Tag Archives: CM 2012

Configuration Manager 2012, Microsoft System Center, Reporting

CM 2012 – Reporting – Narrowing Results with Parameters

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I’m continuing the series on SSRS Reporting within Configuration Manager 2012 and building on the previously create report outlined in

CM 2012 – REPORTING – CREATE A TABLE REPORT USING SSRS

CM 2012 – REPORTING – CREATING MEANINGFUL RESULTS WITH SQL CASE STATEMENTS

We will create and use a parameter which will display as a drop-down menu using values from a new dataset.

The SQL queries used in this video is shown below:

Second Dataset for Parameter

SELECT DISTINCT
Operating_System_Name_and0

FROM
V_R_System

ORDER BY
Operating_System_Name_and0

Original Dataset with Added Parameter in WHERE statement

SELECT
v_R_System.Name0,
V_R_System.Operating_System_Name_and0,
CASE
WHEN
v_R_System.Client0=1 THEN ‘YES’
ELSE
‘NO’
END AS Client0,
CASE
WHEN
v_R_System.Active0=1 THEN ‘YES’
ELSE
‘NO’
END AS Active0

FROM
v_R_System

WHERE
V_R_System.Operating_System_Name_and0 = @OSName

ORDER BY
V_R_System.Operating_System_Name_and0,
v_R_System.Name0

Configuration Manager 2012, Reporting

CM 2012 – Reporting – Creating Meaningful Results with SQL CASE Statements

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Building upon our previous reporting outlined in

CM 2012 – REPORTING – CREATE A TABLE REPORT USING SSRS

we will use a SQL CASE statement to create more meaningful results from the values presented previously.

The SQL query used in this video is shown below:

SELECT
v_R_System.Name0,
V_R_System.Operating_System_Name_and0,
CASE
WHEN
v_R_System.Client0=1 THEN ‘YES’
ELSE
‘NO’
END AS Client0,
CASE
WHEN
v_R_System.Active0=1 THEN ‘YES’
ELSE
‘NO’
END AS Active0

FROM
v_R_System

ORDER BY
V_R_System.Operating_System_Name_and0,
v_R_System.Name0

Configuration Manager 2012, Reporting

CM 2012 – Reporting – Create a Table Report Using SSRS

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One of the best features of Configuration Manager is its ability to collect immense amounts of data.  What a CM Administrator does with that data can make the difference between a supervisor being impressed with the capabilities of CM, or believing it has a database full of useless information.  That’s where the reporting feature comes in.  I’ve met many CM Administrators who are still exporting the results of SQL queries into spreadsheets and sending those to their supervisors.

Hopefully, the series of videos I’ll be releasing will help those folks create some very useful reports and get them excited about using Report Builder.

This is a short video demonstrating how to create a basic table report using Configuration Manager 2012 and SQL Report Builder.

The SQL query used in this video is shown below:

SELECT
v_R_System.Name0,
V_R_System.Operating_System_Name_and0,
v_R_System.Client0,
v_R_System.Active0

FROM
v_R_System

ORDER BY
V_R_System.Operating_System_Name_and0,
v_R_System.Name0

PowerShell, Site Components, Troubleshooting

CM 2012–Troubleshooting – MP has rejected a message from GUID:XXXXX

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For those not familiar with the CM database, it can be confusing at times to locate the specific client to which an error message within SMS_MP_CONTROL_MANAGER is referring.

Let’s take the following error as an example:

Message ID:  5447
Description:  MP has rejected a message from GUID:F36C6053-12D7-404C-AAF6-E406F84DAF50 because the signature could not be validated. If this is a valid client,  it will attempt to re-register automatically so its signature can be correctly validated.

When looking at the CM database, specifically at the view, v_R_System, one would notice that there are two columns which have names explicitly containing the label “GUID” – Object_GUID0 and SMBIOS_GUID0, neither of which match up to the GUID referred to in the error message shown above.  Looking at the properties of these two columns, we find that Object_GUID0 is related to the Active Directory object of the resource and SMBIOS_GUID0 is the BIOS GUID of the resource.

So, where can one find the information needed to track down the resource to which the above error message is referring?  The answer is the v_R_System column named SMS_Unique_Indentifier0 – intuitive, isn’t it?  Reviewing the properties of this column, we find that this refers to the Unique ID of the resource, which is exactly what the error is returning, the source identifier.  I’ve included a couple methods for identifying the resource below.

SQL Method:  (Query against the CM database)

SELECT
Name0,
SMS_Unique_Identifier0

FROM
v_R_System

WHERE
SMS_Unique_Identifier0 = ‘GUID:F36C6053-12D7-404C-AAF6-E406F84DAF50’

PowerShell Method:
Enter your data where the [] are, but omit the brackets.

$params = @{Namespace=”ROOT\SMS\site_[YOURSITECODE]”;
Class=”SMS_R_System”;
ComputerName=”[YOURSITESERVER]”;
Filter=’SMSUniqueIdentifier = “GUID:F36C6053-12D7-404C-AAF6-E406F84DAF50″‘}
Get-WmiObject @params | ForEach-Object {
$Name = $_.Name
$Name = ” Computer Name:  $Name”
$ResourceID = $_.ResourceID
$ResourceID = ”   Resource ID:  $ResourceID”
$ClientVersion = $_.ClientVersion
$ClientVersion = “Client Version:  $ClientVersion”
Return $Name, $ResourceID, $ClientVersion
}

Application Catalog, Application Management, Configuration, Graphics Tools

CM 2012 – Application Catalog – Color Themes

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For this article, I decided to write about something a little lighter… color choices within the CM 2012 Application Catalog.  If your company likes to have a specific color dominant within corporate websites, perhaps you can preemptively change the color theme of your Application Catalog to match this color before you are asked to do so.

If you navigate to the properties page of the Application Catalog website point and then select the Customization tab, you will see a line labeled “Website theme:” followed by a box showing a blue square and the word “Blue.”  (I’ve cut out a lot of the blank space in the picture below.) Blue is the default color of the Application Catalog.

Customization Tab

This box is a drop-down selector for other default colors, plus a color palatte for creating a custom color theme.  Click on the box and the drop-down selections shown below will appear.  If you wish to create a custom color, click on “More colors…” at the bottom of the list.  After you have completed selecting a color, click the “Apply” button and then click okay.  The Application Catalog will reflect the selected color upon next being loaded by a client.  (I discuss more about custom colors as well as a useful tool that can be used for that the end of the article.)

Color Palette

Here are the colors in order of selection from the above drop-down menu.

Blue:

Blue

Magenta:

Magenta

Purple:

Purple

Teal:

Teal

Lime:

Lime

Brown:

Brown

Pink:

Pink

Orange:

Orange

Red:

Red

Green:

Green

Customizing colors for the Application Catalog utilizes a standard color palette with which you should be familiar.  After selecting “More colors…” from the Website theme drop-down selector, a standard color palette will appear.

Alternative Colors

If none of these alternate colors closely match what you need, clicking on the “Define Custom Colors” button at the bottom will bring up a custom color palette, again, which should be familiar.

Alternative Colors 2

The tool I prefer to use for discovering RGB numbers for corporate colors is a free tool named Instant Eyedropper available from SpiceBrains.  Here is the site for the Instant Eyedropper tool itself.  The download link is in the upper right-hand corner.  After installing this tool, an icon will appear in the system tray (Windows 7 is shown in these examples) as a small color wheel.  I’ve put a red square around the icon in the picture below.

System Tray

Right-clicking the icon brings up color type selections and options.  For using color palettes as shown above, select the RGB color type.

Instant Eyedropper 01

Now that the color type is selected, go back to the system tray, left-click-hold the left mouse button and a color point measurer will appear.  Continue to hold the left mouse button and drag the color point measurer over the color you want to read.  The RGB colors numbers will show and you can then copy these into your custom color palette!

Instant Eyedropper 02

Honestly, this is one of the coolest free tools for graphics that I’ve seen in a long time.  One thing to note – if you have multiple monitors, you must use monitor one.  Dragging the color point measurer to any monitor but monitor one will yield a color of 255 255 255 (black) – not sure why, but it does, so avoid that.  Enjoy!