Best Practices For OrchestratorPete Zerger, MVP Principal ConsultantInfront Consulting Grouphttp://systemcentercentral.com

SD-B317

Anders Bengtsson Senior Premier Field EngineerMicrosofthttp://contoso.se

Share with you experience gained in the field working with Orchestrator. Session focus on general runbook authoring.

System Center 2012 Orchestrator Unleashed

Coming Summer 2013!

Agenda

Best Practices for runbook automation Design and Planning

Runbook PlanningRunbook Design Runbook Development

OperationsMonitoring and Operations Establishing Role-Base Security

Please hold questions until the end of the session

We will also be at the Speaker Q & A @ 6-7:30 by the Serverquarium

Planning

Develop an Runbook Automation Wish List Which processes are the most time-consuming?Where are service levels suffering the most?Which problems recur most frequently?Which are most expensive for the company?Which process failures are visible to customers?

There are several questions that should be answered before authoring begins: Is Orchestrator the right tool for this task?Is it technically feasible?Development cost and effort? Time to recoup investmentWhat ports and permissions will this use?

Closing the loop with ITSM integration

Identify Best Candidate Processes for RBA

Runbook Automation Reality Funnel

Best candidates for runbook automation

Recovery Tasks

Incident Remediat

ion

User Provisioni

ngFrequency of Use

Automation Effort

Exceptions / Variance

Automate “manual” task• 1 time every month• Takes 20 minutes to do • 1 week to build runbook

Scenario 1 – Basic Task Automation

20 minutes x 12 months = 4 hours per year40 hours / 4 hours = 10 years

Automate “Service Stopped” alerts• 1 alert every day• 1st line receives and forward (5 mins)• 2nd line RDP and fix (15 mins)• 1 week to build runbook

Scenario 2 – Incident Remediation

20 minutes x 365 days = 121 hours per year1 week = 40 hours40 hours / 20 minutes = 120 days = 4 months

Invent “Skynet”The runbook will first monitor this system for new objects, then it will… and if it is like that it will… then it will integrate with… and pass data into… …We don’t think it will take more than 14-18 months to build the solution. …By the way, we have never used Orchestrator before

Scenario 3 – Customer Request

Developers at Contoso often need to test new software versions.

This is a time consuming process both for developers and the IT department.

Contoso needs to automate this process.

Runbook Design

Create Web Service“drag-drop-done version”Anders Bengtsson

General rulesRename activities and linksRe-color links

SuccessWarning / Critical”Could be”

Folder and runbook structureNaming conventionVariables and hard coded values brings challengesFrom left to right

Create Web Servicev 1.02Anders Bengtsson

Fault toleranceInfrastructure level

Runbook level

Design to support failover and handle all result

Fault tolerance for ”monitoring” activities

Runbook failoverv 1.05Anders Bengtsson

Logging

You need…a process specific log…a technical log

Don’t …use logfiles…use SEND PLATFORM EVENT…enable activity specific logging

Runbook logging

Anders Bengtsson

Action Request

Collect Validate Record Execute

If you integrate your runbooks in Service Manger, you get the first four for free!

Runbook failoverService Manager IntegrationAnders Bengtsson

Operation

Runbook and Orchestrator monitoringOperations Manager management pack

Infrastructure and rolesServicesEvents

Custom management pack for runbook monitoring

Job historyQueueReal time job dashboard

Orchestrator Dashboard

Permissions

ProductionProductionPre-production

Sandbox Test

Test Sandbox

Import and ExportPromoting Runbooks to Production

ADproduction

Pre-production

Sandbox

Test

TestSandbo

x

Exchangeproduction

VMproduction

Import and ExportSeparate Management Group per Support Unit

Start smallPlan BEFORE you startIntegrate with Service Manager

Session Summary

Anders Bengtssonandersbe@Microsoft.comwww.contoso.se

Pete Zergerpete.zerger@infrontconsulting.comwww.systemcentercentral.se

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