2. Setting Status Message Viewer Options
When
SMS components or services generate status messages, they’re written to
the site database. The Status Message Viewer uses the SMS Provider to
query the database for the detailed messages when you use the technique
described in the preceding section.
As shown in Figure 9,
the Status Message Viewer for the site system status displays all the
SMS components that are running on that site system or that affect it
in any way. These messages are the same as those displayed for each
component in the Component Status window. For example, the highlighted
SMS_Site_Control_Manager message in Figure 9 is the same as the message highlighted in Figure 6.
Regardless
of whether you’re viewing component status or site system status, the
Status Message Viewer always displays the following information:
Severity Specifies whether the message category is info, warning, or error
Type Specifies whether the message type is milestone, detail, or audit
Site Code Specifies the three-character site code of the site for which the message was generated
Date / Time Specifies the time and date stamp indicating when the message was generated
System Specifies the server name of the site system for which the message was generated
Component Specifies the name of the SMS component or service that generated the message
Message ID Specifies the numeric code related to the task performed by the SMS component or service that generated the message
Description Provides a detailed description of the message
The
Status Message Viewer provides many features that can facilitate your
analysis of messages. Let’s begin with some of the GUI features. You
can change the sort order of each column simply by clicking the column
header. Each column has three
sort options: click once to sort from lowest to highest, click again to
sort from highest to lowest, and click once again to return to the
default column order. You can, of course, resize the columns by
clicking the border between each column heading and dragging to make
the column wider or narrower. You can also move the columns to
customize the display simply by dragging and dropping a column header
to a new position.
By right-clicking any
message entry to display its context menu, you can copy it, delete it,
or display its Status Message Details window. You can also set a filter
for the Status Message Viewer or refresh all the messages from this
menu. You can select multiple messages for copying, deleting, and
printing by using the Windows Explorer Ctrl-click method.
The
Status Message Viewer also provides a variety of options and features
that are enabled through the menus on its menu bar. Because most of
these settings are self-evident, we’ll look here only at those that are
unique or of particular interest to the SMS administrator—in
particular, the options in the Status Viewer Options dialog box and the
Filter Status Messages window.
The Status Viewer Options Dialog Box
Let’s
start by discussing the Status Viewer Options dialog box. Begin by
displaying the Status Message Viewer for a component or site system.
Choose Options from the View menu to display the Status Viewer Options
dialog box shown in Figure 10. The General tab is shown by default.
The General Tab
The
Status Message Viewer doesn’t refresh the interface with new messages
by default unless you tell it to—for example, by pressing F5. The
General tab lets you enable auto-refresh and specify a refresh
interval. However, having the viewer automatically refresh itself will
incur additional resource cost, so you shouldn’t select this option
unless you intend to leave the viewer open for a long time—perhaps to
follow the flow of a task or the generation of messages. You can also
limit the number of messages that are collected and displayed.
Caution
The
Status Message Viewer might not display data correctly when you execute
it on the SMS Administrator Console running on Microsoft Windows XP
Professional with no service pack applied and when your SMS site
database or SMS Provider is on a server running Windows Server 2003. To
ensure that the Status Message Viewer executes correctly, be sure to
update the Windows XP Professional computer running the SMS
Administrator Console with Service Pack 1 or higher. |
The
Status Message Viewer displays messages stamped with the local time and
date. The General tab lets you specify different time zones if you want
to see when a message was generated on a site or site system in a
different geographic location.
Most
status messages are generated based on generic text strings in which
variables have been inserted to customize the detail to a specific
component, time, and so on. For example, message ID 4611 for the SMS
Component Status Summarizer contains the text:
SMS Component Status Summarizer reset the status of component %1, running on
computer %2, to OK.
This
message always reads the same, except that the percent values are
replaced with a specific SMS component value and server value.
Displayed in the Status Message Viewer for SMS Site Component Manager
on site server SQL1, this message would read:
SMS Component Status Summarizer reset the status of component "SMS Site
Component Manager", running on computer "SQL1", to OK.
If you clear the Resolve
Description Strings and Resolve Property Strings check boxes in the
General tab, the status messages would resolve more quickly but would
leave empty quotation marks in the variable positions, rendering the
messages not especially helpful to the SMS administrator.
The Columns Tab
The Columns tab of the Status Viewer Options dialog box, shown in Figure 11,
enables you to customize the information displayed in the Status
Message Viewer by adding columns to view thread and process IDs or by
removing columns that might not be of interest.
The Export Tab
By
default, status messages are deleted after seven days, but you can
adjust this setting to suit your needs. Because some components can
generate a multitude of messages, you might decide to delete messages
more frequently to better manage database space. If you need to save or
copy status messages to file for future reference and analysis or to
print them out, the Export tab of the Status View Options dialog box,
shown in Figure 12, provides options for doing so.
The
Exported Details frame lets you specify whether to include all possible
data about a status message or only the data associated with the
displayed columns. Under Information Delimiter, you can identify
whether columns should be exported as tab delimited or comma delimited.
This option is helpful if you expect to import this data into some
other reporting or analysis tool such as Microsoft Excel or Microsoft
Access. The Export Selection frame lets you specify whether to export
only messages that you’ve selected in the viewer or all messages. By
default, every time you choose to copy, print, or save a message, this
Export tab is displayed, allowing you to modify the options before
continuing. If you want the same options to apply to every copy, print,
or save operation, clear the Force Selection Of Export Options For Each
Export check box.
The Font Tab
The Font tab, shown in Figure 13,
enables you to set the typeface, style, and size of the font that will
be used to display messages in the Status Message Viewer. Be careful to
choose something readable. A decorative font might look pretty at
first, but if you’ll be scrutinizing messages for long periods of time,
a poorly chosen font can give you a headache.
Filter Options
Another
neat feature of the Status Message Viewer is the set of filter options,
which let you customize which messages are displayed in the Status
Message Viewer. If you’ve used the filter options in the Windows Event
Viewer, these filter options will be familiar. To set the filter
options, choose Filter from the View menu to display the Filter Status
Messages dialog box, as shown in Figure 14, or click the Filter icon from the tool bar (the one that looks like a funnel).
You can filter messages based on any status message detail. Figure 14
shows a filter that displays error messages of any type (milestone,
detail, and audit) for site S00 and generated by the component SMS Site
Backup on site system SQL1. Click the Advanced button to display the
Advanced Filter Options dialog box, where you can also specify
filtering based on Process ID and Thread ID, message properties, and a
range of time.
