUR INNER GEEK AND

ROCK ON”

Service Manager and all the tricks I have learnt

It has been some time since I last blogged, been a really nutty time. however i will make the time to blog and hopefully who ever reads this, it will be of assistance to them.

The lessons I have learned thus far.

1. Label all your workflows properly, this cost me a case with MS Support only to discover that all workflows and NOW notifications are grouped together. I am assuming that this is to aid the troubleshooting process should something go wrong.

2. A lot of tweaking and customization is actually needed, there are some great tools available for this. There is the System Center Service Manager Authoring Tool SP1 which is a great help. There is also SMLets, which is a collection of Powershell Cmdlets designed for Service Manager. I would not be able to function correctly without this collection of tools, you can do many things with this tool.

a.Force-Activate a case once it has been closed, should a user come back and claim that the case is NOT Resolved, click here for the link.

b, Automatically close “Resolved” cases after a certain period of inactivity. Click here for more information. I also took it a step further and used a great application called PowerWF and used this link to create the MP, it did need some tweaking though.

c. Implement the changes slowly, as this product will be a lot for the END Users to come to grips with.

3. The original e-mail setup with SCSM (NO Service Pack) will only work with e-mail enabled users with your Exchange Organization. I cannot as yet comment on the System Center Service Manager – Exchange Connector. I will let you know soon.

 

Keeping it short and sweet for now.

 

“EMBRACE YOUR INNER GEEK AND

ROCK ON”