FRESHPANGOLIN

Monitoring your
Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Infrastructure with
System Center
Operations Manager

2009

By Edwin Senjobe Ssentoogo

System Centre Operations Manager 2007 in a Dynamics CRM 4.0 Infrastructure
ESS

Monitoring your Microsoft

Dynamics CRM Infrastructure
with System Center Operations Manager
2007

Prepared for
Dynamicsbase

Prepared by
Edwin Senjobe Ssentoogo
Director: Freshpangolin Ltd

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System Centre Operations Manager 2007 in a Dynamics CRM 4.0 Infrastructure
ESS
Introduction
For any organisation, Systems Availability is crucial to the business and business
continuity. Because of the nature and complexity of a CRM Architecture, it is vital to
understand the current state of its various components and computers. The entire CRM
Architecture can be centrally managed and monitored using System Center Operations
Manager 2007 (SCOM), a Dynamic Systems Initiative from Microsoft to help support
and be more effective and efficient, thereby saving time and money. The use of SCOM
takes guess work out of the support equation, by identifying the root cause of an issue
and providing the appropriate solution. As a predictive product it also provides alerts
on unforeseen potential problems, enabling proactive support. In this document we
discuss the use of SCOM to manage and monitor the CRM architecture comprising of
Windows 2003 server, Microsoft SQL Server 2005 or 2008, Microsoft Exchange Server
2003 or 2007, Microsoft Internet Information Server IIS 6 and 7, BizTalk Server 2006,
Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0, Windows XP, 2000, Vista, Microsoft Office 2007 and
custom .Net applications

SCOM alerts are based on real world problems and solutions developed by domain
experts and Windows error reporting is linked to latest resolution knowledge. For
illustration purposes the diagram below shows the Asynchronous Service Architecture,
a small part of the CRM 4.0 Architecture. The Asynchronous architecture is monitored
in the SCOM deployment for CRM 4.0.

Figure 1 Asynchronous Service Architecture

© 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

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System Centre Operations Manager 2007 in a Dynamics CRM 4.0 Infrastructure
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SCOM Solution for a Dynamics CRM 4.0 Architecture
Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 architecture can be complex, depending on deployment.
To ensure that all the CRM 4.0 components are functioning properly requires a robust
support infrastructure. Microsoft System Center Operations Manager is a software
solution that meets the need for end-to-end service monitoring in the
enterprise. Deploying SCOM is key to effective support for any organisation that values
its technology investment, and takes systems availability and uptime seriously.

SCOM components
Operational Database consists of operational data and configuration data for a
management group. A Root Management Server is used for configuration management.
Management Agents discover, collect, analyse and manage servers’ and clients’ alerts so
as to resolve issues and can also wake failed systems. A Reporting Server provides
reports for the management group and is displayed in the SCOM console.

Agentless Exception Monitoring extends monitoring to operating systems and

applications. It configures error-reporting clients to redirect their reports to the
management server providing information on failure and available solutions. An Audit
Collector, found on the management server, provides information on security of
managed computers from audit enabled agents. In DMZ configurations, a Gateway
Server can be used for agents beyond a firewall or found in Non Trusted Domains.

Deploying SCOM
To setup SCOM OpmMgr and RMS databases, SCOM is deployed on a MS SQL Server
where the Action, SDK and Service Accounts are specified. A webconsole is deployed
specifying the SQL instance, the database name and SQL Listening port, plus provide
relevant accounts. With installation complete, an Administrator has to logon to the
SCOM server to complete the setup by configuring Discovery and select the managed
objects in addition to configuring computers and devices to manage, and importing
management packs1.

Operations Manager 2007 Reporting is setup by installing the data reporting data
warehouse and reporting server for reports and dashboards. It is recommended to
install the Data Warehouse and Reporting Server on separate servers. A SQL Server
Instance is used for the Audit Collection Service and Audit Collection Database setup
and enablement.

1
Refer to MOM 2005 Conversion for Dynamics CRM 4.0

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SCOM Monitoring
A SCOM Monitor looks at different application aspects, known as Object Types,
consisting of system devices or services with one of three operational states: healthy,
warning or failure. A Distributed Application Designer is built on Service Oriented
Monitoring and is easy to configure using a graphic designer. It can also be used to
monitor ports and IP addresses of given systems. It also handles Line of Business
Applications.

Roles have to be created to manage the SCOM system. Roles are integrated with Active
Directory and they can manage tasks authorised for specified roles.

Notifications can be delivered individually via Email, Pager, Instant Messaging, Session
Initiation Protocol, Short Message Service support (SMS) and SMTP via the Notification
Device Wizard.

SCOM can be integrated with AD for Security Discovery and Agent Management
enabling agent deployment and configuration automatically. The SCOM Discovery
Wizard feature uses LDAP identify devices in the Directory to manage agents
automatically. The MOMADAdmin tool is used to integrate with AD by creating an
admin access point with the ability to specify exclusions through the ADSI Edit2 tool.

To setup Agentless Exception Monitoring, requires configuring the Customer

Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) and Error alert routing, transmission settings
(through HTTP/S or with SSL with authentication preferences) and Error Crash
Behaviour. These alerts can be forwarded to Microsoft and Microsoft will provide
available information to solve the issue or in crash cases Microsoft will investigate the
issue further.

2
Active Directory® Service Interfaces Editor (ADSI Edit) is a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) editor used to manage objects and attributes in
Active Directory. It provides a view of every object and attribute in an Active Directory forest and is used to query, view, and edit attributes that are not exposed
through other Active Directory Microsoft Management Console (MMC) snap-ins.

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System Centre Operations Manager 2007 in a Dynamics CRM 4.0 Infrastructure
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SCOM Management Features
Through the monitoring space, administrators are able to see in Real-Time the state of
systems and or services. Through the health explorer administrators can see the events
that are not healthy and can then take corrective action to fix the problem using
diagnostics and recovery features found in the management packs. Administrators can
work with reports, creating reports for customers etc. and report on planned and
unplanned operations and much more. Reports can also be specific, providing
information on specific issues.

SCOM 2007 has an excellent and customisable knowledgebase known as Company

Knowledge. This knowledgebase is an invaluable resource that provides information on
root causes of issues and how they can be resolved. The Company Knowledge is
editable, allowing for the addition of company related issues and how they have been
resolved.

Company Knowledge is used to capture the steps required to resolve an alert in an

OpsMgr installation. When paired with the Product knowledge (which provides
application developers knowledge on the causes and suggested resolution steps for an
alert), the two help any operator with the best steps they can take to resolve an alert.
Product Knowledge is embedded in a rule or monitor.

The power of SCOM lies in the End-to-End visibility of the health and performance of
the CRM architecture. This powerful feature empowers support staff to have a complete
view of their supported environment, with access to easily accessed information on how
to resolve issues affecting their CRM environment in case of an IT issue. They are
empowered to take proactive action regarding issues before users can start calling or
before systems actually fail, ensuring short Mean Time To Identify (MTTI) and Mean
Time to Repair (MTR).

Organisations that have successfully

deployed System Center Operations
Manager 2007 testify to the ability to
provide efficient support and
avoiding time wasting extensive
manual investigations that can give
support a bad name. Many have
deployed SCOM and integrated it
with their Helpdesk systems. This
integration facilitates the automatic
generation of tickets or calls, leading
Figure 2 SCOM monitoring in a CRM Architecture
to a significant reduction in waste of

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System Centre Operations Manager 2007 in a Dynamics CRM 4.0 Infrastructure
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support staff effort used to manually create, update and manage tickets or support
Calls.

A Microsoft Dynamics CRM (Customer Relationship Management) 4.0 system is built

on a three tier Enterprise Architecture consisting of; Client, Application and Data.
SCOM is able to monitor the health and performance of these systems and their
applications, easily providing service level monitoring that allows the support team to
meet their operational level agreements. Because CRM can be web-enabled, SCOM has
the capability to monitor several URLs at any one time and provide real-time data on
connectivity status.

Note
SCOM has the capability to monitor non Microsoft technology through Operations
Manager Connector Framework. It does this through the bi-directional synchronised
partner connector solutions that connects to the third party management packs.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 Management Pack

At the time of writing, there is no SCOM Management Pack for Microsoft Dynamics
CRM 4.0. However, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 can be managed using SCOM, by
converting the MOM 2005 Management Pack for CRM3. This particular management
pack monitors the CRM Architecture including:
1. CRM Asynchronous Processing services.
2. World Wide Web Publishing
3. Microsoft Dynamics CRM Deletion Service
4. Microsoft Dynamics CRM databases

Deploying SCOM 2007 provides

support staff with an easy-to-use
monitoring environment to
monitor corporate servers,
applications, and clients. This
coverage gives staff a full view of
the organisation’s systems,
something that allows support
staff to provide pro-active
solutions to issues before they
happen, enabling them to
proactively maintain and reduce
resolution times for any issues that
may affect overall availability and
performance of the CRM system. Figure 3 Dynamics CRM 4.0 Architecture
© 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

3
An additional step is required in SCOM 2007 for backward compatibility.

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System Centre Operations Manager 2007 in a Dynamics CRM 4.0 Infrastructure
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Within SCOM, Role assignment can be aligned with the IT support levels, to reflect the
line of support. This allows for issues that are complex to be escalated and handled by
competent staff, while enabling junior staff to learn through the use of the Company
Knowledge knowledgebase.

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