You can schedule several of the maintenance tasks
mentioned above to run on your timetable through the SMS Administrator
Console. You can find these tasks in the Site Maintenance node under
Site Settings. Two types of database maintenance objects can be
configured: SQL commands and tasks.
Scheduling SQL Commands
No predefined SQL
commands are available for you to schedule; you must configure these
commands yourself. For example, among the recommended weekly tasks is a
database size check. You can view database size using the SQL Enterprise
Manager, of course, but you can also determine it by executing the SQL
stored procedure SP_SPACEUSED.
Caution
Before running any SQL stored procedure, be sure to consult the SQL Server documentation for correct syntax and usage. |
You can configure this
SQL stored procedure to run according to your defined schedule and
generate a report based on its results. To do so, follow these steps:
1. | Navigate to the SQL Commands node under Site Settings, then Site Maintenance in the SMS Administrator Console and select it.
|
2. | Right-click
the folder, choose New from the context menu, and then choose SQL
Command to display the SQL Command Properties dialog box shown in Figure 1.
|
3. | Enter a descriptive name for the command.
|
4. | Verify
that Enable SQL Command is selected. Enter the command name in the SQL
Command text box. Be sure to use the appropriate syntax or the command
will fail.
|
5. | In
the Log Status To text box, enter the path and filename of the text
file you want the command results written to. This must be an existing
share.
|
6. | Define your schedule and then click OK.
|
The SQL command you
created will now be listed in the SMS Administrator Console when you
select the SQL Commands node. You might consider scheduling other SQL
maintenance commands, such as DBCC CHECKDB, DBCC CHECKALLOC, DBCC
CHECKCATALOG, and DBCC UPDATEUSAGE. For example, if you recently
reindexed the database, you might want to run the DBCC UPDATEUSAGE
command to reset space usage reporting so that SP_SPACEUSED returns
accurate data. You could schedule this command to run with SP_SPACEUSED
or separately, under its own schedule.
When the SQL command is run, it will write the results of its execution to the log file you specified. Figure 2 shows the results of the SQL command created in the previous example.
The first line of data (beginning with SMS_333)
indicates the total database size and the available free space. The
second line of data indicates the amount of reserved space, breaking
this value down into the amount of space used by data, the index size,
and unused space.
Scheduling Tasks
The other type of
database maintenance objects you can schedule, tasks, is found in the
Tasks node in the SMS Administrator Console. The Tasks folder contains
13 predefined tasks; you can’t add tasks to this list. Table 1 describes these predefined tasks.
Table 1. Database maintenance tasks
| Task | Description |
|---|
| Backup SMS Site Server | Performs
a comprehensive backup of the SMS site database, the software metering
database, the \SMS directory on the site server, and the SMS and NAL
registry keys on the site server. This task isn’t enabled by default. |
| Rebuild Indexes | Rebuilds indexes created on database tables that are used to more efficiently retrieve data. Enabled by default. |
| Monitor Keys | Monitors the integrity of primary keys used to uniquely identify all SMS database tables. Enabled by default. |
| Delete Aged Inventory History | Deletes
all hardware inventory that hasn’t been updated within a specified
period of days (by default, 90 days). By default, this task is enabled
and runs every Saturday. |
| Delete Aged Status Messages | Deletes status messages older than seven days by default and runs every day. Enabled by default. |
| Delete Aged Discovery Data | Deletes
all discovery data records (DDRs) that haven’t been updated within a
specified period of days (by default, 90 days). By default, this task is
enabled and runs every Saturday. |
| Delete Aged Collected Files | Deletes
all collected files that haven’t been updated within a specified period
of days (90 days, by default). By default, this task is enabled and
runs every Saturday. |
| Delete Aged Software Metering Data | Deletes
metered software data that’s older than five days to conserve space in
the SMS database. This task is enabled by default. |
| Delete Aged Software Metering Summary Data | Deletes
metered software summary data that’s older than 270 days to conserve
space in the SMS database. This task is enabled by default. |
| Delete Inactive Client Discovery Data | Deletes
all client records that haven’t received an updated DDR within the
specified number of days—for example, through Heartbeat Discovery. This
task is useful when you’re using Active Directory Discovery to create
DDRs for computers. When you delete a computer in Active Directory
directory service, its Active Directory record might remain for some
time before being purged. As a result, SMS Active Directory Discovery
would continue to report the computer as a valid client, even though the
computer is no longer physically present on the network. |
| Summarize Software Metering File Usage | Enables
summarization of collected software metering data to conserve space in
the SMS database. This task is enabled by default. |
| Summarize Software Metering Monthly Usage Data | Enables
summarization of collected monthly software metering data to conserve
space in the SMS database. This task is enabled by default |
| Clear Install Flag | Directs
SMS to clear the install flag for clients that have been uninstalled.
The install flag identifies to SMS those clients that have been
installed as SMS clients. When the client is uninstalled, the install
flag isn’t automatically removed, and the client can’t be successfully
reinstalled. This task clears the flag so that a client can be
reinstalled. This task isn’t enabled by default. |
Notice
that 10 of these tasks are already enabled by default to ensure that
vital tasks such as rebuilding indexes are carried out on a regular
schedule. All the deletion tasks are designed to keep the database from
becoming too large and unwieldy. You can, of course, modify the schedule
and disable or enable any of these tasks as you choose. (To enable or
disable a task in the Tasks folder, right-click the task and choose
Properties from the context menu. In the Task Properties dialog box,
select or clear the Enable This Task option.) For example, you could
enable the Backup SMS Site Server task to schedule a regular backup of
the SMS database (and site server) without having to do so in SQL
Server.
The most powerful of
these tasks is Backup SMS Site Server. This is by far the most
comprehensive backup routine available for SMS. It backs up not only the
SMS site database and software metering database, but also the full SMS
directory structure on the site server and the SMS and NAL keys in the
Windows registry on the site server—all necessary to fully recover a
failed site server.
