DELL OPENMANAGE IT

ASSISTANT
Version 8.9.1
Readme
IT Assistant has been declared "End Of Life”: 01 Jan
2013
Dell System Management (OpenManage) 7.2 is the last version supporting IT Assistant (ITA). Starting
Systems Management 7.2, the availability of IT Assistant on the System Management Tools and
Documentation (SMTD) DVD is removed. There are no future versions planned for ITA. We recommend
using Dell OpenManage Essentials (OME) as replacement for ITA. You can directly upgrade your existing
ITA to OME.

To know more about "Essentials" and to download, refer: www.delltechcenter.com/ome

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

IT Assistant provides a central point of access to monitor and manage systems on a local area network (LAN)
or the wide area network (WAN). By allowing an administrator a comprehensive view across the enterprise,
IT Assistant can increase system uptime, reduce repetitive tasks, and prevent interruption in critical
business operations.

NOTE: Dell OpenManage Systems Management software, including IT Assistant and its documentation, is
available on the Dell Systems Management Tools and Documentation DVD and on the Dell Support website
at dell.com/support

This file contains updated information for your "Dell OpenManage IT Assistant User's Guide" and any other
technical documentation included with IT Assistant.

What’s New in ITA 8.9.1?

1. Improved IT Assistant's ActiveX Component: Security vulnerability exists in Dell IT Assistant 8.9.0
that could allow system information to be disclosed remotely. IT Assistant 8.9.1 resolves the
vulnerability.

2. What’s New in ITA 8.9?

1. New Operating Systems Support: IT Assistant can discover and manage servers installed with new
operating systems. However, you must install the required Dell OpenManage software from the
OpenManage product suite to discover and manage devices. For more information on supported
operating systems and hardware, see Dell Systems Software Support Matrix for OpenManage 6.5.
2. Now, you can install the IT Assistant management station on these 64-bit operating systems:

• Windows 7 64-Bit
• Windows 2008 R2
NOTE: These operating systems must be WoW64 enabled:

Now, IT Assistant can discover and manage servers installed with these operating systems:

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.5

 • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.0
• ESX 4.0 Update 2
• ESX 4.1 Update 1
• ESXi 4.0 Update 2
• ESXi 4.1 Update 1
• Windows Server 2008 HPC Edition Server R2
NOTE: You must also install the required Dell OpenManage software from the OpenManage
product suite to discover and manage devices.
3. Now, you can launch the warranty support site and view the current warranty information.
4. In addition to the Express Service Code for PowerEdge servers now, IT Assistant displays Chassis
Express Service code and Chassis Service Tag for PowerEdge Blade servers running OpenManage
Server Administrator version 6.5 or later. You can also see Enclosure specific Express service code
in the Details tab.
5. Deprecated features and OS: The following features are not supported in IT Assistant
• Topology view
• Volume Information Report—As IT Assistant does not support Volume

Info Report, this will be removed if you upgrade from previous version to IT Assistant 8.9.1.

Hardware and Software Requirements

Minimum Supported Operating System Requirements for IT Assistant (by Enterprise Size)

• Small (up to 500 Managed Systems):

o Windows 7 Professional
o Microsoft(R) Windows(R) XP Professional with SP2
o Windows Vista(R) (Business and Enterprise Editions)
o Windows Server(R) 2003 with SP2
o Windows Server 2003 R2 (Standard, Enterprise, and Web Editions)
o Windows Server(R) 2008 (includes Standard, Enterprise, and Web Editions)

NOTE: If you run Internet Explorer in Protected Mode on Windows Server 2008,Internet Explorer cannot gain
write access to the files in a user's profile or system locations. Due to this reason, the exported data from IT
Assistant to these locations is not visible in the expected location. You can view files created by IT Assistant on
the user's profile from the virtualized "UserProfile" folder
"%userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Virtualized\{system drive
letter}\Users\{username}").
o Windows Server(R) 2008 R2 (Standard and Enterprise editions)
• Large (500+ Managed Systems):
o Windows Server(R) 2008 (includes Standard, Enterprise, and Web editions)

NOTE: If you run Internet Explorer in Protected Mode on Windows Server 2008, Internet Explorer cannot gain
write access to the files in a user's profile or system locations. Due to this reason, the exported data from IT
Assistant to these locations is not visible in the expected location. You can view files created by IT Assistant on
the user's profile from the virtualized "UserProfile" folder
("%userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Virtualized\{system drive
letter}\Users\{username}"). For more information on this issue, see
"http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-
us/IETechCol/dnwebgen/ProtectedMode.asp"

• Windows Server(R) 2008 R2 (Standard and Enterprise editions)

• Windows Server 2003 with SP2
• Windows Server 2003 R2 (Standard and Enterprise Editions)
 NOTE: IT Assistant can be installed on Dell systems running Windows 2008 R2 x64 and Windows 7.0 x64
operating systems with WOW64 component enabled.

NOTE: On 64 bit operating systems with WOW64 component, IT Assistant can be launched only in 32-bit Web
browsers.

NOTE: If you have a problem when launching any URL using an IPv6 Link Local address, see the browser
and/or Operating System documentation.

Recommended Minimum Hardware Configuration for IT Assistant (by Enterprise Size)

• Small (up to 500 Managed Systems):

o Processor: 1 processor (1.8-GHz minimum)
o Memory: 1-2 GB
o Disk Space: at least 4 GB
• Large (500+ Managed Systems):
o Processor: 2 to 4 processors (800-MHz minimum)
o Memory: 2-4 GB
o Disk Space: as much as 10 GB

NOTE: The disk space needed may increase based on the:

o Number of Dell Update Packages you import for software update.
o Number of MSI files you import for software deployment
o Amount of performance monitoring sample data you collect
There is no recommended operating system update.
Additional Software Required to Run Some Features of IT Assistant

• For Dell/EMC storage arrays, ensure your array is FLARE(R) version 19 or above. You should also
install Navisphere(R) Secure CLI (version 19 or above) on your management station.

NOTE: This CLI software is part of the IT Assistant install.

Recommended SQL Server Updates

• IT Assistant 8.9.1 supports SQL Server 2008 R2 as the default database.

• IT Assistant 8.9.1 is backward-compatible with the following SQL Servers:
o SQL Server 2000
o SQL Server 2005 SP1
o SQL Server 2005 SP2

Installation
1. First-time Installation of IT Assistant 8.9.1
See the "Dell OpenManage Installation and Security User's Guide" and Dell OpenManage IT
Assistant Version 8.9 User's Guide" for instructions on setting up IT Assistant for the first time on a
system.
2. Upgrade from IT Assistant 6.x to IT Assistant 8.9.1
IT Assistant 8.9.1 does not support a direct upgrade from versions 6.x or older. To upgrade from
version 6.x to 8.9.1, first install version 7.0, and then apply version 8.9.1 as an upgrade.

NOTE: During an upgrade from version 6.x of IT assistant to version 7.0, the installation will preserve the
following settings:
(a) Global configuration settings
 (b) Discovery configuration settings
(c) Event Stored actions
Any other database information such as custom groups, custom event filters, or event categories is
not migrated because the database schema is not compatible with earlier versions of IT Assistant.
To save this information, back up your original database before upgrading. Upgrade from IT
Assistant 7.0 to IT Assistant 8.9.1

3. Upgrade from IT Assistant 7.0 to IT Assistant 8.9.1

If you have changed the data that was pre-populated as part of the 7.0 install in the Report and
EventSource tables, but want to retain this data after upgrading to version 8.9.1, take a backup of
these tables and restore them manually after the upgrade.

NOTE: If you used the CIM protocol before an upgrade, then after an upgrade, it is important to verify the CIM
credentials. CIM credentials should be qualified with a domain or local host if no trusted domain is configured
(for example, domain\administrator or local host\administrator). You can view the CIM credentials by editing
the imported discovery ranges in the "CIM Configuration Pane." If the CIM credentials are not qualified with a
domain or local host, devices will not be discovered through the CIM protocol.

Prerequisites
For more information on Operating system, Browser & Consoles, and Minimum Hardware Configuration
see the Dell Systems Software Support Matrix Version 6.5 on support.dell.com/manual.

1. Database (SQL Server)

SQL Server 2008 R2 (This is part of IT Assistant install). Also supports:
• SQL Server 2000
• SQL Server 2005 SP1/SP2
2. Additional Software’s
• Navisphere(R) Secure CLI: For Dell/EMC storage arrays inventory, ensure your array is
FLARE(R) version 19 or above. You should also install Navisphere(R) Secure CLI (version 19
or above) on your management station.
NOTE: This CLI software is part of the IT Assistant install.

Upgrade
Software Update: IT Assistant does not support the software update task on the management station. This
is because a software update may require a reboot that may affect other scheduled tasks that are run on
the management station. You can perform software updates using the "Dell Systems Management Tools
and Documentation" DVD after closing the IT Assistant application.

Software updates for Linux: To perform a remote Linux software update, IT Assistant uses Plink for SSH
communication. By default, IT Assistant passes your password as a command-line parameter to Plink.

NOTE: This occurs only on the IT Assistant management station. Passwords are always encrypted when transferred to
the managed system.

If passing passwords through the command line on the IT Assistant management station is of concern, you
can configure the updates to use RSA keys instead of passwords. A blank password in IT Assistant will
trigger SSH authentication using the RSA keys.
To create RSA keys, perform the following steps:

NOTE: It is assumed that you are running an SSH2 server and are using the RSA2 keys.
1. Run PuTTYgen (or your preferred mechanism) for generating public/private key pairs. You can save your
private keys (".ppk" files)to any location on your system.

The following is a sample public key that you would put in a file that you create called "authorized_keys2 for
RSA2 keys."

ssh-rsa
AAAAB3NzaC1yc2EAAAABJQAAAIEAxfMzTwS4Cwnua61h7kiad9l3Hvl
SeFIYPsZOrCYMuA++

9mPRraUEtrKNkwdaPKqPnc2/JFHyAxOu31jfUgQqgM2CSqwdr7fuowjseVVPTuG
5JdVR1BwUAXlJK/
Hy1BM+mkKHMuNe0jTrN/gUxcmlA0lHFaFNRjV++AeM15upJsk= rsa-key-20050209

Linux ships with other utilities for creating public/private key

pairs. You can download PuTTYgen from the following Web address:
"http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html"

The public keys are saved in the following configuration file on

the Linux system.
~/.ssh/authorized_keys2
2. Create this file, if it is not present.
3. You can store the private keys in the directory of your choice. For security reasons, it is recommended that you
set the appropriate permissions for your private key files.
4. This is a sample "sshconfig.pro" file where you can configure the names and location of your private keys:
#server[.user]=<path-to-file>
#A server-name of global would be appropriate to accommodate a
network where all or most systems are set up using the same key.
#global[.user]=<path-to-file>
global.root=C:\SSH Private Keys\root\global_root_privatekey.ppk
global.fred=C:\SSH Private Keys\fred\global_fred_privatekey.ppk
192.168.157.149.root=C:\SSH Private Keys\root\
system1_root_privatekey.ppk
192.168.157.151.fred=C:\SSH Private Keys\fred\
system2_fred_privatekey.ppk
5. Copy "sshconfig.pro" to the bin folder of IT Assistant. By default, this folder is located at:
"C:\Program Files\Dell\SysMgt\ITAssistant\bin directory
NOTE: A blank password in IT Assistant triggers SSH authentication using the RSA keys instead of using
passwords. IT Assistant then attempts to find the entry in the "sshconfig.pro" file. If IT Assistant finds the
system and user or global key in "sshconfig.pro", it uses the ".ppk" file for establishing an SSH connection to
the server. However, if IT Assistant cannot find this information, it assumes that you meant to enter a blank
password.
Dell recommends that SSH version 2 or above be used on the managed system for better security.
For more information on the usage of public keys for SSH authentication, see
"http://www.tartarus.org/~simon/puttydoc/Chapter8.html"
Reports
When you install IT Assistant, an in-built utility generates a report on the applicable software updates on
the systems that IT Assistant discovered. This report is generated by comparing the versions of the
packages/bundles imported into the IT Assistant repository (in the Software Updates) and the versions
installed on the managed systems. The utility is present under the folder "<ITA Installation Directory\bin>"
and is named "itacompliance.vbs". The report is generated in Microsoft Excel(C) format.

Usage
Run this utility on a system where the IT Assistant database is installed. By default, IT Assistant and the IT
Assistant database are installed on the same system. However, if you use a remote database, copy the
following files from the IT Assistant bin folder to the system running the remote database.

• itacompliance.vbs
• compliance.xml

Create a folder "Reports" under C:\. The report will be saved in a folder. Run the compliance utility from
"Windows Explorer" or from the command line. If the utility prompts for the name of the report file,
specify only the file name with a ".xls" extension. It will then connect to the IT Assistant database and
generate the report. The report is saved in the "C:\Reports". You can view this file using Microsoft Excel.

The report contains the following columns: Computer Name, Service Tag, Server Model, Patch Name,
Software Type, Customer Hardware, Current Version, Patch Version, and Patch Level. The patch level
indicates the severity of the update.

Notes
None

Documentation Errata
In the Dell OpenManage IT Assistant Online Help, the following section:

Introduction -> Existing Features from Earlier Releases of IT Assistant, the row titled Microsoft Windows 7,
reads:

IT Assistant can discover and manage devices that are running on the Windows 7 operating system. Install
the required Dell OpenManage software from the OpenManage product suite to discover and manage
devices.

It should be read:

IT Assistant can be installed on the system running on the Windows 7 operating system.
Open Issues and Resolutions
• The processor count in IT Assistant will differ for managed systems that contain processors with
multiple cores or Hyper Threading enabled. The count differs based on whether the managed
system is discovered using the CIM or SNMP protocol. The systems discovered using SNMP will
report physical processors, and the systems discovered using CIM will report logical processors.
• IT Assistant can receive and process alerts from systems with IPv4 address format.
• If you have configured the Navisphere CLI port different from default, EMC console launch from IT
Assistant fails. You have to manually launch the EMC console in a new web browser window,
specifying the newly configured port.
• If you attempt to update the BIOS from version A05 or earlier on a Dell PowerEdge(TM) 1500SC
that has 4 GB of system memory installed, the system stops responding on the BIOS post screen.
BIOS will not be updated even if you manually reboot the system. To avoid this issue, either use the
diskette flash method or temporarily remove some memory before performing the update.[148580]
• Remote Server Administrator command line task may not respond for Server Administrator running
on Microsoft Windows 2008 and Microsoft Windows 2008 R2.
To enable the successful functioning of remote Server Administrator CLI and software
updates/deploy features; ensure the following (applicable to Microsoft® Windows® only)
The managed system and the management station must be on the same domain or there should
be a trust relationship between the two domains.
If you have a Windows Firewall configured on the management station or the managed system,
make the following configuration changes to enable remote Server Administrator CLI and software
updates to work successfully.
Management Station:
a. Open TCP port 135.
b. Add the application "omremote.exe" (located in ITAssistant\bin) to the Firewall exception
list.
Managed System:
If you have the Windows firewall configured, enable remote administration by running the
following command in the command prompt:
"netsh firewall set service RemoteAdmin"

For more information on connecting through the Windows firewall, see Microsoft's MSDN website
for Platform SDK: Windows Management Instrumentation (Connecting through Windows Firewall)
at :
"http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa389286(VS.85).aspx"
"http://support.microsoft.com/kb/875605"

For Windows Server 2008 onwards, see the following link:

"http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa822854(VS.85).aspx"
[312918]
• When running Firefox on Red Hat(R) Enterprise Linux(R) versions 3.0 and 4.0, the focus on a
component may disappear when you hide a Modal Dialog. This is a known issue with Java(TM).
[6274378].
 To regain the application focus, click outside the context of the browser in which IT Assistant is
running, and then click back within the IT Assistant user interface (UI). [146975]
• The preference and help pages on the IT Assistant browser will be active only after IT Assistant has
loaded completely. [145205]
• Dell PowerEdge systems with DRAC III, DRAC III/XT, ERA, or ERA/O will be displayed in the IT
Assistant Device tree under modular systems if the out-of-band SNMP agent property is enabled
with "racadm." This property is not supported on the DRAC III family and is likely to be disabled in
future. If you see systems with a DRAC III card under modular systems, use the racadm command-
line utility to disable the property with the following command:
Locally on the server with the DRAC card:
"racadm config -g cfgOobSnmp -o cfgOobSnmpAgentEnable 0"

Remotely from a management station with the RAC management software installed:
"racadm -r <ipaddress of RAC card> -u <RAC username> -p <RAC password> config -g cfgOobSnmp
-o cfgOobSnmpAgentEnable 0" [139394]
• On Windows 2000, you may see an error message when you launch the Remote Desktop
Connection application using the right-click menu option on the Device tree. This issue may occur
because older versions of the client do not get installed in the system path. To correct this problem,
install a later version of the Remote Desktop Client (6.0.2600.0 or later). You can download the
client from Microsoft's website at:
"http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/tools/rdclientdl.mspx." [139630]
• When running Mozilla(R) on Linux: Using the "View | Reload" (Ctrl + R) command in Mozilla results
in unpredictable behavior. IT Assistant may reload in some cases, but at other times you may see
the following message:
"An instance of the IT Assistant console is already running on this device."
To address this issue, close the browser session and open a new session. [132635]
• When the name resolution on an IP address to a host name fails using DNS, IT Assistant attempts to
resolve the name using the NetBIOS name query. This action may cause the device to appear in
IT Assistant with the NetBIOS name even if it does not have a DNS entry. [138013]
• The IT Assistant UI supports the Mozilla browser only on systems running the Linux operating
system. On systems running the Windows operating system, the supported browser is Internet
Explorer and Firefox. Multiple instances of IT Assistant on Windows Server 2008 with the Firefox
browser is not supported and a valid message is not displayed. [150687]
• The IT Assistant UI cannot be launched using Firefox 3.0 on Windows Server 2008 x64 and
Windows Server 2008 x86 systems.[231656]
• If you use a special character font (for example, Wingdings(R) or a similar font) for your report
name, the report is saved correctly but the name will be displayed as question marks instead of the
special character font. To avoid this issue, use only standard fonts for report names. [135701]
• If you have Java(TM) Runtime Environment (JRE) versions 1.3 and 1.5.0 installed on your IT
Assistant UI client, and you uninstall an older version of the JRE, the IT Assistant UI may request
that you reinstall JRE version 1.5.0. To correct this problem, uninstall JRE version 1.5.0 and then
reinstall it by launching the IT Assistant UI.[137304]
For more information on this issue, see bug ID 4994468 on "http://bugs.sun.com."
• IT Assistant does not work well with operating system schemes that use very large fonts (for
example, various "High Contrast" schemes in Windows). Changing the display settings to use such a
scheme may cause text in various parts of IT Assistant to appear incomplete or truncated. If you
notice this issue, change the display properties.
To change the display properties on Windows systems:
1. Click the "Start" button, click "Settings"-> "Control Panel"->"Display Settings," then select
the "Appearance" tab.
2. Select a scheme with smaller fonts.
3. Close the browser and restart IT Assistant to implement the new settings.
On Linux systems, similar issues may occur if the selected system font size is too large. To correct
this issue, select smaller fonts ("Start"-> "Preferences"-> "Fonts") and restart the application.
[102193]
• To disable mnemonics at the operating system level, close and restart the IT Assistant browser
session. Doing so allows the JRE to re-load and implement the new settings. [120978]
• When managing an environment with more than 2000 devices, increase the amount of memory
allocated to the JRE heap.
Open the Windows Control Panel and click the "Java" icon to display "Java Control Panel."
Select the "Java" tab. Then click "Java Runtime Environment Settings | View..." Enter -Xmx384m in
the "Java Runtime Parameters" section. [123581]
• Changing the display "Scheme" option under "Preferences," on the topmost IT Assistant menu bar,
is not supported in IT Assistant 8.8.[123829]
• When viewing the Network Interface Card (NIC) information of Red Hat Enterprise Linux systems
on the "Details" page, the information may not be aligned correctly. IP addresses may not align
with the correct MAC addresses, or the IP and MAC addresses may not be displayed at all. This
issue has been fixed in the Red Hat net-snmp package. To correct this issue, install the latest Red
Hat net-snmp package on the managed system. [131619,74483]
• If you try to open a second session of IT Assistant on the same system while using the Mozilla
browser, an error message is displayed stating that only one browser session at a time may be
used. Close the second browser session using the Mozilla "File | Close" command or by clicking the
"X" in the top right corner of the browser window. Do not click the IT Assistant "Logout" hotlink on
the top Global Navigation bar on the top right of the window. Since only one session is allowed per
client, clicking "Logout" would have the effect of logging out of the first browser session as well.
[131954]
• A registry editor error occurs while opening the IT Assistant UI on a system with less than the
required space. The IT Assistant client requires at least 25 MB of available hard-drive space.
[132615]
• The reporting system generates the output in Unicode format ("http://www.unicode.org"). To
open the CSV reports in Microsoft Excel, open Microsoft Excel and run the "File | Open" command.
Select the "comma delimited" option to open the report with the data in the correct columns.
[132619]
• "Device Name" is a default field and is present in all reports. [134260]
• For Remote Access Controllers (RACs) that have instrumentation installed and that are running on
the host operating system, the RAC IP addresses are shown in the "RACDevice" table. [134365]
• If the intensity of an alert storm increases beyond 5 traps per second, it could take IT Assistant
several minutes to process all the alerts. New alerts that are received in the interim are not
displayed on the UI until all the alerts in the storm are processed.
• Pressing "Next," "Previous," or "Refresh" on the "Alerts" page of the UI, while a constant stream of
alerts is being processed by IT Assistant, may cause the counters in the "Alerts" page of the UI to
fall short. To correct this problem, click "Refresh" when the constant stream of alerts has subsided.
The refresh action does not impact any alert actions. [134862]
• When creating or updating a task, the stamp for the creation or update time is that of the IT
Assistant UI. The "Last Run Time" displayed on the summary report, however, is the time of the IT
Assistant Services system. If there is a significant variation in the UI and Services system time, it is
possible that a scheduled task may not execute or show that it was executed before it was
created.[137997]
• For NIC information on systems, IT Assistant uses the operating system's provider(s) to retrieve
data rather than Server Administrator. This behavior can result in discrepancies in reporting NIC
information between IT Assistant and Server Administrator. For example:
o On Linux systems, adapters may be named differently between IT Assistant and Server
Administrator. For example, IT Assistant may report a NIC adapter as "eth0," while Server
Administrator shows the actual manufacturer name of the NIC.
o If more than one NIC card is not configured with an IP address, IT Assistant may show only
one of the cards with an IP address of 0.0.0.0.
o IT Assistant may not report disabled NIC adapters.
o On Novell(R) NetWare(R) systems, since NetWare reports each NIC port as a NIC interface
entry, IT Assistant may show more NIC interfaces than are actually present in the system.
[138454]
• While performing discovery, if a device is discovered using "host name," and if its IP Address
changes at a later time, IT Assistant will display two devices after the next discovery cycle. One
device will display the old IP address and status as Power Down, while the other will display the
new IP Address. This problem is likely to affect systems that have DNS-DHCP IP addressing and for
which the IP addresses frequently change. A workaround to eliminate duplicate device is to delete
the device with the old IP address. [148069]
• IT Assistant will discover a RAC under the RAC group only if IT Assistant can communicate out-of-
band (bypassing the operating system) with the SNMP agent on the controller. DRAC III does not
• have this capability, and hence would not be grouped under the RAC group. DRAC 4 (and above)
support out-of-band communication with the SNMP agent and are discovered under the RAC group.
[151535]
• The choice of protocols specified for discovering and managing the devices can result in varying
levels of manageability. For instance, if you choose to manage devices in your network using only
CIM, the devices with only SNMP agent (example DRAC) are classified under the "Unknown" group
and consequently, you may not get application launch (example RAC console) functionality for the
device. To avoid such issues, make a careful choice of the protocols while configuring discovery
ranges, keeping in mind the devices (and protocols supported by agents running on those devices)
that you are going to manage. [153729]
• After installing IT Assistant, if you reinstall the database application (Example: Microsoft SQL
Desktop Engine (MSDE) 2000/SQL Server 2000 etc, which is used by IT Assistant) the IT Assistant
 database will be detached from the database application. Run the following command manually to
attach it back to the application.

NOTE: The command mentioned below shows the default location of SQL Server. Use the exact path to locate
the database files.
EXEC sp_attach_db @dbname = 'ITAssist', @filename1 =
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL\Data\
ITAssist_Data.MDF",
@filename2 = "C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL
Server\MSSQL\Data\ITAssist_Log.LDF"
o This command can be run directly in SQL Query Analyzer. Or on the command prompt, run this
command by using "OSQL -E."
o After executing the command, ensure that IT Assistant services ("DSM IT Assistant Connection
Service" and "DSM IT Assistant Network Monitor") are up and running.

• IT Assistant incorrectly associates a stand-alone Dell PowerConnect(TM) 3448 switch with a

modular chassis, as the switch firmware incorrectly reports a non-blank chassis service tag. This
issue will be corrected in the next firmware release for the 3448 switch.
• The password changes on a Windows managed system will not have any effect on the performance
monitoring task if the connection to the managed system has already been established.[71103]
• If you are managing a Dell/EMC AX100i (iSCSI) array, see the EMC PowerLink website and view the
information in the Knowledge Base article emc136753 for obtaining a FLARE patch. This patch will
fix an issue with discovering the AX100i devices.
• NIC information is not displayed in the device details screen for Dell/EMC arrays. Use Navisphere
Manager to view these details.
• When using the Broadcom ASF client utility to change Administrator or Operator permissions on
your client machine, re-discover the device in IT Assistant to apply the changes before creating any
new ASF power control tasks.
• The time displayed in the reports generated by IT Assistant and the "Device Summary/Details"
pages are in the time zone corresponding to the management station. [75603]
• If you are managing a Dell/EMC storage array, note that you need to enter the IP address for only
one of the storage processors (that is, either SPA or SPB, and not both) in the discovery range. The
storage processors are redundant and return the same inventory data to IT Assistant. If you enter
both SPs in the discovery range, only one SP will be displayed in the device tree.
• On Dell PowerEdge x8xx systems (IPMI 1.5 systems) discovered through IPMI, system health will
not reflect any redundancy information. For example, if one of the redundant power supplies is
unavailable, the system health will still indicate green. [78500]
• While browsing the SNMP MIB in the "Device Details" tab, the timeout values may have to be
changed to enable retrieval of large entries from the MIB. The timeout value that controls the MIB
retrieval is for the range applicable to the device. (SNMP configuration timeout in step 3 of the Edit
Discovery Wizard.) The request timeout values may also need to be changed. [80132]
• It is not recommended to provide an IP address in multiple ranges, especially when you are using
the IPMI Protocol. This could result in duplicate devices being displayed on the device tree. [78710]
• For discovering systems running SUSE(R) Linux Enterprise Server and using SNMP, add the
following to the snmpd.conf:

com2sec mynetwork 192.168.1.0/24 public group MyRWGroup v1 mynetwork view all included .1 80 access
MyRWGroup "" any noauth exact all all none
Ensure that you retain the trapsink and the smuxpeer lines in the existing conf file. You can delete all
other content. In the line containing "com2sec mynetwork...," substitute the existing address with the
subnet address your management station is on. For example, if the IT Assistant system has an IP
address of 143.166.29.117, then substitute it with 143.166.29.0. Make sure to retain "/24." Restart
/etc/init.d/snmpd. [81249]

• For IPMI-based discovery or inventory, the maximum length for the host operating system name is
62 characters. Any character beyond that limit will be truncated. [91210]
• Initialization of ML6000 may take a few minutes to give accurate information on the slot
count/drive count on IT Assistant.[66838]
• You may experience problems while performing resource-intensive operations in IT Assistant if you
keep the same browser session open for a couple of days. These operations include working with
Software Deployment tasks and Performance and Power Monitoring features. To recover, close the
browser and launch IT Assistant in a new browser window. [156726]
• A first-time catalog update on the Online Repository Synchronization Wizard may not populate the
tree. To work around this issue close and re-run the wizard.[162862]
• If IT Assistant is running on a Windows Vista system, a first-time Catalog update on the Online
Repository Synchronization Wizard may cause the session to expire. If the session expires, close the
browser and launch IT Assistant in a new browser window [162315].
• On Vista and later operating systems, the Microsoft telnet client may not be installed by default.
Due to this, IT Assistant may not show application launch point for SOL Proxy and telnet. Microsoft
Telnet Client must be installed on the system where the IT Assistant UI is running. [157301]
• If you set the task start or end time to a time in Daylight Saving Time (DST) shift period, IT Assistant
will change the task start or end time to the closest valid time. A workaround to eliminate the
changing of start or end time is to set a valid start/end time. [165393]
• Changing time zone on the IT Assistant Management Station could lead to fatal errors being
displayed. This could happen if you have date/time related data (for example, an Alert Filter) that is
applicable to a particular date and time, configured on one time zone. If you change the time zone
to another one that happens to be observing daylight saving time, and, if the date-time
combination corresponding to your data is invalid, then launching IT Assistant would result in the
above error.
To recover from this error:
o Change back the system time zone to the previous one
o edit the data values such that they would translate into valid date and time combination in
the other time zone
o Change the system time zone and restart IT Assistant. [165919]
• When opening the IT Assistant UI, respond to the security certificate challenge box and Microsoft
User Access Control pop-up messages within approximately 2 minutes; otherwise the UI will time-
out and fail to load. To correct this issue, close the current UI and re-open it. [102193,163732]
• Power monitoring agent shows unknown status for devices if you have selected only the Peak
Amperage or Peak Power counters for the task running on these devices. [171464]
• By default, root login through SSH is not enabled on VMware ESX Servers. As a result, all IT
Assistant tasks that use the root account would fail. To enable the SSH root login on the ESX Server,
set the option "PermitRootLogin=YES" in "/etc/ssh/sshd_conf" file.[174023]
• For systems with a Trusted Computing Group (TCG) 1.2-compliant Trusted Platform Module (TPM)
chip, software updates for BIOS will fail if all of the following are true:
o The Microsoft Windows BitLocker Drive Encryption feature is enabled.
o The TPM feature is set (using BIOS) to ON with Preboot Measurement. For information
about TPM security settings, see the "Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Online Help"
or the "Dell OpenManage Server Administrator User's Guide" available on the Dell Support
website at support.dell.com" and on the appropriate media supplied by Dell.
For software updates for BIOS to function, perform the following steps:
1. Disable the Microsoft Windows BitLocker Drive Encryption feature: For information on
disabling this feature, see the Microsoft documentation at "www.microsoft.com."
2. Update BIOS.
3. Re-start the system.
4. Re-enable the Microsoft Windows BitLocker Drive Encryption feature.

You can use IT Assistant to view the TPM information in the Device Details page.

You may not get appropriate privileges in the IT Assistant GUI if:

o You are part of an Active Directory group, which is in turn part of another group and
o You launch Server Administrator using the desktop icon and Single Sign-on is enabled. [167801].
• In the Online Repository Synchronization wizard, while testing Internet connectivity, if the test
passes, IT Assistant may use the same Internet Connection settings and continue to report further
tests as successful even if you provide different proxy settings. This issue can be overcome by
restarting the DSM IT Assistant Connection Service. [174323]
• If the CPU throttles, the following message in the Hardware System Event Log (SEL) will be
displayed with an unknown severity, System Board Power Optimized: Performance status sensor
for System Board, unknown event. This would be displayed in the "Hardware Logs" tab when you
select the system in the Devices view.[175331]
• SNMP connectivity from IT Assistant may fail if the SNMP ports on the management station and
managed system are different. If some management applications change the default SNMP port, it
could lead to SNMP connectivity failure from IT Assistant.[175442]
• Server Administrator Deployment task requires dependent components (example libc++) to be
installed on the target systems running the Linux operating system. If these components are not
installed, the task will fail with the following error message:
"omexec must be installed on the remote node for the task. See the help and ensure remote node
requirements are met before executing the task." [175296]
• When IT Assistant is launched using the Internet Explorer 7 browser, it may present a page
displaying "Certificate Error." On clicking "Continue to this website (not recommended)," it may fail
to load the application and redirect to the "res://ieframe.dll" page.
To work around this problem, enable "Active Scripting" in the "Internet" security zone. Perform the
below steps to do this:
In Internet Explorer,
1. Go to "Tools"-> "Internet Options"-> "Security."
2. Select "Internet" zone.
3. Click "Custom Level" button.
4. Go to "Security" -> "Active Scripting."
 5. Select "Enable."
6. Close the browser and launch IT Assistant in a new browser window. [189345]
• Software Deployment on a managed server running Linux operating system with only Online
Diagnostics tool installed will upgrade only the components of the Online Diagnostics tool.
OpenManage Server Administrator components will not be installed. Running the task again will
install OpenManage Server Administrator components [167175].
• IT Assistant Virtual Machine Report will provide information of Guest Virtual Machines running on
VMware ESX Servers only. This will not report the information of Guest Virtual Machines running
on a Microsoft® Hyper-V Server or Microsoft® Windows Server 2008 Enterprise servers [230058].
• The IT Assistant alerts will not be processed for about an hour if you upgrade to IT Assistant 8.8 on
a management station running on certain time zones such as "AUS Eastern Standard Time,"
"Tasmania Standard Time" and so on. This will affect only those alerts that are:
1. Already there in IT Assistant
2. received within an hour before upgrading to IT Assistant 8.8.[227869]
• Following issues will be seen when IT Assistant is upgraded to IT Assistant 8.8 in AUS Eastern
Standard Time (Canberra, Melbourne, and Sydney), Tasmania Standard Time (Hobart) and New
Zealand Standard Time (Auckland, Wellington) time zones.
1. Alert Logs: In DST period, an already existing alert will be ignored from the same device for
one hour.
2. Scheduled tasks: In DST period, all the:
• Hourly tasks (tasks scheduled to run every ‘n’ hour) will skip the next schedule cycle.
• Periodic tasks (tasks scheduled to run every ‘n’ minute) will resume after one hour.

In non-DST period, all the hourly and periodic tasks run immediately after upgrade and
continue normal cycle. To fix the issue in DST period, edit the tasks manually to start them
in the next schedule cycle.

To fix the issue in non-DST period, remove the tasks manually before starting the upgrade.
After upgrade, add the tasks manually to start them in the next schedule cycle. [240902]

• If "Log On" account of "DSM IT Assistant Connection Service" or "DSM IT Assistant Network
Monitor" services are changed, the following user rights must be assigned for the "Log On"
account
o "Adjust memory quotas for a process"
o "Replace a process level token"

If the "Log On" account is missing the above user rights, the IT Assistant tasks will fail to
execute.

To assign user rights to an account on the local computer

1. From the "Start" menu, point to "Administrative Tools," and then click "Local Security
Policy."
2. In the "Local Security Settings" dialog box, double-click "Local Policies", and then double-
click "User Rights Assignment."
3. In the details pane, double-click "Adjust memory quotas for a Process."
 4. Click "Add User or Group," and, in the "Enter the object names to select box type the user
or group name" to which you want to assign the user right and click "Ok."
5. Click "Ok" again and double-click "Replace a process level token" in the "Details" pane.
6. Click "Add User or Group" and in the "Enter the object names to select box type the user or
group name" to which you want to assign the user right and click "Ok".[239550]
• Launching IT Assistant on two or more tabs in a single browser window is not supported. First
instance of IT Assistant on a tab will stop working if second instance of IT Assistant is launched on
another tab in the same browser window. Close the browser and launch IT Assistant in a new
browser window.[187750]
• If user manually changes the hostname of the server which has already been discovered in IT
Assistant, then duplicate entries will appear in the device list corresponding to the IP address of
the device whose hostname has been changed. The new hostname also corresponds to same IP
address and the duplicate entry of the earlier hostname is not automatically deleted. ITA will
display both the new and the old hostnames.[247879]
• If a server is discovered using both SNMP and IPMI (in-band and out-of-band IP addresses
respectively) IT Assistant will correlate the two and display a single device under the "Servers"
group in the devices view. If IPMI is then disabled, a new device would appear under the
"Unknown" group, corresponding to the out-of-band interface. The device details under the
Servers group will continue to display the out-of-band IP address as well. After you re-enable IPMI,
the device under Unknown group can be removed by right-clicking it and selecting "Remove".
[262869]
• On RAC devices, the "Firmware Enclosure ID" column of the "Firmware Information" table may not
reflect the correct "Firmware Enclosure ID." It is recommended that you use the "Firmware
Enclosure ID" column in the "Firmware Information" table for the server on which the RAC device is
hosted. [296511]
• When a "Power Monitoring Capable" Server is discovered through the CIM protocol, on the
"Device Details" screen, IT Assistant may display "No" under the "Power Management" column in
"Power Supply Information" section. To display the correct information, discover the server with
either SNMP, or both SNMP and CIM protocols. [300080]
• If you create an Alert Ignore/Exclude Filter to ignore alerts with Normal severity, IT Assistant
continues to log alerts and execute any Alert Action associated with them, if the alert severity is
defined as Informational in the MIB. [324693]
• When you launch Dell OpenManage Server Administrator for managed systems with Server
Administrator agent only installations, using a remote web server; provide the user name,
password, and IP address of the managed system. [390431]
• IT Assistant does not support Chassis Management Controller (CMC) package & bundles. If you are
using IT Assistant which is older than v8.9, you may see CMC packages/bundles as part other
Software Repository catalog downloaded from Dell FTP site. These packages are not supported by
IT Assistant and will give following error message when selected to view their details or tried to
import. IT Assistant v8.9 will not show these packages in the tree itself.
Error Code: 0
Error Message: The package manifest file in <cmc_package_name> is invalid or cannot be
read. This may be due to invalid/corrupted package or an older unsupported package
version.
• While creating a "Generic Command Line" Task, “Application requires interaction with desktop"
checkbox will not work and executable window will not be visible when IT Assistant is installed on
the Microsoft Windows 2008 R2 system. Task will run the executable in the background.
• Status poll for non-virtual devices does not output results when an SNMP trap is received from the
managed device. You have to manually re-run the status poll task or the status is updated in the
next schedule status discovery task.
Known limitation and workaround
None

Corrected Problems
None

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Information in this document is subject to change without notice.

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Other trademarks and trade names may be used in this publication to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names or their products. Dell
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The following disclaimer applies to the "TreeTable" control code in
IT Assistant:
Copyright 1997, 1998 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification,
are permitted provided the following conditions are met: - Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of
conditions and the following disclaimer. - Redistribution in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the
following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. Neither the name of Sun Microsystems, Inc. or the
names of contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.
This software is provided "AS IS," without a warranty of any kind. ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED CONDITIONS, REPRESENTATIONS AND
WARRANTIES, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR
NON-INFRINGEMENT, ARE HEREBY EXCLUDED. SUN AND ITS LICENSORS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES OR
LIABILITIES SUFFERED BY LICENSEE AS A RESULT OF OR RELATING TO USE, MODIFICATION OR DISTRIBUTION OF THIS
SOFTWARE OR ITS DERIVATIVES. IN NO EVENT WILL SUN OR ITS LICENSORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY LOST REVENUE, PROFIT OR
DATA, OR FOR DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, INCIDENTAL OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, HOWEVER CAUSED AND
REGARDLESS OF THE THEORY OF LIABILITY, ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF
SUN HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
You acknowledge that this software is not designed, licensed, or intended for use in the design, construction, operation, or maintenance of any
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2013 Rev. A01