Troubleshooting with Microsoft

Q: What do I do before upgrading a site? What if the upgrade doesn't complete?

Be sure to back up the site, all subsites, and their related SQL databases before upgrading. For information about backup procedures, see Appendix K in the Systems Management Server Administrator's Guide for primary sites, and Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q138347 for secondary sites. You can access the Knowledge Base from the Microsoft Network (MSN), ftp.microsoft.com, Microsoft TechNet, and CompuServe.

Before you upgrade Systems Management Server (SMS) site server software, Microsoft recommends that you perform a Site Reset from the SMS Setup program. This reset ensures that all service components are properly responding to service control commands for stopping and starting.

If you are running Windows NT 3.5 with Service Pack 3 and attempt to install SMS 1.1, you may be unable to upgrade. On NT 3.5, SMS 1.1 setup checks only for Service Pack 2 and below. Contact Microsoft Product Support Services (PSS) for technical assistance.

During an install or upgrade of an SMS primary site, the appearance of the Primary Site Configuration dialog can mean that the system detected an installation error, a component failing to install, or a component failing to start correctly. If you change the Site Code when the second dialog appears, SMS Executive, Inventory Agent, and Package Command Manager services do not install successfully.

The smssetup.log file in the root of the SMS site server C drive is useful for finding installation and upgrade failure points. Do not, under any circumstances, change the SMS share name comments from those SMS creates.

Q: How do I add NetWare 4.X servers to my site?

For specific instructions on adding NetWare servers to your SMS site, see the SMS 1.1 Release Notes and the SMS 1.1 Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) Help file. Setup creates an icon for this Help file in the SMS program group. The Help file provides detailed information about modifying the login script and configuring the server.

Q: Why am I having difficulty setting up my Windows for Workgroups (WFW) client?

You can choose among several ways to troubleshoot this problem, depending on the client's symptoms. Some problems relate to client memory configuration (e.g., not enough environment space available). If you can run smsls.bat (or runsms.bat) and you see Client Setup start, you can run through a few troubleshooting scenarios to identify your problems.

First, SMS Client Setup can incorrectly identify a Windows workstation as an MS-DOS client (i.e., the SMS section in the sms.ini file indicates OS=1 for an MS-DOS client instead of OS=2 for the Windows client) for three reasons:

1. SMS Setup cannot find the win.com file in the path.
2. Setup cannot find win.com in the path if the subdirectory for Windows is too far down the path. For example, a system with the following path is detected as an MS-DOS client:
   path c:\;c:\dos;c:\util\path;
   c:\apps\oracle;c:\apps\pctools;c:\wfw311
3. The SMS batch process runs out of environment space.

Make sure that you correctly specify your Windows directory in the path, and avoid using \Windows without specifying the full path name. To ensure proper detection of the OS, move the Windows subdirectory closer to the beginning of the path statement. One implementation of a correct path is the modified path below:
path c:\;c:\dos;c:\wfw311;c:\
util\path;c:\apps\oracle;
c:\apps\pctools

To ensure that the SMS batch process does not run out of environment space, place the following setting in the Windows client's system.ini:

[NonWindowsApp]

CommandEnvSize=1024

If the client hangs when you run Inventory Agent, you need to check for a c:\smssafe.tmp file. This file lists each test you've run. The last test in the list is the test that hung the client. Inventory Agent deletes this file if it completes normally. If you are running SMS 1.1, the smssafe.tmp file is also in the ms\sms\data directory. You can set the SMSLS=1 environment variable. It turns on the smsls.bat file's verbose mode, which echoes all output to the screen, to help you determine where the Inventory Agent hung the client. Furthermore, you can modify the Inventory Agent command line directly to redirect its output to a file. You can closely examine the resulting text file to investigate the problem. An example of this procedure is

invdos /v > c:\invdos.txt

Once you determine where the Inventory Agent is hanging, remove or reconfigure the suspect component, and rerun the inventory. After you narrow the problem to a particular configuration, report the results to Microsoft PSS.

Finally, when you mistakenly configure two clients with the same SMS ID, the machine inventory appears to change and contain entries from another system. Check the machine name, logon name, or other unique identifier. If these change, you can track which machines have the same SMS ID.

To correct this problem, delete the sms.ini file from one system and run smsls.bat again on that system. This deletion assigns a new SMS ID to the affected system and creates a new entry in the SQL database. If this problem occurs on several systems, check all the \\<logon server>\sms_shr\smsid directories for the site, and confirm that the current .uid file contains a unique ID to assign to the next new SMS client that the system configures.

Q: What precautions do I need to ensure a successful first-time SMS site installation?

For step-by-step instructions, see the setup.hlp Help file under the smssetup subdirectory on the retail SMS 1.1 CD. Also, be sure you have configured your SMS service account correctly and granted it the proper rights (e.g., a member of the Administrators group has the "Log on as a service" right) and that you have met all SQL requirements. You can review the smssetup.log file in the root of the C drive if any problems arise.

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