MNSCUG September 2015 Meeting Notes
The September meeting was a good one. Lots of great content from Ryan Andorfer regarding Service Management Automation. The latest automation arm of the System Center suite. Thanks again to concurrency for sponsoring!
- SMA – store powershell scripts in a centralized location. Does not require SCORCH
- SMA – PowerShell v4 currently. V5 not supported. SCORCH uses 32 bit PS v2 for comparison
- PowerShell v2 introduced the concept of workflows. These workflows can be used in SMA, however, using PowerShell modules would do the same as workflows – but easier. Modules can be deployed to SMA and to the local servers so they are available both to SMA and to the administrators remoting into those SMA servers.
- Capacity – SCORCH by default can run 50 runbooks at a time. SMA has similar default capacity. Both can be tuned.
- Ryan’s team created a database that tracks the runbook usage and time saved. Last quarter they ran a report that showed the value of automation versus manual. The money saved was almost $500,000.
- Another benefit is to track who requested what change to the environment
- Using the PowerShell ISE – a great tool to help store, sort, and search your projects - https://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/Powershell-ISE-Explorer-bfc92307
- Use ErrorActionPrefernce = Stop. This will help you identify non-terminating errors.
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