System Center Service Manager, part 1

Since as a part of my system center blogging spree, I thought I’d go ahead with the setup of SCSM.

For those that don’t know what Service Manager is.
(Service Manager provides an integrated platform for automating and adapting your organization’s IT service management best practices, such as those found in Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) and Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL). It provides built-in processes for incident and problem resolution, change control, and asset lifecycle management.)

So, WHAT does that mean ? Like all of other System Center products it has numerous features, much of them will make a lot more sense if  you are familiar with ITIL terms. Much is related to

* Incident and Problem management
* Change Management
* Service Request Management
* Release Management
* CMDB
* Data Warehouse reporting

I like the term “learning by doing” so hopefully you can learn a ’bit from my posts regarding this.

The Service Manager consists of:

Service Manager management server
Contains the main software part of a Service Manager installation. You can use the Service Manager management server to manage incidents, changes, users, and tasks.

Service Manager database
The database that contains Service Manager configuration items (CI) from the IT Enterprise; work items, such as incidents, change requests, and the configuration for the product itself. This is the Service Manager implementation of a Configuration Management Database (CMDB).

Data warehouse management server
The computer that hosts the server piece of the data warehouse.

Data warehouse database
Databases that provide long-term storage of the business data that Service Manager generates. These databases are also used for reporting.

Service Manager console
The user interface (UI) piece that is used by both the help desk analyst and the help desk administrator to perform Service Manager functions, such as incidents, changes, and tasks. This part is installed automatically when you deploy a Service Manager management server. In addition, you can manually install the Service Manager console as a stand-alone part on a computer.

Self-Service Portal
A web-based interface into Service Manager.

So lets continue on with the setup.
NOTE: .Net 3.5.1 Is required to install SCSM so install this using the Add feature wizard.
NOTE: Windows 2008 R2 SP1 is required.

As you can see from the Setup, the Management Server and The Data Warehouse server cannot coexist on the same server ( so we will have to install the data warehouse components on another server ) But we start with the Management Server,

 First menu, enter your product key or as In my case trial And Accept the license terms.

Next, choose the installation location.

Then click next, now the setup will run the prerequisites check.
In my case I forgot a bunch of stuff before I could continue.

The Report Viewer is avaliable on the installation media,  the other components are available
From Microsoft.com http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/confirmation.aspx?id=8824

After you have installed the missing components you can continue on with the setup.
On the next page, you have the database setup, ulike OpsMgr and ConfigMgr, Service Manager doesn’t like the default collation SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS, if you have a clean database server for this purpose choose this collation, Latin1_General_100_CI_AS (but if you are using the previous one, you will get an error message, so we continue on!)

After you are done entering the info, click next.
Now you have to enter a Management Group name and a management group administrator group.

NOTE: Management group names must be unique. Do not use the same management group name when you deploy a Service Manager management server and a Service Manager data warehouse management server. Furthermore, do not use the management group name that is used for Operations Manager.

Click next, and configure the service account to be used for Service Manager.

On the next page you need to setup the Service Manager Workflow account,

Click next, and choose a setting for the CEIP (Regardless of whatever you choose here, I recommend that you actually choose yes here. Since Microsoft is actually using the data they gather to make a better product)

Next menu is regarding if you want to use Microsoft Update, in my case I have patch management via SCCM so I choose no.

Click next and you get the summary screen, double-check that everything is correct before you install.
NOTE: It’s a pretty small installation to it will only take a couple of minutes.
NOTE: If setup failes, check the logs under Userscurrentuserappdatalocaltemp
NOTE: In the last part of the installation it might say something about importing management packs, don’t get confused and mix it with OpsMgr. This is because Service Manager also uses the term Management Packs
After installation is complete start the console via the start menu –> Service Manager Console.

This is what the console looks like the first time,

The graphical user interface is similar to ConfigMgr and Opsmgr, and as you can see in the overview, the console list a whole bunch of objectives that we should do before we start using Service Manager.
Lets just go trough the basics of the console. On the left side we have 4 different options.

Administration –>  

• Announcements
• Connectors  
• Deleted Items
• Management Packs
• Notifications
• Security
• Service Level Management
• Settings 
• Workflows

 

Library –>

• Groups
• Knowledge
• Lists
• Queues
• Runbooks
• Service Catalog
• Service Offerings
• Tasks
• Templates

 

Work Items

• Activity Management
• Change Management
• Incident Management
• Problem Managmeent
• Release Management
• Service Request Fullfillment

 

Configuration Items (Which contains all the CI’s, they typically include Services, hardware, software, buildings, people)

• Builds
• Business Services
• Computers
• Enviroments
• Printers
• Software
• Software Updates
• Users

All these words, Service Management, Configuration Items, Incident Management, Change Management is directly linked to ITIL & MOF. So It doesn’t make a lot of sense for people who aren’t familiar with the ITIL terminology.
But for the sake of this blog, lets go trough a quick demo.

The Demo
A User (Bill) is sitting on Computer (Computer1) And is having trouble with (Printer1) and he creates an incident using the portal.

First we have to use the Active Directory connector to sync his User to Service Manager. Go to Administration –> Connectors –> Active Directory Connector.

Give the sync a valid name and a good description:

Choose “Enable this connector” click next –>

Choose the default domain you which to sync from and choose which account you want to use to sync the information, click test connection to see if the user info you wrote is valid. Click next –> then import the user and the computer ( In my case ill created the printer as an CI)

Click next, double-check the summary and click create.

If you go to the Configuration Items and choose users you will now see that Bill is appear in the list, and if you choose the computers menu you will see that computer1 is appearing. And I have created the printer manually.

Lets say Bill send you an e-mail regarding an incident relating to the printer1 on computer1, then you as an administrator would have to “Create a incident”. If its confusing that you think “Well ain’t that a problem instead of an incident?” Well in terms of ITIL thinking,  a Problem is one that comprises multiple incidents. Since this is a single event, it is a incident. If a lot of people are having trouble with the printer, well then it’s a problem.

Go to the Work items –> Incident Management –> Create Incident

Next you have a wealth of info that you need to enter,

First we have to enter the users that is affected, title for the incident with an accurate description, the impact and if its urgent or not. And with the affected items. The console also takes track of time you are using with the incident.
And you also have to provide an owner of the “incident” in my case im going to give it to my Tier 1 support tech-guy SQLuser.

 

Click Apply then OK. Then go back to the “all incidents” view you will get the incident that we just created.

When the issue is fixed, we can just click on the incident and change the status to resolved
This has been part 1 on SCSM, more to come.