Wade Wegner

There has been some excellent activity by some heavy-weights in the Commerce Server world.  Sadly, I haven’t been contributing very much on my blog, as I am desperately trying to complete my book.

It started with Søren Spelling Lund‘s two-part series (and maybe more?) on what it’s like developing with Commerce Server 2007.

• Developing with Microsoft Commerce Server 2007 Part 1: Secure By Default

In this post, Søren highlights the high-level of security that has gone into Commerce Server 2007, calling it “both a blessing and a curse.”  He attributes this to the flexibility and granularity of the security system, in addition to the complexity that comes with it.  Commerce Server 2007 makes use of the Windows Authorization Manager for security.  See the following links for more information: Developing Applications Using Windows Authorization Manager, and Managing Authorization Policies.

Søren also highlights the Distributed Transaction Manager and use of MSDTC and System.Transaction in the .NET Framework 2.0.

• Developing with Microsoft Commerce Server 2007 Part 2: Three-Way Data Access

Søren discusses three different data access systems for Commerce Server 2007, based on the subsystem with which you’re working (i.e. the Profile system, the Catalog system, and the Order system).  Take a look at his post for the specifics.  I would also suggest you take a look at MSDN for some additional information on developing with Commerce Server 2007.

Not to be out-done by Søren, Max Akbar took some time out of his busy schedule to post a great article on caching and Commerce Server 2007.

• A Few Things You Didn’t Know About Commerce Server’s Catalog Cache

Max highlights a number of important topics, including: the Catalog cache, Web.Config settings, refreshing the cache, the cache size, the cache location, how to use your own caching.

As always, Max’s post is a great blend of information and code snippets.

Last, but certainly not least, Tom Schultz contributed to the discussion of caching by highlighting a mixed-authentication solution for the SiteCacheRefresh HTTP handler.

• SiteCacheRefresh – Mixed Authentication Solution

Tom shows how the SiteCacheRefresh HTTP handler provides Commerce Server with caching capabilities.  He goes beyond this, however, when he points out that by default the ASP.NET site uses forms authentication.  Since the web site can support either forms or windows authentication, a mixed authentication model is required.  Tom shows you how to construct this by taking aspects of the Starter Site

All in all, great stuff!

Note: For those of you that want to skip the explanation, and simply get a converted management pack for Commerce Server 2007, scroll down to download a MOM 2005 pack converted for OpsMgr 2007 for Commerce Server 2007.

I previously blogged about Commerce Server 2007 and Operational Monitoring, and indicated that there is no native OpsMgr 2007 pack for Commerce Server 2007 (although there will be one some day).  For now, we have to convert the MOM 2005 pack.  Fortunately, this is a pretty straightforward process, although there is the potential for things to to fail (learn from my experience!).

In order to convert management packs from MOM 2005 to OpsMgr 2007, you must have the following installed on your server:

• Operations Manager 2007 (hopefully this is obvious)
• The MOM 2005 User Interfaces (found on your MOM 2005 disk)
• The MOM 2005 to OpsMgr 2007 Migration tool (found on your OpsMgr 2007 disk)

Now, before you go and start installing all these bits, let me share my experience.  You should install the MOM 2005 User Interfaces first, followed by Operations Manager 2007, and lastly the MOM 2005 to OpsMgr 2007 Migration tool.  Here’s why — when I originally attempted to convert convert the 2005 pack I started by installing OpsMgr first and then tried to install the migration tool.  The installer told me that in order to install the migration tool I first needed the MOM 2005 UI.  Fair enough, I thought, so I went to install the UI tool.  However, every time the installer went to “Check Prerequisites” I got the following error:

No matter what I did, I got this error (although this error never occurred on any other machine that didn’t have OpsMgr 2007 installed).  I couldn’t find any information on this error (evidently I’m the only person to experience this problem), but I think it’s some kind of installation failure because OpsMgr 2007 was already installed.  I went to test this theory by trying to uninstall OpsMgr 2007, but then I got a “Fatal error during installation” error when trying to uninstall.  Ugly!

Fortunately, this was a virtual machine so I scrapped it and started over.  This time I installed the bits in the following order:

1. The MOM 2005 User Interfaces
2. Operations Manager 2007
3. The MOM 2005 to OpsMgr 2007 Migration tool

This worked perfectly for me, and I never experience the above error.

Once everything is installed, you can begin the conversion process.  Open Start –> All Programs –> System Center Operations Manager 2007 –> Migration Tool.  The migration tool is a wizard that will walk you through the process, and is very easy.  Simply point to the extracted 2005 management pack file (which you can download here) and either migrate it directly to your OpsMgr group or to a file.

If you have chosen to migrate it to file (like I did), you must then import it into OgsMgr 2007.  Open Start –> All Programs –> System Center Operations Manager 2007 –> Operations Console, choose the Administration tab, right-click Device Management, select Import Management Packs, and point to your converted MOM pack.  It’s as easy as that!

Now when you go to the Monitoring tab, you’ll see the following:

All you need to do now is provision the agents on your Commerce Server 2007 machine, and away you go!  Very simple, and very useful.

I hope this helps!

Microsoft_Commerce_Server_2007.XML (2.18 MB)

Operational monitoring (OM) is a practice that is sorely underused, in my opinion.  OM is a performance and event monitoring practice that allows you to respond to errors and gain insight into machines on your network.  Microsoft has two flagship products for operational monitoring: Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005 and System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) 2007.  Through MOM and SCOM you can monitor your Microsoft server products, such as SQL Server, Web Sites, and even Commerce Server 2007.

There are a number of benefits to using OM, including:

• Receive notification of critical errors and warnings
• Automatically respond to errors and warnings
• Gain insight into performance and trends to preempt future problems

Both MOM and SCOM use an agent (a piece of software installed on the monitored machine) to track the performance and events on monitored machines.  The agent watches a number of different sources on the computer, such as the Event Log, and then centralizes this information on the OM server where it is stored in a database.  The OM server applies filters and rules, and will notify individuals and/or groups if necessary.  Additionally, they can respond to events by running scripts or executables on the monitored machine.

While you can define your own events and thresholds to monitor your machines, you can also take advantage of pre-built management packs.  These management packs are designed by the corresponding product team (e.g. the Commerce Server 2007 MOM pack is designed by the Commerce Server team) so that the monitored events and defined thresholds are most appropriate for the product.

Installing MOM 2005

The process for installing MOM 2005 with Service Pack 1 is pretty straightforward (especially if you’re installing it on one machine).  Take a look at the following documentation for detailed steps:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/mom/mom2005/Library/b7b0c768-64d1-486e-b9ed-7292c9e545f9.mspx?mfr=true

There are four steps involved in installing MOM 2005:

1. Installing SQL Server and MOM 2005
2. Discovering computers and deploying agents
3. Install MOM 2005 reporting (optional)
4. Import management packs

I suggest that, before you install MOM 2005, you take advantage of the “Check Prerequisites” tool to make sure that you’ve properly configured your server.

If you have problems installing agents on step two, take a look at the following KB article: ttp://support.microsoft.com/kb/883335/en-us.  Turns out I had a DNS issue on one of the machines I wanted push an agent onto; after resolving the DNS issue I had no problems.

Once you have successfully installed and configured MOM 2005 (steps 1 through 3) you are ready to import various management packs.

Configuring the MOM Pack for Commerce Server 2007

You must first download the MOM 2005 pack for Commerce Server 2007.  When you run the executable you must specify the location to place the files.

I suggest you use the default location for management packs: C:Program FilesMicrosoft Operations Manager 2005Management Packs.  This way, when you run the import from the MOM 2005 Administrator Console, you won’t have to change the default location.

To import the management pack you must do the following:

1. Open the MOM 2005 Administrator Console
2. Browse to Microsoft Operations Manager (<Computer Name>) –> Management Packs
3. Right-click Management Packs and select Import/Export Management Pack.
4. Choose the Import a management pack, and click Next.
5. Lave the default location for the management packs, which is where you installed the Commerce Server 2007 MOM Pack.  Click Next to continue.
   
6. Select the Microsoft Commerce Server 2007.akm management pack to import.  Click Next to continue.
7. On the summary page, click Finish.

Once you have installed the management pack you must then specify your Commerce Server 2007 servers.  To do this, you must do the following.

1. Open the MOM 2005 Administrator Console
2. Browse to Microsoft Operations Manager (<Computer Name>) –> Management Packs –> Computer Groups –> Microsoft Commerce Server 2007.
3. Right-click Microsoft Commerce Server 2007 and choose click Properties.
4. Select the Included Computers tab and click Add.
5. Select the Commerce Server computers you wish to monitor, and click OK.

Now your Commerce Server 2007 servers are being monitored by MOM 2005.

I would say that the “out-of-the-box” settings for the MOM pack are okay about 90% of the time.  The key is to get a baseline for your environments and potentially fine tune the settings based on your findings.

SCOM 2007 and the 2005 MOM Pack

According to the CS product team there is no native SCOM 2007 pack planned at this time.  However, the MOM 2005 pack is supposed to work with SCOM 2007.  While I haven’t tried this myself, I’ve been told by multiple sources that it should work and that this is the supported model.

If I get the opportunity to test this I’ll be sure to update this post.

Additional Resources

In addition to the Commerce Server 2007 MOM Pack you may also want to use the following MOM packs:

• Web Sites and Services Management Pack for MOM 2005
• SQL Server Management Pack for
  MOM 2005

While the Commerce Server 2007 MOM Pack tracks the health of your Commerce Server environment, it doesn’t really monitor the health of your Web Site (i.e. IIS).  Additionally, there are events and thresholds in the SQL Server pack that are also worthwhile.

At the very least, make sure you review the following white paper: Microsoft Commerce Server 2007 MOM Pack White Paper.

Also, here are some good blogs/sites to track:

• Operations Manager Product Team Blog
• OpsMgr, SCE And MOM Blog
• System Center Community
• Scripting for Microsoft Operations Management (MOM)

MOM 2005 and SCOM 2007 are great resources and you should definitely take the time to learn more about them.

I hope this helps!