SMS Software Metering

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This page details problems and issues relating to Software Metering.

9192 Error Messages in Offline Mode

From the microsoft.public.sms.swmeter newsgroup
 If you’re seeing these errors in offline mode and suffering as a result here’s some help and advice…  [Go to article]
 

Can I Load the Software Metering Console on it’s Own?

Contributed By: Cliff Hobbs [MVP SMS]
 You’ve got Software Metering installed but did you know that as well as accessing the Software Metering console through the SMS Administrator console you can also load it standalone?.. [Go to article]
 

Can Software Metering Track Software Usage on Individual Clients?

From the microsoft.public.sms.swmeter newsgroup
 The answer is yes but the SMS 2.0 solution isn’t the ideal solution in all environments…  [Go to article]
 

Cleaning up the Software Metering Database

Here is a procedure for cleaning up the License Metering database. Ensure you test this procedure in a test environment prior to production use.
  1. Shutdown the 'SMS Executive' Service
  2. Shutdown the 'License Server' Service
  3. Shutdown the 'Site Component Manager' Service
  4. Load the SQL Server Query Analyzer
  5. Connect to the server
  6. Switch to 'SMS_LicDB' database
  7. Execute the following command - 'truncate table nonlic'
  8. Grab the empty FoxPro template database called 'Nonlic.dbf' from 'sms\licmtr\dbfile'
  9. Copy this file to the '\swmtr' directory
  10. Bring up all the SMS services

Additional Information on License tables:

  • ABCgrant - license product usage table
  • Ignore - excluded programs to ignore
  • Product - license products (this is in approx. 4 tables)
  • Nonlic - un-metered software (this is what needs to be cleaned up)

The license metering database is using FoxPro because of the company that it was licensed/purchased from. There are approximately 53 FoxPro files under '\swmtr'.
 

Installing Software Metering step-by-step

Does anyone have a step-by-step install of Software Metering. I'm missing something and the flowcharts in the SMS Resource Guide aren't helping.

These are the Seven Steps to install SMS 2.0 Software Metering:

  1. Test this procedure on a non-production network.
     
  2. Make sure that Software Metering was installed on your Site Server when you did the original install, and that it's not on an Alpha machine.
     
  3. Add the Software Metering role to one of your Site Systems. (Not the Site Server or SQL Server.) Put it on a fast drive on a fast server on a fast segment. Make sure the clients have rights to the 'SWMTR' folder/share. The database can go on the Site Server or Software Metering - it is the the role of Software Metering Server that needs to go on a machine other than your Site Server.
     
  4. Configure the Software Metering Component in 'Site Settings'. Make sure you enable summarization.
     
  5. Wait a day and enable/configure the Software Metering Client Agent. Do yourself a favour and don't enable real-time metering.
     
  6. Within a day, the clients should begin reporting metering data.
     
  7. If need be call Microsoft Product support to figure out why Software Metering doesn't work in your specific environment.

Although running the Software Metering database on the same server as the Site Server is a supported configuration, it's not one recommended for large environments. The issue is that Software Metering uses a Fox Pro Database as a local cache and only replicates back and forth with the SQL server on regular intervals (the 'Data Collation' field in the 'Local' tab of the 'Software Metering Properties' box).

So in effect there are really two Software Metering Databases - The one on the Software Metering Server which essentially has info about what's being used 'now', and the one on the SQL server which stores 'history'.

The reason Microsoft did this is so you can have multiple boxes running as Software Metering servers for load balancing, since you wouldn't want to set up and support many instances of SQL server all over the place. All of these servers then regularly collate their information up to the Software Metering database server (SQL box) for querying, reporting, etc.

So the way you set it up is:

  • Have SERVER1 as the 'Software Metering Server'. This gets the '\swmtr' folder (with the FoxPro DB) and alternately can double-duty as a normal file server.
     
  • Have SERVER2 as the 'Site Server'. This server can also host the SQL Server with the 'SMS_SITE' and 'SMS_SITE_LicDB' databases.
     
  • If you want to be special, have a separate SERVER3 SQL Box for the 'SMS_SITE' and 'SMS_SITE_LicDB' databases. This isn't required, though if you have a fairly beefy SERVER2.

The FoxPro Database doesn't work optimally (barely works) on a SQL Server box, so the SQL Server-hosted database sometimes never gets the data from the file-based Fox-Pro database cache. It probably has something to do with the ODBC driver that SMS sets up to access all of the '.DBF' files on the Software Metering server's drive which makes SQL go funny or the other way around. Microsoft claims that a separate Software Metering box will allow you to do online metering, and it's working for St. George's in both the three-box and two-box scenarios in three sites.
 

Is anyone using Software Metering in a large environment?

Is anyone out there using Software Metering successfully on a 1500+ clients environment? Is it On line? How many servers?

We have it running in a few departments, but take one of your zero's off to make it 150 clients. We are running it in real-time mode using 1 server and it is very un-stable. The License Server seems to stop approximately once a week without any good error information. It also seems to be very inconsistent, sometimes a user can run a locked down program and other times they cannot. I wish you the best of luck running to on 1500+ clients.
 

"LICENSE BALANCING: Prod Ref 4 does not require 'instant' license balancing..."

Contributed By: Wally Mead [MS]
 If you're seeing the error above in your Software Metering log then read on... [Go to article]
 

Software Metering console not responding

When I start the Software Metering console, I click on the 'Summary' button, and the console hangs. When you bring up Task Manager it shows up as not responding. I checked the services and everything seems to be ok.

Wait. Depending on how long metering has been running without summarization, it could take a VERY long time and take up LOTS of RAM. Let it sit there. You can come back in an hour or so and see thousands of entries in the summary window.
 

Software Metering Invalid Errors

We installed Software Metering not too long ago, and to my astonishment, it worked.  However, we are getting an error message in SMS status messages such as this:

Message ID: 9379 - The software metering server manager does not have sufficient privileges to file://\\SMSSQLA. Make sure the software metering server manager's account "smsadmin" has administrative privileges on "\\SMSSQLA".

followed by:

Message ID: 9235 - The software metering server manager could not install the server "SMSSQLA". The installation will be retried

Is your SMS Service account in the Local administrators group? By default only the 'domainname\administrators' group has SQL admin rights on a SQL box. Try going and creating a new SQL login ID based on your SMSAdmin account and give it SQL admin privileges.
 

Software Metering - Lessons Learned

Contributed By: Rick Butler
 From the SMS Forum, this article contains some useful lessons learned from installing Software Metering… [Go to article]
 

Software Usage only reported for Domain Admins

Software Metering is currently only reporting software usage for our Domain Admins. The License Metering component is installed on all of our clients.  However, they just don't report software use. But if a Domain Admin logs onto a normal user's workstation, it reports all software that they run. Then when the user logs back on, it doesn't report anymore.  We have only provided RX rights to our user's drives in most areas, including the root, but they do have change to their 'Winnt' folders, the 'temp' folder, and a few other places in Program Files that are required.

When the Software Metering server is a Member server in a Resource domain, SMS configures the local 'Users' group on that server with rights to the Software Metering inbox. Therefore, you have to add the 'Domain Users' global group from the Accounts domain to the local 'Users' group on the Software Metering server (as by default only the Resource domain's 'Users' group is in there). The 'Domain Admins' group in the Accounts domain is already added to the 'Local Admins' group on this server so they can log on locally - this gives them plenty of rights to upload their metering info.
 

SQL database not being updated when using Offline Software Metering

We have enabled OFFLINE Software Metering and although we can see what is happening via the Software Metering interface, the data collation does not seem to be working as the SQL database is not being updated, so reports are blank. How can I troubleshoot this?

Software Metering isn't the fastest feature of SMS. It can take a couple of days before the data actually starts to be displayed.

Check to see that the SQL database is actually being propagated. Clients send data to the 'Licmtr\inboxes\offline' directory, then the Foxpro database gets updated (which is the 'current' database), then based on the data collation setup the SQL database (which is the 'history'), should be populated. The reports themselves take their data from the SQL database.

Try rebooting the server and make sure the Licensing service starts. If it doesn't then try changing the account and password this service runs under.
 

Using Software Metering to control Microsoft Product License

If Software Metering is employed, you can legally install Microsoft products on every computer in your organization and use Software Metering to control the licenses. For example:

The company has 2000 users, but has only purchased 1000 licenses of Microsoft Office.  The company is legally entitled to install 2000 copies of MS Office, as long as:
  1. Real-time License Verification is enabled for Software Metering.
  2. Software Metering is configured to balance 1000 licenses.

Why is the "License Metering" Component "Not Available" on Windows 2000 Terminal Services?

Contributed By: Wally Mead [MS]
 This is normal behaviour as detailed here... [Go to article]
 

Windows 9x Clients running Software Metering repeatedly hang for 20 or 30 seconds

I have a number of Windows 9x clients running Software Metering that repeatedly hang for 20 or 30 seconds at a time and this is really annoying my users.

You can add a new Registry value that causes the Software Metering Client agent to run in offline mode after is encounters a network error:

  1. Load Regedit

  2. Navigate to 'HKLM\Software\Microsoft\SMS\Client\Client Components\License Metering\Properties'

  3. Create a new DWORD value named 'GoOfflineAfterFailure' with a value of '1'.
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