Dell Foglight™ for SQL Server 5.7.5.10
Developed for Foglight Management Server 5.7.5
Release Notes
April 2016
Welcome to Foglight for SQL Server
Resolved Issues and Enhancements
These Release Notes cover the resolved issues, known issues, workarounds and other important information about the 5.7.5.10 release of Foglight for SQL Server. Review all sections before starting installation.
Version 5.7.5.10 contains the following new features and updates:
Full Monitoring coverage and analysis for the entire Microsoft’s BI stack:
Other features
For a list of issues fixed in this release, see the issues listed in Resolved Issues.
The following is a list of issues addressed and enhancements implemented in this release.
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-15550 | Unavailable database alarm is fired on a secondary log shipping database |
| SSDB-15549 | Always on listener is not online if wrongfully fired |
| SSDB-15548 | Quick view does not identify secondary log shipping instances |
| SSDB-15433 | Re-categorize sql server events as idleSSDB- |
| SSDB-15427 | Add database name to alarm DBSS - Long Lock Running |
| SSDB-15426 | Executions metric unit is incorrect |
| SSDB-15258 | DBSS - Connection Time message is confusing |
| SSDB-15232 | Connection time should ignore unrelated hold ups |
| SSDB-15079 | Purged PI change tracking alert produce a failure when preparing FglAM's agents data in GA or Migration |
| SSDB-15051 | Adding Changes on any system devices |
| SSDB-14968 | 'Enabling SOL PI' progress appear even though there isn't PI. |
| SSDB-14881 | Error: Instance is already monitored |
| SSDB-14642 | No OS data - Hanged WMI queries |
| SSDB-14548 | Added the job duration to the Long Running Job alarm |
| SSDB-14472 | Blocking History - Fixed export to file |
| SSDB-14461 | HADR Cluster - sometime cluster tree does not display data |
| SSDB-14390 | “Tune SQL” downloads a wrong tuning file and open the Optimizer for Oracle instead of the SQL Server Optimizer |
| SSDB-14358 | Custom dashboard for sessions table |
| SSDB-14333 | SQL PI - Statement list show query hash instead of text |
| SSDB-14300 | SQL PI - Add a new custom dashboard that show the wait events. |
| SSDB-14293 | Unify Long Lock Running alarm configuration with PI or without |
| SSDB-14245 | SQL PI - Add ability to copy sql statement text |
| SSDB-14224 | The Installer failed when the default FglAM does not have the minimum required version |
| SSDB-14205 | Support monitoring for non default Replication distribution DB |
| SSDB-14174 | SQL PI - Improve the sensitivity of "SQL PI Experiencing Errors" alarm |
| SSDB-14157 | Change default encryption method to 'No Encryption' |
| SSDB-14151 | SQL PI Change Tracking - Adding changes on any system devices |
| SSDB-14142 | SQL PI - Add batch execution count |
| SSDB-14112 | DBSS-Disk Percentage Used alarm has been replaced by IC alarm |
| SSDB-14097 | Connection validation fails when @@SERVERNAME does not contain the instance name |
| SSDB-13272 | Ignore monitoring of deleted objects |
| SSDB-13265 | Added include/exclude configuration of the following alarms: Job Failed, Long Job Running, Days Since Last Backup |
The following is a list of issues resolved in patches issued for the previous release. These issues are also fixed in this release.
The following is a list of issues resolved in this patch.
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-14797 | Prevent alarm rules from being deployed to the FMS federator |
| SSDB-14684 | Fix the metric 'total transactions' in the database info summary report |
| SSDB-14648 | SQL PI Repository Security - Authentication level should not support empty password |
| SSDB-13867 | Changing the Availability Listeners collection to cope listeners with more than one IP address |
| SSDB-12340 | Support German collation for the SQL Server Reporting Services monitoring |
The following is a list of issues resolved in this patch.
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-14489 | Change the ‘Error Log’ monitoring to be based on OS collection by default |
| SSDB-14470 | Prevent potential wrong links between the monitoring agents and the SQL PI repository |
| SSDB-14460 | HADR Cluster – Resolve missing data |
| SSDB-14413 | Revised SQL PI Administration screen |
| SSDB-14370 | Revised SQL PI Installation wizard |
|
SSDB-14301 |
Resolve wrong reported durations of CPU_usage, Active_time and wait_time |
The following is a list of issues resolved in this patch.
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-14489 | Change the ‘Error Log’ monitoring to be based on OS collection by default |
| SSDB-14470 | Prevent potential wrong links between the monitoring agents and the SQL PI repository |
| SSDB-14460 | HADR Cluster – Resolve missing data |
| SSDB-14413 | Revised SQL PI Administration screen |
| SSDB-14370 | Revised SQL PI Installation wizard |
|
SSDB-14301 |
Resolve wrong reported durations of CPU_usage, Active_time and wait_time |
The following is a list of issues resolved in this patch.
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-14052 | In Memory databases doesn't return information when the number of databases is high |
| SSDB-13849 | Supports long FglAM names through the installation wizard |
| SSDB-13809 | Prevent SQL agents topology duplication |
| SSDB-13772 | Enterprise Disk Storage is now replaced by two reports: Top Disk Space Usage: Shows top instances (By size) and enables filtering their displayed disks by available free space (% or MB). Disk Space Usage: Shows the disk usage by an instance |
| SSDB-13751, SSDB-13747, SSDB-13594 | Reduce the log files to the minimum required |
| SSDB-13558 | Degree of Parallelism – Metric units changed to 'Threads' |
| SSDB-13604 | Protect against false CPU utilization reported on SQL Server of version 2008 (due to Microsoft's case number 115020112345243) |
| SSDB-13899 | Prevent SQL agents topology duplications |
Database Administration Dashboard
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-13400 | Add description to all alarms |
| SSDB-14046 | Default Email have been revised to check the minimal severity |
Rules
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-14075 | Rule DBSS - File Group Utilization has been tuned |
| SSDB-14019 | Rule "DBSS - Long Running Job' have been tuned |
| SSDB-13935 | Rule "DBSS - Days Since Last Backup" has been tuned |
Collections
|
Defect ID |
Resolved Issue |
| SSDB-13897, SSDB-13638 |
The Blocking collection has been revised in order to handle Lock request time out period and multiple lock types |
| SSSDB-13867 | HADR - Always on collection have been revised to handle listeners with multiple IP's |
| SSSDB-13848 | SPI collections now supports Case Sensitive instances |
| SSSDB-13216 | Added protection to Agent Job List collection when job duration is negative (Due to time change) |
| SSSDB-13621 | Error log collection has been revised due to Microsoft bug SR Number: 115020112345243 |
The following is a list of issues known to exist at the time of this release.
| Defect ID | Known Issue |
| n/a | Monitoring Analysis services is supported only on Agent Managers running on Windows which must have a version of .NET 3.5 or higher installed. |
| n/a |
If the WMI exception "Format specifier '%s' " is entered in agent log the following workarounds are recommended:
|
| SSDB-15192 | SQL BI - Reporting services, integration services and Analysis services are not supported on cluster configuration. |
| n/a |
In cases when Foglight or the Agent Manager are installed on a VM the following need to be reserved:
|
| SSDB-14323 |
The SQL Server Error log collection requires you to use WinShell. Follow the instructions below to configure the correct settings: |
| SSDB-13479 | In environments configured to use Agent Manager in High Availability mode the chosen Agent Manager hosting the SQL PI repository will host watchdog and maintenance agents that cannot participate in the Agent Manager high availability utility. |
| SSDB-13199 | Selecting a batch text in the lock tree may navigate to a non-equal batch in the TSQL Batches dimension. |
| SSDB-9277 | In SQL Server 2012, when a database is part of an availability group and is currently accessible for connections, when the application intent is set to read only, several collections will fail. |
| SSDB-9138 | Cluster data can be collected only if the xp_cmdshell parameter is configured. To configure this parameter, run the following commands: EXEC sp_configure ‘show advanced options’,1 GO --To update the currently configured value for advanced options. RECONFIGURE GO —- To enable the feature. EXEC sp_configure ‘xp_cmdshell’, 1 GO —- To update the currently configured value for this feature. RECONFIGURE GO |
| SSDB-8987, SSDB-7326 | On Microsoft Windows 2008 R2, a SQL Server version 2012 instance with a name that contains inverted commas (''; (for example:'X641_ENT1') can encounter issues with the retrieval of WMI data. This is by design on the part of Microsoft. Workaround: If WMI data is not retrieved, the instance name without the '' should be added in the field Service Name in the Agent Properties dashboard |
| SSDB-8949 | When editing the properties of the Foglight Agent Manager concentrator (Dashboards > Administration > Agents > Agent Status), the name of the Foglight Agent Managers should be entered in the Downstream FglAMs section exactly as they appear in the topology, under Home > Agents > All agents > <Agent name> > RMI data > Fglam host property. |
| SSDB-8826 | A Foglight Agent Manager (FglAM) residing on a Linux/UNIX machine cannot use Windows Remote Management (WinRM) to establish a connection with a Windows server. Connection using WinRM can only be carried out by a Foglight Agent Manager (FglAM) residing on a Windows machine. |
| SSDB-8388 | In an environment that includes a Foglight Agent Manager concentrator, when upgrading the environment where the concentrator does not contain any regular agents, the concentrator is not upgraded. Therefore, after the upgrade process takes place the Foglight Agent Manager concentrator has to be deployed manually. |
| SSDB-7866 | When running the agent installation wizard on a monitored host whose OS version is Windows 2008 R2, the OS validation fails. Workaround: review the following knowledge base article: https://support.quest.com/kb/SOL63439 |
| SSDB-7241, WCF-12907 | Currently users can create a recursive service, which calls itself and thereby causes an endless loop. If a user creates such a service the Databases dashboard will not be displayed. |
| SSDB-7090 | Reuse and copy of user-defined collections is only possible for collections that were created after the 5.6.4 version of the product was installed. |
| SSDB-7059 | The reports wizard contains multiple "all reports" tabs. Each tab is for a different database type. |
| SSDB-3045 | In a Federation environment, deleted agents are still displayed in the Global View > Databases table. |
| SSDB-3061 | Changes made in the Global Administrations > Alarms screen are saved when switching to another global administration screen, even if selecting "Yes" in the dialog box that asks whether to exit without saving changes. |
| SSDB-3039 | The DBSS- Deadlock Details alarm is disabled by default. |
| SSDB-2455 | User-defined collection names and fields must be entered in Latin characters (A to Z), without any special symbols. |
| SSDB-2379 | When working with Global View while the screen resolution is set to 1024 by 768 pixels, it is advisable to switch to the browser's full view (F11 toggles between full and normal views in all browsers). |
| SSDB-2060 | On SQL Server 2008, deadlocks on two different databases of the same instance become one chained deadlock. Workaround: Implement trace flag -T1234 |
| SSDB-5248 | Editing a user-defined collection results in periodic overlap of data. |
| SSDB-5542 | Creating a user-defined collection with more than one SQL in it will not alert the user, however, only the first SQL in the collection will be executed. |
| ODB-2984 | In the Global Administration > User-defined Collections screen, it is possible to create two collections that bear the same name with a different capitalization (for example: MyCollection and Mycollection); however, the more recently created collection will not appear in the topology, nor will it be displayed on the User-defined Collections panel. |
| ODB-2829 | When running user-defined collections on dynamic tables, deleted items are still kept in the topology. As a result, the number of rows displayed on the user-defined collections table will exceed the configured value for maximum allowed rows. |
| ODB-1606 | Performing an upgrade process on a large environment (more than 50 agents) takes time to complete. |
| SSDB-10920 | row_count metric is supported from SQL Server version 10.50.2500 and above |
| Defect ID | Known Issue |
| In the Execution Plan comparison popup, the date of the selected plan is the insert time to the SQL PI repository and not the execution time. | |
| SSDB-11283 | Execution plan may not be resolved |
| SSDB-11657 | Time range changes are not effecting the execution plan dashboard. |
| In the Execution Plan Comparison popup for statement - the estimated plan appears only as the selected plan on the left side. It cannot be selected from the list. | |
| SSDB-11582 | Sometimes, query_hash is changed by SQL Server and generating a plan using the Generate button fails. SQLhash isn't found in XML so the screen displays No operation was found and the execution plan changes are missing. |
The following is a list of third party issues known to exist at the time of this release.
| Defect ID | Known Issue |
| n/a |
Anti-Virus Protection tools installed on Windows may negatively impact CPU and system performance of machines running Foglight the Agent Manager and the SQL PI repository.
|
| n/a | WMI-related issue Problem: WMI support is affected by the firewall Workaround: For Windows versions prior to Windows 2008/Vista, use the following steps:
According to Microsoft http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929851, the default dynamic port range for TCP/IP has changed in these versions. The new default start port is 49152 and end port is 65535. Subsequently, monitoring instances that run under these operation systems can be carried out by using either of the following options:
|
| n/a | As a result of the change introduced in Java 6 update 29 to how data is sent to databases, users may experience connection failures when using the Microsoft JDBC Driver for SQL Server to connect to SQL Server. This interoperability enhancement is available in the following SQL Server versions:
|
| n/a | Third Party Limitations Monitoring an SQL Server instance that resides on a Windows 2008R2 requires a workaround as follows:
|
| n/a | Some base values are not updated when using the Win32_PerfRawData_PerfDisk_LogicalDisk WMI class to calculate performance data in Windows Vista or in Windows Server 2008, because this class does not contain the PercentDiskTime_Base metric. Workaround: A hotfix is available on Microsoft site, http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961435/en-us. |
| n/a | Due to a known Microsoft issue (case 114081811709822), on SQL Server instances version 2014 the SQL> text presented may be truncated |
| n/a |
The Windows System Center 2012 Endpoint Protection tool may negatively impact CPU and system performance of machines running Foglight and the Agent Manager. To reduce resource consumption it is highly recommended that you exclude the following directories from being scanned by the tool:
|
| n/a | SQL's and execution plans may not be collected on SQL Server 2014 as a result of a Microsoft bug " "The values of column query_hash and query_plan_hash are NULL for DMV sys.dm_exec_requests in SQL Server 2014" http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2953592 |
| n/a |
The Foglight Time Bar Chart click event does not work with Chrome version 40.x.x.x and 39.x.x.x. https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=428308 |
Workaround for all missing WMI metric cases
In some cases, running the command: %windir%\system32\wbem\wmiadap.exe /f in Windows' command-line (CMD) may solve the problem of missing WMI classes. This command parses all the performance libraries on the system and refreshes the Performance Counter Classes. For further details, see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394528%28VS.85%29.aspx
A direct upgrade to Foglight for SQL Server 5.7.x is only available from version 5.5.8 or later. Customers that are running earlier versions of the product must first upgrade to version 5.5.8 and then upgrade to version 5.7.x.
This release supports a minimum Foglight version 5.6.11 and minimum Agent Manager version 5.7.0.
Before installing Foglight for SQL Server, ensure that your system meets the hardware and software requirements detailed in Foglight System Requirements and Platform Support Guide. Customers running large deployments (more than 50 instances) should consult the Foglight for Databases Deployment Guide.
Notes:
| Operating System/ SQL Server Version |
SQL Server 2000 | SQL Server 2005 | SQL Server 2008 | SQL Server 2008 R2 | SQL Server 2012 | SQL Server 2014 |
| 32-bit | ||||||
| Windows Server 2003 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | |||
| Windows Server 2008 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | |
| 64-bit | ||||||
| Windows Server 2003 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | |||
| Windows Server 2008 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | |||
| Windows Server 2008 R2 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | |
| Windows Server 2012 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | ||
| Windows Server 2012 R2 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | ||
| Windows 7 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | ||
| Windows 8 | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | √, SQL PI | ||
Notes:
Support for Microsoft® Internet Explorer® 8, 9, and 10 will be discontinued as of the next Foglight release.
Microsoft ended the support for these browsers on January 12, 2016. For more information, visit https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle?p1=13418.
These versions of Internet Explorer are supported in this release, as documented in the Foglight System Requirements and Platform Support Guide.
This section provides a list of references which address the most commonly faced issues relating to remote connectivity, allowing for easy troubleshooting using the vendor's information knowledgebase:
Foglight includes a licensing capability that restricts access to those features that are defined in the license. Any Management Server installation requires a license that grants access to server-specific parts of the browser interface and the features associated with them. Foglight cartridges are also license-protected. While some cartridges are covered by the base Foglight license (such as Foglight Agent Manager cartridges and the Foglight for Infrastructure), others may require an additional license.
Foglight for SQL Server is covered by the base Foglight license that allows cartridges to be installed. The SQL Performance Investigator extension requires a dedicated license.
To activate a trial or a purchased commercial license:
The Foglight for SQL Server release package contains the following:
Refer to the Managing SQL Server Database Systems User and Administration Guide for installation instructions, available at http://documents.quest.com/foglight-for-sql-server-cartridge/5.7.5.10/user-guide/.
Determine your environment hardware requirements using the Deployment Guide, available at http://documents.quest.com/foglight-for-sql-server-cartridge/5.7.5.10/deployment-guide/.
Get the latest product information, find helpful resources, test the product betas, and join a discussion with the Foglight Dell team and other community members. Join the Foglight Community at http://communities.Dell.com/community/foglight
This section contains information about installing and operating this product in non-English configurations, such as those needed by customers outside of North America. This section does not replace the materials about supported platforms and configurations found elsewhere in the product documentation.
This release is Unicode-enabled and supports any character set. In this release, all product components should be configured to use the same or compatible character encodings and should be installed to use the same locale and regional options. This release is targeted to support operations in the following regions: North America, Western Europe and Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe, Far-East Asia, Japan.
This release has the following known capabilities or limitations: The server will be enabled for Global Operation, but not localized to any particular locale.
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For sales or other inquiries, visit http://quest.com/company/contact-us.aspx or call 1-949-754-8000.
Technical support is available to customers who have purchased Dell software with a valid maintenance contract and to customers who have trial versions. To access the Support Portal, go to http://support.quest.com.
The Support Portal provides self-help tools you can use to solve problems quickly and independently, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. In addition, the portal provides direct access to product support engineers through an online Service Request system.
The site enables you to:
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