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Enterprise Reporter 3.5.1 - Configuration Manager User Guide

Product Overview Configuring the Configuration Manager
Starting the Configuration Manager Finding answers and getting help Overview of Enterprise Reporter Communications and Credentials Required Using the Credential Manager Setting Up Your First Collection Computers (Nodes) Modifying Your Deployment Configuring Global Settings Customizing the Configuration Manager View
Understanding Discoveries Creating Discoveries
Step 1. Create the Discovery (Name) Step 2. Choose what to include in your discovery (Scopes) Step 2a. Choose scopes for your on-premises discoveries
Choosing your Active Directory Scopes Choosing your Computer Scopes Choosing Your Exchange Scopes Choosing Your File Storage Analysis Scopes Choosing Your Microsoft SQL Scopes Choosing Your NTFS Scopes Choosing Your Registry Scopes
Step 2b: Choose scopes for your cloud discoveries Step 3. Schedule your Discovery Step 4: Review the summary
Managing Discoveries Troubleshooting Issues with Enterprise Reporter Appendix: PowerShell cmdlets Appendix: Encryption Key Manager Appendix: Log Viewer

NTFS Discovery: Decide what to collect from any computer in the discovery

When you run an NTFS discovery, it is resolved to a list of computers and folders. Folders will be accessed using the share path and you must have read access to the share. Accessing folders using the share path is useful if shares are distributed, as in the case for DFS shares or Net App filers where administrative shares are disabled or not available.

The NTFS object that is being shared (for example a folder) is collected, and will be displayed in the report. For example, folders and files on a share called \\NYC_SVR\TrainingMaterials that is physically located on the computer named NYC_SVR in the path C:\HR\NYC\NewHires\TrainingMaterials would be accessed and displayed as \\NYC_SVR\TrainingMaterials.

For all computers in the discovery, you need to decide the starting point for your collection. This combines with your global scopes and recursion level to determine what folders are collected from each computer in the scope.

You must specify how to collect the information from each computer in the discovery. You can collect all available public shares, collect all available volumes, or collect only the selected shares, folders, and DFS shares. The following table outlines these options.

 

Table 35. NTFS Discovery: How to collect the information from each computer in the discovery
Option
Notes
Performance Cost

Collect all available public shares

The following data is collected:

•
All folders available through public shares on any computer included in the scope, directly or indirectly
•
Explicitly added folders
•
Folders in explicitly added shares, DFS shares, and NetApp filers
•
All globally included folders
•
All folders in globally included shares

Medium

•
Include hidden shares

 

High

Collect all available volumes

All folders on any computer resolved from the scope are collected, unless:

•
they are specifically excluded from the discovery.
•
specific folders or shares are the only objects included on the computer. In this case, the specified folders or the folders in the specified shares are the only data that will be collected.

NOTE: Based on your selected scope, if you are collecting against NAS devices, you have the option to use specified NAS Configurations.

High

Collect only selected shares, folders and DFS shares

This option is displayed when either:

•
both computers and global targets are included in the scope or
•
explicit shares or folders are included in the scope.

When this option is selected, the NTFS discovery will only collect applicable folders and shares without performing the collection of all public shares and volumes.

Medium

The following table outlines the additional information that can be collected during the discovery. Collecting additional information impacts discovery performance. Options with a high performance cost will slow discovery performance more than options with a medium or low performance cost.

 

Table 36. NTFS Discovery: Optionally collect information for the following objects
Option
Notes
Performance Cost

Folder Options

You have options to choose how deep into the tree the discovery will collect data.

 

•
All folder levels

The default is to collect all folder levels, starting from the included scope.

High

•
Folder depth

You can collect just the root level by setting the folder depth to 0.

You can choose the number of levels to collect, starting from the included scope, by setting the folder depth as desired. The root is not counted as a recursion level. If you have an excluded scope within an included scope, no folders below the exclusion are collected. In a very complicated nested set of includes and excludes along the same branch, the recursion level is reset with each includes scope.

Medium

File Options

You have options to choose what file information is collected.

 

•
Collect files and their basic details like size and attributes

 

Medium

•
Collect advanced file metadata such as author and title

Option available if collecting files and their basic details.

Requirement: Microsoft Office must be installed on the Enterprise Reporter node computer.

High

•
Calculate duplicate files within the same computer

Option available if collecting files and their basic details.

High

Permission Options

 

 

•
Collect folder permissions

 

High

•
Collect file permissions

Option available if collecting files and their basic details.

High

•
Only collect and store files which have explicitly granted permissions

Selecting this option reduces the high performance cost of collecting all file permissions

 

•
Calculate permission differences between folders and subfolders (and files)

Collects the permissions that are Added, Modified, and Removed for a file or folder as compared to the parent.

NOTE: Only the DACL and Owner permissions are collected.

High

•
If a group account is found when collecting permissions, recursively collect group members.

You can choose to recursively collect the members of any groups found in the collection of file or folder permissions by selecting this option.

High

Advanced Options

 

 

•
Create a task per share for each computer

A collection task is always created for each computer in an NTFS discovery. Selecting this option will create a task per share for each computer to allow tasks to be load balanced using multiple nodes.

 

The following options further refines how collection tasks are handled. When collecting additional attributes, especially ones with a high performance cost, consider enabling these performance options to help improve collection performance.

 
Table 37. NTFS Discovery: Performance Options
Performance Option
Notes

Folder Options

You have options to choose how deep into the tree the discovery will collect data.

•
All folder levels

The default is to collect all folder levels, starting from the included scope.

•
Folder depth

You can collect just the root level by setting the folder depth to 0.

You can choose the number of levels to collect, starting from the included scope, by setting the folder depth as desired. The root is not counted as a recursion level. If you have an excluded scope within an included scope, no folders below the exclusion are collected. In a very complicated nested set of includes and excludes along the same branch, the recursion level is reset with each includes scope.

Permission Options

 

•
Only collect and store files which have explicitly granted permissions

Selecting this option reduces the high performance cost of collecting all file permissions.

Advanced Options

 

•
Create a task per share for each computer

A collection task is always created for each computer in an NTFS discovery. Selecting this option will create a task per share for each computer to allow tasks to be load balanced using multiple nodes.

The following options determine how target computers are resolved during discoveries.

 
Table 38. Discovery Resolution Options
Option
Notes
Resolution Options

 

Allow a configurable number of seconds for a target computer to respond to a ping request

Pings target computers at collection time to determine the existence of target computers on the network before processing tasks.

Resolve target computers with disjoint namespaces

Verifies the existence of target computers with disjoint namespaces by using their DNS host names and, if that fails, by using their NetBIOS names.

The scopes are now selected and configured. It is a good idea to review your scopes before continuing.

NTFS Discovery: Configure NAS Host Devices

If you have selected to Collect all available volumes for an NTFS discovery and the targets to be collected contain NAS host devices, you must add the configuration and credentials for each NAS host device.

See also:

•
Configuring a NAS Host Device
•
File Storage Analysis Discovery: Configure NAS Host Devices
To configure a NAS host device
1
Select Collect all available volumes.
An additional question is displayed, “Based on your selected scope, if you are collecting against NAS devices, do you want to use specified NAS Configurations?”
2
Select Yes.
3
Click Configure your global NAS Configuration.
4
Click Add.
- OR -
Select an existing device and click Edit.
5
Select the appropriate type of device.
6
Enter the Host IP address.
For FluidFS targets, enter the IP address of the computer where Enterprise Manager is installed.
7
Enter the Host port number.
8
Click the ellipsis (...) to use the Credential Manager to enter and select the credentials required to access this device. For more information, see Using the Credential Manager .
9
Click OK to close the Credential Manager.
10
Click OK to close the NAS Configuration details.
11
Click Close to close the NAS Host Device Manager.
To delete a NAS host device
1
Select Collect all available volumes.
An additional question is displayed, “Based on your selected scope, if you are collecting against NAS devices, do you want to use specified NAS Configurations?”
2
Select Yes.
3
Click Configure your global NAS Configuration.
4
Select an existing device and click Delete.
5
Click Yes to confirm the deletion.
6
Click Close to close the NAS Host Device Manager.

NTFS Discovery: Configure your file collection

You can decide what files, if any, to collect from the folders you targeted. You can use both wildcards and regular expressions to include or exclude groups of files. These are applied to every scope in the discovery. Both explicit and inherited permissions are collected for all files included in the discovery.

To collect all files
•
Click Collect files and their basic details like size and attributes.
Include *.* appears in the list.
To use wildcards to include or exclude files
1
Ensure that Using wildcards is selected. If necessary, click to change.
2
Type in the desired pattern using the acceptable wildcards.
Use * to replace any number of characters, and ? to replace a single character.
3
Click Include or Exclude.
Your file pattern appears on the list, replacing *.*.
You can press Enter to add to your list. Enter functions as the last button you clicked—for example, if you have just clicked Include, Enter includes your file pattern.
To use regular expressions to include or exclude files
1
Ensure you Using Regex is selected. If necessary, click to change.
* 
NOTE: Below the input box for Include/Exclude the option Using wildcards (click to change) or Using regex (click to change) is displayed in light blue. Click this option to change the expression type.
2
Type in the desired expression, using Microsoft® .NET Framework or Perl® 5 syntax.
For more information, search Microsoft.com for Microsoft® .NET Framework regular expressions.
3
Click Include or Exclude.
To remove a file pattern
1
Select the file pattern on the list.
2
Click Remove.
To collect file permission data
1
Select File Options | Collect files and their basic details like size and attributes.
2
Select Permission Options | Collect file permissions.
3
To refine your collection of files, select Only collect and store files which have explicitly granted permissions.
This option may shorten the time your discovery takes to run.
* 
NOTE: If you select Only collect and store files which have explicitly granted permissions, files that only have inherited permissions are ignored when you run the discovery. These files will not be available to reporting users.
* 
NOTE: To collect the members of all groups included in the file permissions, make sure If a group is found when collecting permissions, recursively collect group members is selected on the Scopes page.
* 
NOTE: Only the DACL and Owner permissions are collected.
To collect duplicate file information
1
Select File Options | Collect files and their basic details like size and attributes.
2
Select File Options | Calculate duplicate files within the same computer.
* 
NOTE: Enabling this option locates duplicate files per computer within a single discovery by performing CRC checks to compare files that have both the same name and the same size. Collecting duplicate file information increases the discovery time.
To collect file details
1
Select File Options | Collect files and their basic details like size and attributes.
1
Select File Options | Collect advanced file metadata such as author and title.

Choosing Your Registry Scopes

Registry scopes determine what information will be collected when you run the discovery. There are several steps you should take to properly design your discovery.

See also:

•
Registry Discovery: Include scopes
•
Registry Discovery: Optionally refine your scope list with exclusions
•
Registry Discovery: Select your global scopes
•
Registry Discovery: Decide what to collect from any computer
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