Showing posts with label scorch. Show all posts
Showing posts with label scorch. Show all posts

Friday, April 26, 2013

Schedule Activity: First Business Day of the Month

Maybe this is more straightforward than I originally thought it was....sometimes I tend to over think and complicate things than they actually are.  So just in case someone else finds this helpful.... :)

I recently got a request for a workflow to run on the 1st calendar day of the month or first business day if the 1st fell on a weekend.  I first though that it wasn't possible to do with the native scheduling and PowerShell was needed.  After I wrote up a Posh script to do the heavy lifting, it dawned on me how to use the native schedule activity.  It's not as straight forward as using the script, but does work.

Orchestrator's built-in schedule activity supports two options:
1)  Specifying the calendar day(s) of the month to run

2)  Specifying the week day to run

Here is the "main" runbook for the schedule that will invoke the rest of the workflow.  It requires four different schedule activities to accomplish the logic.  Each of the following links (green) have the logic "confirms to schedule equal to true".













Here is the PowerShell script to accomplish the same schedule result.  The "$Success" variable would be in the Published Data to use in the link logic to continue or not if Success equals true.

$DayOfWeek = [DateTime]::Now.DayOfWeek
$DayOfMonth = [DateTime]::Now.Day

If (  (($dayOfMonth -eq 1) -and ($dayOfWeek -ge [DayOfWeek]::Monday) -and ($dayOfWeek -le [DayOfWeek]::Friday)) -or ((($dayOfMonth -eq 2) -or ($dayOfMonth -eq 3)) -and ($dayOfWeek -eq [DayOfWeek]::Monday))  )
{
    $Success = $true   
}
Else {
    $Success = $false
}

Thursday, February 14, 2013

Orchestrator and Excel Automation

I figured I'd throw this out here in case anyone is looking to automate Excel tasks through Orchestrator and PowerShell and running into issues.  I was tasked with modifying an Excel file (removing worksheets and saving as a csv file) in SCOrch as part of a workflow prior to processing the file.

I used the PowerShell script below in the Run .Net Script activity.

Script
#Remove Worksheets
$objExcel = new-object -Com Excel.Application
$xlFixedFormat = [Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel.XlFileFormat]::xlWorkbookDefault
$objExcel.Visible = $false
$objExcel.displayalerts = $false
$objWorkbook = $objExcel.Workbooks.Open("\\PathtoMyFile\MyFile.xlsx")
$objWorksheets = $objWorkbook.Worksheets | Where {($_.Name -ne "Data")}
If ($objWorksheets) {
    ForEach ($objWorksheet in $objWorksheets) {
        $objWorksheet.Delete()
    }
}
$objWorkbook.Save()
$objExcel.Workbooks.Close()
$objExcel.quit()
[System.Runtime.Interopservices.Marshal]::ReleaseComObject($objExcel)
[System.Runtime.Interopservices.Marshal]::ReleaseComObject($objWorkbook)
Remove-Variable objExcel
Remove-Variable objWorkbook

Running this script manually on the runbook server worked fine and as expected.  However, running the script in SCOrch throws the following error (or similar error with opening the file).

Error
Exception calling "Open" with "1" argument(s): "Microsoft Excel cannot access the file '\\PathtoMyFile\MyFile.xlsx'. There are several possible reasons:

• The file name or path does not exist.
• The file is being used by another program.
• The workbook you are trying to save has the same name as a currently open workbook."


To solve this issue, create an empty folder called "Desktop" under the systemprofile folder as shown below:

C:\Windows\SysWOW64\config\systemprofile\Desktop
C:\Windows\System32\config\systemprofile\Desktop 

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Orchestrator 2012 Web Service Request Issue

I've started running into an issue w/ external requests to start a runbook via the web service.  I'm interested to see if others are experiencing the same issue.

It seems sporadically that requests coming in (w/ or w/o parameters) will fail and the web service will return a 405 (Method Not Allowed) status code with the response.  Trying the same request again moments later would succeed.

Turning on Failed Request Tracing (FRT) in IIS for the "Microsoft System Center 2012 Orchestrator Web Service" will reveal more details w/ the error. 

From the site highlighted in IIS, you can enable FRT from the Actions pane.  After FRT is enabled, you can create the rule to capture specific status codes (400,404,405,500 in the example below).







After the issue occurs and the request fails w/ a code of 405, a log file will be generated in the following folder if you accepted the default path - C:\inetpub\logs\FailedReqLogFiles\W3SVC2.  Towards the bottom of the log file, you'll find this error information:

<Data Name="Buffer">&lt;?xml version=&quot;1.0&quot; encoding=&quot;utf-8&quot; standalone=&quot;yes&quot;?&gt;
&lt;error xmlns=&quot;http://schemas.microsoft.com/ado/2007/08/dataservices/metadata&quot;&gt;
  &lt;code&gt;&lt;/code&gt;
  &lt;message xml:lang=&quot;en-US&quot;&gt;The requested operation requires Publish permissions on the Runbook&lt;/message&gt;
&lt;/error&gt;</Data>

This appears to be a bogus error since sending the same request again will succeed using the same credentials.

After a little more digging, the error occurring seems to correlate w/ the ClearAuthorizationCache maintenance task in the SQL database.  Since this task computes/populates the folders, runbooks, and permissions....it theoretically make sense that while that task is running, incoming requests would fail since it thinks the user does not have permissions to the runbook (when it does!).  This could technically also affect requests being sent through the Orchestration Console to stop/start jobs.  By default, this task runs every 600 seconds (10 minutes).  I'm not sure of the duration it takes for the ClearAuthorizationCache task to complete, but it would depend on how much data there is to process (# of runbooks, folders, etc. in the environment).


If you have seen or do experience similar issues, I'd appreciate if you left a comment.  I also suggest opening a case w/ Microsoft to determine if this is a general product issue.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Orchestrator Runbook Migrations - Invoke by path Property

****The following process is not supported by Microsoft!  This directly updates data in the Orchestrator database!  Use at your own risk!****


While migrating policies from Opalis to Orchestrator or between Orchestrator environments, you may run into the issue where Invoke Runbook activities magically get updated w/ the "Invoke by path" property set to True (or checked).

This occurs when a runbook targets another runbook that was not included in the export file.  Orchestrator attempts to keep the relationship chain by specifying the path to the target runbook since the runbook id guid is no longer valid.

To find all active Invoke Runbook activities that have this property set to true, you can execute the following SQL query to identify them.

The first query will group the target runbooks so you know how many are affected (we'll use these individual values later....).


Select TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyPath AS TargetRunbookPath
From TRIGGER_POLICY
INNER JOIN OBJECTS ON TRIGGER_POLICY.UniqueID = OBJECTS.UniqueID
INNER JOIN POLICIES ON OBJECTS.ParentID = POLICIES.UniqueID
Where TRIGGER_POLICY.TriggerByPolicyPath != 0 and OBJECTS.Deleted != 1 and POLICIES.Deleted != 1
Group By TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyPath
Order By TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyPath




Select POLICIES.UniqueID, POLICIES.Name AS SourceRunbook, TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyObjectID AS TargetRunbookID, TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyPath AS TargetRunbookPath, TRIGGER_POLICY.TriggerByPolicyPath, TRIGGER_POLICY.TargetActionServers
From TRIGGER_POLICY
INNER JOIN OBJECTS ON TRIGGER_POLICY.UniqueID = OBJECTS.UniqueID
INNER JOIN POLICIES ON OBJECTS.ParentID = POLICIES.UniqueID
Where TRIGGER_POLICY.TriggerByPolicyPath != 0 and OBJECTS.Deleted != 1 and POLICIES.Deleted != 1
Order By TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyPath


Now if you have a loooot of individual activities that have this property set (shown from the 2nd query above), you can update to update them by target runbook in mass rather than tediously going to each and every activity and updating the target runbook, unchecking the invoke by path property, and updating any parameters if applicable.

From the first query above, you can copy the target runbook name and paste it into the highlighted section below.

**Note the query below will only SELECT the rows that will be ultimately updated.  You'll need to comment out the 'Select' line and remove the comments from the 'Update', and two Set cmds.


Declare @TargetPath varchar(250)
Declare @UpdatedID varchar(250)

Set @TargetPath = 'Policies\Path_To_Runbook'
Set @UpdatedID = (Select '{' + CAST(Resources.UniqueId as varchar(250)) + '}'
    From [Microsoft.SystemCenter.Orchestrator.Internal].Resources AS Resources
    Where Resources.Path = SUBSTRING(@TargetPath,CHARINDEX('\Globals',@TargetPath,0),len(@TargetPath)))


Select POLICIES.UniqueID, POLICIES.Name, @UpdatedID, TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyPath, TRIGGER_POLICY.TriggerByPolicyPath
--Update TRIGGER_POLICY
--Set TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyObjectID = @UpdatedID
--    ,TRIGGER_POLICY.TriggerByPolicyPath = 0
From TRIGGER_POLICY
INNER JOIN OBJECTS ON TRIGGER_POLICY.UniqueID = OBJECTS.UniqueID
INNER JOIN POLICIES ON OBJECTS.ParentID = POLICIES.UniqueID
Where TRIGGER_POLICY.TriggerByPolicyPath != 0 and OBJECTS.Deleted != 1 and POLICIES.Deleted != 1 and TRIGGER_POLICY.PolicyPath = @TargetPath


Tuesday, September 18, 2012

SCOrch FTP Integration Pack Update v1.3

I've just released v1.3 of the Orchestrator IP for FTP/SFTP.  You can find it on codeplex at this link:


Please install this in a test environment before deploying to production!  Also, please comment on any issues/bugs you may encounter.

********
Since adding the extra "UsePassive" and "UseBinary" input fields, please note the following steps required for existing installs upgraded to v1.3.  These fields must be commited to the database in the existing activity before they will work.

1)  Stop runbooks where the activities are located.
2)  Check out the runbook
3)  Open the activity and click "Finish" (no changes required)
4)  Check in the runbook
(Thanks to Jeff for the insight for commiting the added fields to existing activities!)
********

Activity Change Log:
 
Create Folder
Resolve issue where host key is not saved and cmd to change directory fails
Add option for passive/active connection
Allow Paths/Filenames with spaces
Adjust FTP Timeout
Dir Change Error Handling

Delete File
Resolve issue where host key is not saved and cmd to change directory fails
Add option for passive/active connection
Allow Paths/Filenames with spaces
Adjust FTP Timeout
Dir Change Error Handling

Delete Folder
Resolve issue where host key is not saved and cmd to change directory fails
Add option for passive/active connection
Allow Paths/Filenames with spaces
Adjust FTP Timeout
Dir Change Error Handling

Download File
Resolve issue where host key is not saved and cmd to change directory fails
Add option for deleting source file(s)
Add option for bin/ascii transfer
Add option for passive/active connection
Allow Paths/Filenames with spaces
Adjust FTP Timeout
Dir Change Error Handling

List Folder
Resolve issue where host key is not saved and cmd to change directory fails
Add option for passive/active connection
Allow Paths/Filenames with spaces
Adjust FTP Timeout
Dir Change Error Handling

Rename File
Resolve issue where host key is not saved and cmd to change directory fails
Add option for passive/active connection
Allow Paths/Filenames with spaces
Adjust FTP Timeout
Dir Change Error Handling

Upload File
Resolve issue where host key is not saved and cmd to change directory fails
Add option for deleting source file(s)
Add option for bin/ascii transfer
Add option for passive/active connection
Allow Paths/Filenames with spaces
Adjust FTP Timeout
Dir Change Error Handling
Empty File/0 byte Error Handling

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Audit Jobs started from Orchestration Console (Who Started It)

This post I'll explain how to setup a runbook that runs a daily audit report of runbook jobs started from the Orchestration Console (OC).  As more end users and external applications get access to start runbooks, it's important to know who started a runbook at any given time.

The runbook itself is fairly simple.







First, we need to query the database for the jobs table ([Microsoft.SystemCenter.Orchestrator.Runtime].Jobs) which holds most of the data for the jobs.  One key to both queries is to flatten the data which we will later break back out into multi-valued data.




Select POLICIES.Name, Jobs.CreatedBy, Jobs.CreationTime, Jobs.Status
From [Microsoft.SystemCenter.Orchestrator.Runtime].Jobs AS Jobs
INNER JOIN POLICIES ON Jobs.RunbookId = POLICIES.UniqueID
Where Jobs.CreatedBy != 'S-1-5-500' and datediff(HOUR, Jobs.CreationTime, SYSUTCDATETIME ()) <= 24
Order By Jobs.CreationTime Desc


You can also extract parameters, runbook servers specified, etc... from the query if you like.  I joined the POLICIES table onto Jobs to get the name of the runbook from the guid.  Since this is a daily report, I selected jobs created in the past 24 hours.  I've also filtered out jobs started by the SID - "S-1-5-500".  This will narrow our results down to the OC.  Jobs started from the designer console or "internally" to SCOrch will have that SID.  Jobs created from the OC will show the SID of the user that started the job.

Next, we run almost the same query just to get the SIDs of the users we need to translate.


Select Jobs.CreatedBy
From [Microsoft.SystemCenter.Orchestrator.Runtime].Jobs AS Jobs
Where Jobs.CreatedBy != 'S-1-5-500' and datediff(HOUR, Jobs.CreationTime, SYSUTCDATETIME ()) <= 24
Group By Jobs.CreatedBy


Now to the script that puts it all together.  You'll notice from this screenshot where I've used the published data to parse.





Here is the script (I've left out the published data alphabet soup since it would be translated to the guid).

$RawResults = ""

$MyObjectCol = @()

$Regex = [regex] '/*__%__'
$Results = $Regex.Split("$RawResults")
ForEach($Data in $Results)
    {
    If ($Data.Split(";")[0].Length -ne 0) {
    $Field1 = $Data.Split(";")[0]}
    Else {$Field1 = $null}
    If ($Data.Split(";")[1].Length -ne 0) {
    $Field2 = $Data.Split(";")[1]}
    Else {$Field2 = $null}
    If ($Data.Split(";")[2].Length -ne 0) {
    $Field3= $Data.Split(";")[2]}
    Else {$Field3 = $null}
    If ($Data.Split(";")[3].Length -ne 0) {
    $Field4= $Data.Split(";")[3]}
    Else {$Field4 = $null}

    $MyObject = new-object psobject
    $MyObject | add-member -MemberType noteproperty -name RunbookName -value $Field1
    $MyObject | add-member -MemberType noteproperty -name InvokedBy -value $Field2
    $MyObject | add-member -MemberType noteproperty -name Date -value $Field3
    $MyObject | add-member -MemberType noteproperty -name JobStatus -value $Field4
    $MyObjectCol += $MyObject
    }

#Remove Empty Objects
$MyObjectCol = @($MyObjectCol | Where-Object {$_.RunbookName -ne $null})

#Convert SID to Username
$Users = @()

$SIDs = ""
$SIDs = $SIDs.Split("__%__")
ForEach ($SID in $SIDs) {
    If ($SID.Length -ne 0) {
        $objSID = New-Object System.Security.Principal.SecurityIdentifier ($SID)
        $objUser = $objSID.Translate( [System.Security.Principal.NTAccount])
        $User = $objUser.Value
        ForEach ($Object in $MyObjectCol) {
             $Object.InvokedBy = $Object.InvokedBy -Replace("$SID","$User")
        }
    }
}

#Convert UTC to Local Time
$strCurrentTimeZone = (Get-WmiObject win32_timezone).StandardName
$TZ = [System.TimeZoneInfo]::FindSystemTimeZoneById($strCurrentTimeZone)

ForEach ($Object in $MyObjectCol) {
     $Object.Date = [System.TimeZoneInfo]::ConvertTimeFromUtc($Object.Date, $TZ)
}

$MyObjectCol = $MyObjectCol | Sort Date -Desc | ft -AutoSize | Out-String -Width 4096 -Stream | %{ $_.Trim() }
$MyObjectCol | Out-File -FilePath "C:\Temp\JobAudit.txt"


I create a hash table to save the end results in.  The script converts the SIDs to usernames and also converts the time from UTC to local.  It then saves the output to a txt file which we'll email as an attachment.  I chose to do it this way so the data would be saved in columns and formatted cleanly to read.  You could also format it as a list to put directly into the body of the email.




Finally, just for housekeeping, the txt file is deleted.