SupportAssist Collections on Dell EMC’s 14th generation of PowerEdge servers ABSTRACT This white paper describes the various options available in the 14th generation of PowerEdge servers for generating and accessing SupportAssist collections across all iDRAC and Lifecycle Controller interfaces. It also provides resources and information required to use the available options in iDRAC and Lifecycle Controller.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ...................................................................................................... 4 AUDIENCE ................................................................................................................................... 4 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................... 4 SUPPORTASSIST COLLECTION OVERVIEW ..............................................................
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The white paper describes the SupportAssist collection capabilities across various iDRAC interfaces. iDRAC provides the customer and application interfaces for gathering information that enables Dell EMC Technical Support to resolve issues that may occur on your server.
IDRAC GUI For generating a SupportAssist collection through the iDRAC GUI: 1. Log in to the iDRAC GUI 2. Click Maintenance SupportAssist. If the server is not registered for SupportAssist, the SupportAssist Registration wizard is displayed. 3. Click Cancel Cancel Registration. 4. Click Start a Collection. 5. Select the data sets that you want to include in the collection. Optionally, proceed with the default selections. 6.
The following screen captures illustrate the steps to save the collection on a network share.
WSMAN This section describes the packets that you can use for generating and retrieving SupportAssist Collections through WSMAN. DCIM_LCService.SupportAssistAcceptEULA() Note: The End User License Agreement (EULA) must be accepted before you generate a SupportAssist Collection. To accept the EULA, send the following SOAP packet to the WSMAN service. WSMAN SOAP packet: PAGE 10DCIM_LCService.SupportAssistGetEULAStatus() To get information about the EULA acceptance, send the following SOAP packet to the WSMAN service. WSMAN SOAP packet: PAGE 11DCIM_LCService.SupportAssistCollection() To trigger a SupportAssist Collection and optionally send the collection to a network share or to Dell EMC (on registered servers), use the following method. WSMAN SOAP packet: PAGE 12Share UserName Share Password 0 To generate a collection with all data sets included and to export it to NFS network share, use the following as sa_collection.xml. Note: Replace Server IP Address and Share Name with the actual values. PAGE 13Output WSMAN SOAP packet: http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/ws/2004/08/addressing/role/anonymous http://schemas.dmtf.
To export the existing collection to a specific network share (non-default location) http://schemas.dmtf.
Output: http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/ws/2004/08/addressing/role/anonymous http://schemas.dmtf.
Output: http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/ws/2004/08/addressing/role/anonymous http://schemas.dmtf.
Output WSMAN SOAP packet: http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/ws/2004/08/addressing/role/anonymous http://schemas.xmlsoap.
RACADM This section describes the RACADM commands that you can use for generating and retrieving SupportAssist Collections. racadm supportassist accepteula Note: The End User License Agreement (EULA) must be accepted before you register SupportAssist. To accept the EULA, use the supportassist accepteula command.
Output: Job ID = JID_123456789012 RAC1154: The requested operation is initiated. Run the RACADM jobqueue sub-command, using the job id to check the status of the requested operation. racadm supportassist exportlastcollection To export an existing SupportAssist Collection to a specific network share or to a default network share (See Setting Default Network) .
LIFECYCLE CONTROLLER For generating a SupportAssist Collection through the Lifecycle Controller User Interface in a pre-boot environment: 1. Reboot server and boot to Lifecycle Controller (F10). 2. Click Hardware Diagnostics Export SupportAssist Collection. 3. Accept the Terms and Conditions and click Next. 4. Select the desired data sets to be included in the collection and click Next.
The following screen captures illustrate the steps to save the collection to a NFS share.
IPMI (HOST OS) If iDRAC is not setup for using any of the iDRAC interfaces (iDRAC GUI, WSMAN, or RACADM), SupportAssist Collection (System information logs only) can be generated from the Host Operating System by using the following IPMI commands. 1. Initiate a SupportAssist Collection To start a SupportAssist Collection, run the following IPMI Command. The command output status code pending (0x02) indicates that the collection has started and is running.
4. Cancel SupportAssist Collection operation While the SupportAssist Collection is running, if necessary, you can cancel the collection. The following IPMI command stops the SupportAssist Collection process. The status of the cancel request can be verified by using Get Command Status. After the operation is canceled, the status command will return 0x07 indicating that you had requested to cancel the collection.
IDRAC SERVICE MODULE (ISM) SERVICE IN HOST OS If iDRAC is not setup for using any of the iDRAC interfaces (iDRAC GUI, WSMAN, or RACADM), SupportAssist Collection can be generated from the Host Operating System by using iSM. A collection generated through iSM will include System Information, OS logs, and application data. A collection generated through iSM can also be filtered for Personally Identifiable Information. For more information on filtering, see the Filtered Vs Non-Filtered Collection section.
COLLECTION VIEWER The SupportAssist Collection Viewer is a HTML file that is bundled along with the SupportAssist Collection. The Collection Viewer file can be found in the collection directory under /tsr. The Collection Viewer displays the inventory, configuration, and LC-related information of the iDRAC.
The Config tab displays all the configuration related information of the system. It also provides a search option that you can use to filter by keywords for faster lookup.
The Raw tab displays the complete inventory information. You can use the options in the View menu to view the Full Inventory or Firmware Only information. The Collection Viewer also enables you to compare two viewer files. With one viewer file open, you can drag and drop the second viewer file that you want to compare. This creates a compare tab that displays a comparison of all collected attributes. Additionally, the raw data or comparison data can be exported to the local system by using the Export tab.
The Lifecycle Logs can also be viewed based on a range of dates that you select. You can also export these logs to local system.
SETTING DEFAULT NETWORK SHARE FOR SAVING COLLECTIONS iDRAC GUI 1. Log in to the iDRAC GUI 2. Click Maintenance SupportAssist. If the server is not registered for SupportAssist, the SupportAssist Registration wizard is displayed. 3. Click Cancel Cancel Registration. 4. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Settings Collection Settings Set Archive Directory. 5. Select the protocol and enter the network share details. 6. Click Set as Default to set it as the default share for saving collections.
Output WSMAN SOAP packet: http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/ws/2004/08/addressing/role/anonymous http://schemas.dmtf.
RACADM To save a default protocol for network share, use the following command: racadm set idrac.supportassist.DefaultProtocol 1 The accepted protocol are NFS (1) and CIFS (2). The default protocol is CIFS. To save a default sharename for network share, use the following command: racadm set idrac.supportassist.DefaultShareName /home/nfs_share The ShareName attribute accepts a string of 0 to 64 characters in length.
FILTERED VS NON-FILTERED COLLECTION If necessary, you can also filtered Personally Identifiable Information (PII) from SupportAssist Collections. The option to filter the SupportAssist Collection can be selected during a manual collection generation through all available iDRAC interfaces. IDRAC GUI WSMAN 1 RACADM racadm supportassist collect - - filter Filtered collections will exclude Personally Identifiable Information from System Information Data.
APPENDIX 1. How to build and execute wsman commands: http://en.community.dell.com/techcenter/systems-management/w/wiki/4374.
