MID Server version should be updated to match platform version - Product Knowledge

MID Server version should be updated to match platform version  Product Success Playbook

MID Server version should be updated to match platform version

A step-by-step guide to analyze and remediate ITOM Health & Visibility Issues

Table of Contents

Summary

Goal of this Playbook

Audience

Problem Overview

Executive Summary

How this playbook can help you achieve business goals

How this playbook is structured

Problem Analysis

Upstream Causes

Downstream Consequences

Impact on Your Business

Engagement Questions

Remediation Plays

Summary

Play 1: Review your MID Servers

Play 2: Analyze your records

Play 3: Manually update your MID

Play 4: Troubleshooting MID upgrade issues

Data Governance

Summary

Goal of this Playbook

The goal of this playbook is to help you keep your MID Servers upgraded to match your ServiceNow Instance.

Author John (Johnny) Walker Date 11/03/2021 Addresses HSD # HSD0009874 Applicable ServiceNow Releases Any release Time Required Approximately 1 to 2 hours (depending on your environment) Audience

Configuration Manager or Configuration Management team

ServiceNow Administrator or Discovery Administrator

Problem Overview

The MID Servers are a necessary part of your ITOM applications on the ServiceNow platform. They perform work within your network and report back to your ServiceNow instance. When these servers are not updated to the latest available version to match their SN instance, there could be unexpected results and it's possible they will be unable to perform the activities assigned to them.

Executive Summary

How this playbook can help you achieve business goals

Having MID Servers properly updated (patched) will ensure that they are available for the business processes that depend upon them.

How this playbook is structured

This playbook contains a section to analyze and confirm our findings about your MID Servers. This is followed by a play designed to clarify if an update / upgrade is your only concern at this time. Then there are 2 plays designed to help you update the MID Server(s) or troubleshoot issues with a failing update process. Lastly, some guidance is provided in a play to help you keep an eye on the MID Servers using the provided MID Server Dashboard.

Problem Analysis

Upstream Causes

A MID server could have failed to perform self-update

At certain times it may have been necessary to "pin" a MID server to a certain release version

When a MID has failed to restart and remains in the Down status, it will miss out on updates to the platform

OS patches on the host machine (usually Windows) can interrupt connectivity between the MID application and your instance, keeping them from updating

A MID server could have been decommissioned and now the ecc_agent record is an orphan

Firewall (physical or virtual) rules might be blocking one or more MID servers from downloading the updates

Planned maintenance within your organization might have taken a MID server temporarily offline, which has caused it to fail to self-update

Downstream Consequences

Data Consequence

Your CMDB might be missing information related to newer features Operation Consequence

For features supported by newer code and updates, time could be wasted on troubleshooting issues related to version mismatches App Consequence

Applications depending on MID Servers can have unexpected results and behaviours due to missing code updates

Applications depending on the MID Servers can experience a loss of functionality due to missing code updates Impact on Your Business

MID Servers being down (offline) could impact your business outcomes depending on which SN applications these MID Servers support. Some examples follow.

Increased MTTR ITOM Health depends on MID Servers for event data ingestion

Troubleshooting Workflow functionality which depends on the latest MID Server code will potentially require additional time and effort

CMDB Trust ITOM Visibility depends on MID Servers to perform Discovery Schedules

Newer Discovery Patterns from the store application updates often rely upon code updates to the MID Server

Process Automation Data Sources / Import Sets could be relying on your MID Servers

Any Workflows depending on newer code features will fail

Engagement Questions:

Consider the answers to these questions:

Do you have a review or verification process in place to ensure the MID Servers are updated?

Is there a plan in place to handle issues with MID Servers?

Is the purpose of each of your MID Servers well understood?

Does your organization have a password rotation policy which applies to your MID Server user account? Remediation Plays

Summary

The table below lists and summarizes each of the remediation plays in the playbook. Details are included later.

Play Name

Review your data

What this play is about

Confirm which MID Servers require an update Required tasks

Navigate to MID Servers in the platform Analyze Play

What this play is about

Determine if the MID Server has other issues Required tasks

Notice if the MID is Up or Down Fix Plays

What this play is about

Manually update the MID Server records Required tasks

Navigate to your MID Servers and press the Upgrade MID UI Action Data Governance

What this play is about

Use the MID Server dashboard to keep an eye on them Required tasks

Navigate to the MID Server dashboard and keep an eye on things

Play 1 - Review your MID Servers

What this Play is about

This play will show you the MID Servers in your instance which appear to require an update to match your ServiceNow instance.

Required tasks

To get the proper version intended for your MID Servers, you can check the sys_properties table for 'mid.version'. Navigate to 'sys_properties.list' and filter for name is mid.version.

Example:

Copy the contents of the field: "Value" for use in the next step. This will be a somewhat lengthy string describing a specific MID Server release version, dates and build number.

Note: You can also just view the MID Server records (ecc_agent) and make note of the green, orange and red dots prefixed to the Version values. These field styles use CSS as a helper to display the version information. Searching with the exact mid.version value might be easiest for customers with any visual impairments or special needs.

Navigate to MID Servers > Servers and complete the filter condition as shown:

Field Operator Value Version is not {INSERT THE VALUE FROM STEPS 1 & 2 HERE} Example:

If the Version field isn't present on your list view, use the gear icon to add that field as shown above.

Note the records here with red colored dots prepended to their version values. These dots might be orange in your instance. Green dots indicate MID Servers that are correctly updated.

Example:

Play 2 - Analyze the situation

What this Play is about

This play is to help you decide how to continue working with MID Servers that show a need to be updated.

Required tasks

In reviewing the images above, notice that the example servers which require upgrade are also all in the Down status. A Down MID Server has stopped communicating with the SN instance. It may have stopped running entirely. When communication has stopped between a MID Server and the SN instance, upgrades to the SN instance will not be triggered on the MID Server - in fact, nothing the MID Server is designed to do will ever happen on that MID Server again. To remediate issues with a Down MID Server please STOP HERE and continue in the Playbook designed for Down MID Servers.

Shortly after you are able to bring a Down MID Server back into communication with your instance, the system will automatically update your MID Server. The remediation play below will address what to do if your MID Servers are in communication with your instance (Up) but still are not updating / upgrading along with your instance.

Play 3 - Manually Update MID Servers

What this Play is about

This play is designed to help get your MID Servers updated. If your MID Server is in the Up status but still needs an upgrade, there is likely something that needs attention.

Required tasks

From the List View of MID Servers ( MID Servers > Servers ) open one of the records indicating that the Version does not have a green dot.

Scroll to the bottom of the form and locate the UI Action named "Upgrade MID" and click on it. Click through the popup confirmation message to be presented with an infoMessage that the MID Server [is] upgrading.

Example:

The MID Server should begin downloading the update and installing it. You should notice that the MID Server status changes to Upgrading during this process. This process can take a moment, but shouldn't take longer than 7 to 10 minutes. (estimate)

After the MID Server performs the update, it will change status to Down. If all goes well, your MID Server should come back to status Up and you can now repeat Play 1 to confirm that your MID Server has the correct Version.

Play 4 - Troubleshooting MID Upgrade issues

What this Play is about

This play is high level guidance on resolving issues with MID Server updates. There are many reasons why a MID Server might fail to update. Most of these are documented and we will provide you some links here.

Required tasks

Review the MID Server upgrades Documentation page. Select your release version to continue. We reference this page in the following steps.

Review the MID Server Upgrade Log messages as documented on this page.

Confirm that your particular MID Server requiring upgrade meets the Upgrade Requirements listed on the page.

Confirm there are no present MID Server Issue (ecc_agent_issue) entries for your MID Server. These are documented on this page.

Confirm that the properties for Pinning a MID Server to a specific version have been removed. The process for setting / removing these properties is listed on this page.

In certain circumstances it may have been a good idea to "pin" your MID Server(s) to a particular version. Usually this is when testing a platform upgrade in one of your instances which has MID Servers. The idea being that if you're going to upgrade, test and then rollback your instance through restore from backup, it would make sense to NOT have the MID Servers perform self updates repeatedly. The means to pin the MID Server are available for these and other purposes. It is simply important to allow the MID Servers to update as soon as possible afterwards.

Search the Support portal with any messages in the MID Server logs for information regarding any errors you can't solve on your own. The MID Server is fairly well documented and many answers to common issues will be easy to find.

Tip: If you lack the immediate skills to troubleshoot the MID Server, you can often find help from your Java or Middleware Administrators within your organization. (if any) The MID Server is at its heart a Java application server adhering to standard JVM arguments and behaviors.

If all else fails, you can always open a Support Case to get help with updating your MID Servers. We are here to help.

Data Governance

What this Play is about

This play is designed to help you keep an eye on your MID Servers.

Required tasks

Navigate to MID Servers > Dashboard

Note information on this dashboard including the Status, Version and metrics:

Example:

Further down the page, we find information about active MID Server Issues. These are common situations that your platform can diagnose and bring to your attention. Here we can note that there are two different MID Users (the ID used by the MID to communicate with the SN instance) and each of these users are associated with Down MID servers.

Example:

If you haven't already partnered with your Security teams to make sure that there is a process to be notified of password rotations and updates to the MID Server hosts, you should take steps to get that relationship started.

Congratulations You have completed this Product Success Playbook.