DFSR Replication Backlog

XKJNGZ

Uses Powershell to make WMI queries to get the current backlog file count for each outbound DFSR partner on each DFSR share. These queries can be expensive if the backlog is large, so the polling interval is set to 10 minutes. If there is no backlog, the script finishes quickly. No default alerting is set, but I would recommend adding a threshold to be notified of potential replication issues.

NOTE* - The collector must be able to reach both DFSR partners and will use the same credentials to make the queries for both.

Brandon Woods

Posted 9 years ago·Last reply 2 years ago

15 comments

Cole McDonald

·2 years ago

and... to the most recent question posed... in order to test errors in active discovery, I'll often use a:

try { Normal Code Goes Here -erroraction stop } catch { write-output "$($error[0])##1##1" }

to force the error output to the discovered instances screen... it's also ugly, but works. $error is a stack, newest gets pushed onto the top and can always be referenced as index [0]

LM User

·2 years ago

Why not just run the posh in the collector debug console?

FR: LM, please make a VSCode plugin for collector debug script execution.

Cole McDonald

·2 years ago

I have had that behave differently in the past due to potential credential issues, but !POSH debug is part of my deeper troubleshooting if it doesn't work from within the DS interface.

Jeff_DH

·2 years ago

very handy thanks!

Cole McDonald

·2 years ago

At scale, using remote powershell with implicit sessions (-computername) in an environment using remote profiles can cause issues on the target servers... safer method is to use explicit sessions in an invoke-command -session with a noprofile flag (get-wmiobject doesn't allow a -session parameter):

function Get-LMCreds_WMI {
    param (
        $wmi_user = '##WMI.USER##',
        $wmi_pass = '##WMI.PASS##'
    )

    if ([string]::IsNullOrWhiteSpace($wmi_user) -or ( $wmi_user -like '*WMI.USER*')) {

        write-output $null

    } else {

        $remote_pass = ConvertTo-SecureString `
            -String $wmi_pass                 `
            -AsPlainText                      `
            -Force

        $remote_credential = New-Object                         `
            -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential `
            -argumentlist $wmi_user, $remote_pass

        write-output $remote_credential

    }
}
function Get-Session     {
    $creds  = Get-LMCreds_WMI
    $option = New-PSSessionOption -NoMachineProfile
        
    if ($creds) {
        $session = new-pssession         `
            -computername  $computerName `
            -credential    $creds        `
            -SessionOption $option
    } else {
        $session = new-pssession         `
            -computername  $computerName `
            -SessionOption $option
    }

    write-output $session
}

try {
    
    $serverName    = hostname
    $computerName  = "##system.sysname##.##system.domain##"
    $payload       = {
        quser ### Example query to be made ###
    }
    
    if ($serverName -match "##system.sysname##") {
        #This is a Collector
        $outputString = invoke-command `
            -scriptblock $payload
           
    } else {
        # Not the Collector
        $session      = Get-Session
        $outputString = invoke-command `
            -session     $session      `
            -scriptblock $payload
    }
} catch {
    write-error $error[0]
    write-output -1
}

if ($session) { remove-pssession $session }

It's far more clunky, but in our environments, LM was causing our client users the ability to log in using anything other than a temporary profile most of the time. This fixed it. (WMI in the DataSource itself still does it with implicit sessions, so we minimize the number of WMI DS we use and replace them with powershell script DS using this method)

Jeff_DH

·2 years ago

Hi, I'd also like to get this datasource going if possible.

I too am getting "No instance is discovered for the selected device during this test", when doing an Active Discovery test. When I run the Active Discovery PS script manually on the collector server, it returns the expected data (3 DFS folder instances). When running it manually I'm pasting in the hostname, username and password to the script before running it.

stockholm

·5 years ago

Hey, I've just stumbled on this and getting the same problem others mentioned with no instances found. Was there ever a solution found for this?

Brandon Woods

OP6 years ago

Hi @Nicklas Karlsson and @Jonathan Hill,

So you guys are running into an issue where the datasource isn't finding any instances. That's no good!

The datasource uses remote Powershell commands from the Windows collector to the target server. I would probably start by using an RDP session to a collector and running the script from an elevated PS session. Before you run it, you'll need to modify the script to use whatever creds you have set up on that target server.

For a quick test, just check to see if these two wmi calls return anything from the remote system:


$hostname = <target Server>

gwmi -Namespace "root\MicrosoftDFS" -ComputerName $hostName -Query 'SELECT * FROM DfsrReplicatedFolderInfo'
gwmi -Namespace "root\MicrosoftDFS" -ComputerName $hostName -Query 'SELECT * FROM DfsrConnectionConfig WHERE Inbound = "False"'

If these two work, DM me and we can try to figure out what the issue is. I'm guessing we're running into a character limit and I need to account for that.

Thanks!

Brandon Woods

OP6 years ago

Hi @John Biniewski,

The alert thresholds are largely going to depend on how large your share are. You can set the alert threshold to something quite low like 10, and wait for an alert, but unfortunately, this is one of those times when you'll need to revisit your thresholds to determine what is normal for your environment(s). Wish I could be more help here.

John_Biniewski

·6 years ago

Installed and setup your datasource.

It is collecting data.

I would like to be Alerted if DFS Replication stops between any 2 servers.

What type of alert setup would you recommend?

Thanks in advance.

On 6/13/2017 at 1:20 PM, Brandon said:

XKJNGZ

Uses Powershell to make WMI queries to get the current backlog file count for each outbound DFSR partner on each DFSR share. These queries can be expensive if the backlog is large, so the polling interval is set to 10 minutes. If there is no backlog, the script finishes quickly. No default alerting is set, but I would recommend adding a threshold to be notified of potential replication issues.

NOTE* - The collector must be able to reach both DFSR partners and will use the same credentials to make the queries for both.

Jonathan_Hill

·6 years ago

When I apply this is does not find my file servers DFSr backlog.

When i test the script against known systems with large dfsr backlogs, this is the exit message.

Any ideas?

Ben_Hosseini

·7 years ago

We need this datasource too.

Nicklas_Karlsso

·7 years ago

I used the old one and it does'nt work, can't find any instances on the DFSR replica partners. Are there any update to this DS??

Michael Rodrigues

·9 years ago

@Adrianbald you should be able to get it now.

Thanks for the awesome contribution @Brandon!

Adrianbald

·9 years ago

Very interested in this datasource. When can we expect this to be approved?

1	SUYASH GAIKWAD
2	RR Robin Ratcliffe
3	AH Alejandra Herrera
4	HS Hunter Sparks
5	LT Lily Trbovic
6	AG Asher Guinzy