SyStemS management

DELL POWER SOLUTIONS | November 20081 Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, November 2008. Copyright © 2008 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Enterprise IT environments often combine

complex systems and shrinking budgets for

IT management with requirements for high

levels of availability and rapid problem resolution,

presenting myriad challenges to administrators. IT

departments have traditionally relied on a variety of

tools to help resolve problems, but gathering relevant

information from different sources can be time-

consuming even before troubleshooting begins.

The Dell System E-support Tool (DSET) is a proac-

tive server management tool that includes diagnos-

tics and troubleshooting capabilities to help IT

administrators verify server installations, troubleshoot

problems, and perform repair validation. It offers a

lightweight, nonintrusive, stand-alone troubleshoot-

ing application for discovering and collecting hard-

ware, software, and firmware information from

supported Dell PowerEdge servers and their attached

storage components. IT managers and support tech-

nicians can use the information that DSET collects to

view details about current system configurations and

help troubleshoot problems quickly and accurately.

DSET is designed to quickly provide information

on more than 600 attributes of supported PowerEdge

servers, then generate an approximately 1 MB report

that can be compressed in a .zip file and e-mailed to

Dell Technical Support or an internal support techni-

cian to help streamline troubleshooting or determine

how a maintenance process can optimize a PowerEdge

server. DSET also offers a Web browser–based

graphical user interface (GUI) for viewing the report

and several additional features to help simplify sys-

tems management tasks.

The DSET application itself is a compact 19 MB, and

can be executed without being permanently installed.

In addition, DSET is designed for enhanced memory

management through Python, low memory and proces-

sor utilization, enhanced security that makes the tool

executable only by administrators and allows reports

to be compressed and encrypted in a password-

protected file, simple report creation through its run-

once mode, zero footprint after report creation, flexible

GUI and command-line interface (CLI) support, and

data collection from a VMware® service console.

ComprehenSive reporting featureSAccess to the current configuration information avail-

able at the time of a service call helps streamline the

troubleshooting process. Support technicians can use

DSET to obtain configuration information for Dell

PowerEdge servers when they need it (for an example

scenario, see the “How DSET helps streamline trou-

bleshooting a drive failure” sidebar in this article).

DSET provides several comprehensive features that

fit broadly into one of three categories:

Connected device data enumeration:■■ Can inventory

data related to the hardware and installed software

Log collection:■■ Collects events and their time

stamps from a variety of logs—including hardware,

By automating and consolidating hardware, software, and firmware information into a single comprehensive report, the Dell™ System E-support Tool can help stream-line troubleshooting and accelerate problem resolution for environments using Dell PowerEdge™ servers.

By Shruthi Jayatheertha

Lokesh S. Balu

Ajaykumar C. H.

Streamlined troubleShooting with the dell SyStem e-Support tool

Related Categories:

Dell PowerEdge servers

Diagnostics

Systems management

Troubleshooting

Visit DELL.COM/PowerSolutions

for the complete category index.

2DELL.COM/PowerSolutionsReprinted from Dell Power Solutions, November 2008. Copyright © 2008 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

software, application, and system event

logs—and enables administrators to

clear system events

User interface:■■ Displays collected

information and includes a varied set

of commands to provide detailed

snapshots of systems

Connected device data enumerationDSET can enumerate hardware and con-

nected devices, fetch current system status,

and interact with various modules to take a

snapshot of the server. The inventory

collector launches an appropriate module,

collects the required data from it, and then

displays it in a convenient GUI. DSET can

interact with the following modules:

System Management BIOS (SMBIOS): ■■

DSET can interact with the SMBIOS to

provide a system summary page that

lists important attributes such as OS

details, system name, and Dell service

tag along with their values.

Dell OpenManage■■ ™ Server Administrator

(OMSA): DSET can interact with the

OMSA systems management applica-

tion to gather information from the

underlying hardware, including infor-

mation on the BIOS, baseboard man-

agement controller (BMC), processors,

firmware, front panel, field replace-

able units (FRUs), memory, network,

ports, slots, temperatures, and volt-

ages. In addition to collecting the

current status of a component, DSET

can also report values of some hard-

ware component parameters—for

example, for processors, it can report

One way to evaluate the functionality of the Dell System E-support Tool

(DSET) as a service support tool is to compare the process for resolving a

RAID hard disk drive failure—a typical troubleshooting task in enterprise

environments—without using DSET with the process for resolving a similar

failure using DSET. These hypothetical example scenarios help illustrate how

DSET can streamline troubleshooting in enterprise environments.

Resolving a RaiD DRive failuRe without Dset

In this example scenario, a RAID drive at a Dell-supported organization goes

offline, and Dell OpenManage IT Assistant produces an alert indicating a

problem. The following troubleshooting process without DSET could require

up to eight hours to complete:

1. The IT manager researches the problem and dispatches an internal

technician.

2. The technician reseats the drive, but the rebuild fails.

3. The IT manager calls Dell Technical Support.

4. Dell Technical Support follows the dispatch ticket to take the failed

drive offline, guiding the technician through troubleshooting procedures

that may include several reboots and attempts at running diagnostics.

The server is out of service during this process.

5. Dell Technical Support determines that the drive is faulty and uses the

information shown on the As Shipped Configuration screen to dispatch

a replacement drive along with a backplane (requiring a Dell service

provider) because the technician cannot authorize moving the replace-

ment drive to another slot.

6. The requested parts and Dell service provider arrive on-site.

7. Because the organization had upgraded to a drive with higher per-

formance and higher capacity than the originally installed drive, the

replacement drive is an incorrect model. The Dell service provider

replaces the backplane to confirm that the replacement drive is

needed, which could require up to 20 minutes of downtime and an

additional 10 minutes of involvement with the internal technician.

8. The Dell service provider calls Dell Technical Support, and a correct

replacement drive is dispatched. The Dell service provider remains

on-site until the drive arrives, which requires another dispatch ticket to

cover the extended time on-site.

9. The Dell service provider replaces the drive, and the rebuild proceeds

successfully to bring the system back into full operation.

Resolving a RaiD DRive failuRe with Dset

In this similar example scenario, a RAID drive at a Dell-supported orga-

nization goes offline, and Dell OpenManage IT Assistant produces an

alert indicating a problem. The following troubleshooting process with

DSET would typically require no more than four hours to complete and

no server downtime:

1. The IT manager researches the problem, runs DSET, and determines

that the drive has failed because of an unrecoverable error. Based

on the specific Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology

(SMART) error DSET captures, the manager determines that the failed

drive must be replaced.

2. The IT manager contacts Dell Technical Support, reports the problem,

and sends the DSET report in an e-mail message.

3. Dell Technical Support verifies the details of the problem and the drive

specifications in the DSET report, then dispatches a replacement drive.

4. The IT manager responds by e-mail that its internal technician can

replace the drive without requiring a Dell service provider.

5. The drive arrives on-site, and the IT manager dispatches an internal

technician to replace the failed drive.

6. The technician replaces the drive, and the rebuild proceeds successfully

to bring the system back to full operation.

how dSet helpS Streamline troubleShooting a drive failure

SyStemS management

DELL POWER SOLUTIONS | November 20083 Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, November 2008. Copyright © 2008 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

the connector name, manufacturer,

family, version, and current speed. The

OMSA component can report informa-

tion related to Dell Remote Access

Controllers (DRACs), Dell PowerVault™

storage, and other connected storage

devices.

Dell PowerEdge Diagnostics:■■ DSET

can use Dell PowerEdge Diagnostics

libraries to collect information for

selected IDE, Serial ATA (SATA), and

tape devices connected to a system.

Third-party tools: ■■ DSET can also work

with other third-party tools to collect

system-related information, including

the netstat command-line tool for net-

work-related information; EMC®

PowerPath® and Replication Manager/

SE software for details related to

vendor-specific Fibre Channel host bus

adapter (HBA) controller cards; the

EMC inq utility for information from

connected Fibre Channel HBA control-

ler cards, including their World Wide

Names (WWNs); and native VMware

commands for information related to

guest and host operating systems.

OS information: ■■ DSET can use native

OS commands and application

programming interfaces (APIs) to col-

lect OS-related information. The

msinfo32 command can collect

information for Microsoft® Windows®

operating systems other than the

Windows Server® 2008 OS. For sys-

tems running Windows Server 2008,

DSET can use the Microsoft Win32® API

and the Windows Management

Instrumentation (WMI) utility. For sys-

tems running Linux® operating systems,

DSET can use selected native OS com-

mands to collect software information,

and can refer to relevant files and fold-

ers to gather additional information.

Log collectionAfter collecting logs, DSET displays some

logs in the report GUI and stores the

remainder in report sub-folders. OMSA

can collect the system event log and the

Embedded Server Management (ESM) log

and display them in the GUI. OMSA also

enables administrators to clear the ESM

log at the time of installation or later. After

administrators choose to clear the ESM

log, DSET creates a backup of the existing

log, stores it in a text file on the desktop,

and clears the log.

DSET can also collect information from

a variety of other logs, including those

from OMSA; Dell OpenManage IT Assistant;

Dell PowerVault MD1000 storage (seslog);

Dr. Watson for Windows; remote access

controllers (RACs); Microsoft Windows

(including cluster, event, and system logs);

other applications; Dell Update Packages

and the Dell OpenManage Server Update

Utility; Dell Online Diagnostics; and net-

work interface card teaming.

user interface DSET offers a GUI designed to provide a

convenient way for administrators to

verify the status and values of server attri-

butes. As shown in Figure 1, the GUI

divides this information into three areas:

System (including main chassis informa-

tion), Storage (including OMSA Storage

Management and Dell PowerEdge

Diagnostics information), and Software

(including built-in libraries and APIs). The

information is stored in XML and displayed

in HTML, and the DSET GUI enables

administrators to sort information based

on event source, time, and severity. DSET

supports the latest versions of the

Microsoft Internet Explorer® and Mozilla

Firefox Web browsers.

The left-hand side of the GUI displays

hardware and software information in a

dynamic tree structure, while the right-

hand side displays the corresponding

attributes and values for a selected com-

ponent. The dynamic tree structure is

designed to display only connected hard-

ware as nodes for a specific system. For

example, if no DRAC is installed on a

PowerEdge server, then the DSET GUI

does not display a RAC node on its left-

hand side or that component’s respective

status, attributes, and values on its right-

hand side.

DSET also provides a flexible report-

creation process. Administrators can

create reports through either the GUI or

the CLI, and can create either basic or

advanced reports depending on their

needs. They can create a report through

the GUI either by selecting Start > Program Figure 1. Dell System E-support Tool GUI showing status information for a Dell PowerEdge server

4DELL.COM/PowerSolutionsReprinted from Dell Power Solutions, November 2008. Copyright © 2008 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Files > DSET or by using the DSET installer

(see Figure 2), which can create a onetime

report without permanently installing the

DSET application. The CLI offers a set of

commands for creating custom reports

(see Figure 3).

StreamLined troubLeShooting and probLem reSoLutionBy automatically collecting and storing

comprehensive hardware, software, and

firmware information for Dell PowerEdge

servers along with snapshots of logs in

a single consolidated report, DSET helps

organizations enhance serviceability and

server availability and streamline trou-

bleshooting tasks. Instead of devoting

considerable time and resources to col-

lecting relevant information from differ-

ent sources, IT managers and technicians

can use DSET to help streamline resource

allocation and processes for resolving

service problems. The information that

DSET gathers can help accelerate prob-

lem resolution and help reduce the need

for IT staff to participate in trouble-

shooting tasks, while also helping Dell

Technical Support and enterprise IT staff

identify system components that may be

at risk for failure and suggesting reme-

dial measures to help minimize or elimi-

nate potential downtime.

Shruthi Jayatheertha is a test engineer

senior analyst on the Enterprise Software

Validation team at the Dell Bangalore

Development Center working on

validation of services applications. She

has a bachelor’s degree in Computer

Science Engineering from Visvesvaraya

Technological University, Bangalore.

Lokesh S. Balu is a test engineer senior

analyst on the Enterprise Software

Validation team at the Dell Bangalore

Development Center working on validation

of services applications. He has a bachelor’s

degree in Electronics and Communication

from the University of Madras.

Ajaykumar C. H. is a Product Group test

engineering adviser on the New Platform

Validation team at the Dell Bangalore

Development Center working on valida-

tion of new platform servers. He has a

bachelor’s degree in Electronics and

Communication Engineering from the

Institution of Engineers (India).

QuiCK LinK

Dell System E-support Tool:support.dell.com/dset

Figure 2. Report creation through the Dell System E-support Tool installer

Command parameter result

dellsysteminfo None Creates a basic report containing system, software, storage, and minimum log information

--advanced Creates an advanced report containing a comprehensive set of ESM logs and logs created by Dell and third-party tools

--nohardware Creates a report that excludes hardware information

--nosoftware Creates a report that excludes software information

--nostorage Creates a report that excludes storage information

--nologs Creates a report that excludes log information

clearesm None Clears the ESM log

Figure 3. Example commands and parameters for report creation through the Dell System E-support Tool CLI