Category: Policy Based Management

The Enterprise Policy Management Framework (EPMF) team is proud to announce the updated release of “Enterprise Policy Management Framework 4.0 for project EPMFramework. This is a major release with lots of performance tweaks and

Today on Twitter my friend Jes “Run Forrest Run” Schultz Borland (Blog | Twitter) asked the Community “How do you clean up your dev environments? Let DBs sit out there forever? Delete after X months? Other? This seemed like an interesting issue to tackle and me being the PBM freak that I am, immediately I had a light bulb moment for a policy. In this post I’ll show you a policy you can run against your databases (can work in dev or whatever environment suits you) and will tell you which databases are older than 30 days old. As an added bonus, I’ll also show you how to add a custom extended property to set a custom expiration date.

Whether you know it or not, Policy-Based Management is an integral part of the new release of SQL Server “Denali”. Did you know that the HADR feature actually leverages PBM for checks? Yup, that’s right folks. If you’re an administrator and you’re NOT using Policy-Based Management yet, I highly recommend you pick up a book and check it out!

So what’s new in SQL Server “Denali” CTP3 for Policy-Based Management? I just got the shrink wrap off of it (I’m not quite the go-getter that Aaron Nelson is) but at a quick glance here’s the changes I see. These comparisons were made with listing of facets between SQL Server 2008 R2 and the new “Denali” CTP3 release.

We now have 84 facets (as opposed to 76 in 2008 R2). These are our new facets and their applicable target types!

Again, this still has that new install smell so I haven’t had time to mess around with it but I’ll soon be posting some new policies using these facets so you can get an idea of what you can do administratively using Policy-Based Management and these new facets.

This post is based on an interesting question/situation that was posted over at ASKSSC.com today. The user asked how to create a policy condition that enforces local sql accounts to adhere to password expiration policies.

First off, to create the condition itself is relatively easy. Below I’ve provided the T-SQL code so that you can create the condition that way. I’ve also included a quick list on how to create it via SSMS GUI.

T-SQL method:

Declare @condition_id int
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_condition
    @name=N'Password Policy Enforced', @description=N'', @facet=N'Login',
    @expression=N'<Operator>
  <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>
  <OpType>AND</OpType>
  <Count>2</Count>
  <Operator>
    <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>
    <OpType>EQ</OpType>
    <Count>2</Count>
    <Attribute>
      <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>
      <Name>PasswordExpirationEnabled</Name>
    </Attribute>
    <Function>
      <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>
      <FunctionType>True</FunctionType>
      <ReturnType>Bool</ReturnType>
      <Count>0</Count>
    </Function>
  </Operator>
  <Operator>
    <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>
    <OpType>EQ</OpType>
    <Count>2</Count>
    <Attribute>
      <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>
      <Name>PasswordPolicyEnforced</Name>
    </Attribute>
    <Function>
      <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>
      <FunctionType>True</FunctionType>
      <ReturnType>Bool</ReturnType>
      <Count>0</Count>
    </Function>
  </Operator>
</Operator>', @is_name_condition=0, @obj_name=N'',
@condition_id=@condition_id OUTPUT

Select @condition_id

GO

SSMS method:

1. Under PBM node, right-click conditions folder and select New Condition
2. Name your new condition something useful
3. Select Login facet from drop-down menu
4. Click on field box and select @PasswordExpirationEnabled from properties list
5. Set the operator value to True
6. Click on ‘Click here to add clause’ to add another clause to policy
7. Click on field box and select @PasswordPolicyEnforced from properties list
8. Set the operator value to True
9. Click OK. You’ve now just created a new condition!

Now we’re left with another question: Where does this password policy come from? For details on that you can refer to the Books Online article about it (link). If your box is on a domain that has Active Directory policies regarding password expiration, when you select the box for ‘Enforce password policy’ as well as ‘Enforce password expiration’, these settings will come from that policy. Don’t have an Active Directory policy? No problem! If a policy isn’t provided from Active Directory, Windows then looks to its local security policies for these values.

To see the local values, click on your Start button, then type in ‘secpol.msc’ (don’t type type the single-quotes). This will open up the Local Security Policy MMC Snap-in. Expand the Account Policies folder and then click on the Password Policy folder. In the right side pane you will see the various password-related options you can set such as Maximum password age or password length.

While policy-based management can help you check whether or not the accounts have the option enabled to enforce the policy checks, Policy-based management itself has not bearing on the Local Security Policy settings. This is something you, as an administrator, will have to set and configure outside of SQL Server.

This is just a quick post in regards to a conversation I just had via Twitter. If you don’t already use Twitter, the SQL Community has setup a great resource on there using the hashtag of #sqlhelp.

Today a conversation came up due to a forum question over at SQLServerCentral regarding applying policies to databases with tables that have heaps. If you’re not familiar with the term, a heap is a table that has no clustered index on it. This can be problematic from a performance stand point so it might benefit you to find a way to identify these potential problem children. Enter Policy-Based Management.

This is a simple policy that you can run against your servers and it will identify your tables that are heaps. Just to clarify this policy identifies if your table has a clustered index on it. If it doesn’t then it will fail policy check. I’ve provided two ways to get the policy.

Download policy by clicking here

OR (Updated 4/15/11 to include creation script for condition)

--CREATE CONDITION

Declare @condition_id intEXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_condition @name=N'Find heaps', @description=N'', @facet=N'Table', @expression=N'<Operator>  <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>  <OpType>EQ</OpType>  <Count>2</Count>  <Attribute>    <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>    <Name>HasClusteredIndex</Name>  </Attribute>  <Function>    <TypeClass>Bool</TypeClass>    <FunctionType>True</FunctionType>    <ReturnType>Bool</ReturnType>    <Count>0</Count>  </Function></Operator>', @is_name_condition=0, @obj_name=N'', @condition_id=@condition_id OUTPUTSelect @condition_id
GO

--CREATE POLICY
Declare @object_set_id int
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_object_set @object_set_name=N'Find Table Heaps_ObjectSet', @facet=N'Table', @object_set_id=@object_set_id OUTPUT
Select @object_set_id

Declare @target_set_id int
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_target_set @object_set_name=N'Find Table Heaps_ObjectSet', @type_skeleton=N'Server/Database/Table', @type=N'TABLE', @enabled=True, @target_set_id=@target_set_id OUTPUT
Select @target_set_id

EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_target_set_level @target_set_id=@target_set_id, @type_skeleton=N'Server/Database/Table', @level_name=N'Table', @condition_name=N'', @target_set_level_id=0
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_target_set_level @target_set_id=@target_set_id, @type_skeleton=N'Server/Database', @level_name=N'Database', @condition_name=N'', @target_set_level_id=0

GO

Declare @policy_id int
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_policy @name=N'Find Table Heaps', @condition_name=N'Find heaps', @policy_category=N'', @description=N'Heaps are tables without clustered indexes. Read the link below to learn more about heaps.', @help_text=N'Fragmentation (part 4):what are heaps? by Paul Randal', @help_link=N'http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sqlserverstorageengine/archive/2006/09/19/761437.aspx', @schedule_uid=N'00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000', @execution_mode=0, @is_enabled=False, @policy_id=@policy_id OUTPUT, @root_condition_name=N'', @object_set=N'Find Table Heaps_ObjectSet'
Select @policy_id

GO

During my presentation at SQLSaturday 62 in Tampa I was asked by an attendee about having a policy to check the setting for ad-hoc optimization settings. At the time since I was in a bit of a time crunch (and I couldn’t remember the exact facet to look under) I couldn’t properly demo how to check for it. In this post I’ll show you how to check for that specific setting. In a future post I’ll show you how to check on many more settings.

Before we begin, I highly recommend you familiarize yourself with what exactly this setting changes and how it affects your SQL Server environment. Remember this setting affects the entire instance so all databases installed here will be affected by this change. Read this great post by Bob Pusateri (Blog | Twitter) to get an understanding of what Optimizing for Ad Hoc Workloads really does.

Creating the Policy/Condition

• In SQL Server Management Studio browse down to and expand your management node, expand the Policy-Based Management node, right-click the Policies folder and select New Policy.
• Name your new policy and then from the Check Conditions drop down menu select New Condition.
• Give your new condition a name and from the Facet drop down menu select the Server Configuration facet.
• In the Expression editor, click the area below the column title of field and you will be presented with a drop-down of all the properties available for this facet. Select @OptimizeAdhocWorkloads.

• Under the heading of Value, you will have two options: True or False. When you create a policy you want to establish a condition you want so for the purposes of this demonstration we want our servers to have this setting set to off (which is default setting) so we’ll select the option for FALSE. Click OK to create your condition and return to the new policy window.
• Next we’ll select our Evaluation Mode. This policy, based on the facets and properties we’ve selected offer us three options: On demand, on schedule and On Change: log only. The last option, if enabled, will allow this policy to be active and log any changes made to this particular setting. One cool thing you can do with this is you can create alerts to automatically email you if this particular condition is violated. Check out Ken Simmons (Blog | Twitter) article on Configuring Alerts for Policy-Based Management to learn more. Leave the Evaluation Mode to On Demand and click OK.

Now that we have our policy created simply right-click on it (located under your Policies folder) and select Evaluate to try it out!

GUI? We Don’t Need No Stinking GUI!

In this post I walked you through how to create this policy using the GUI but if you prefer to script this out, you can do that too! Here is the T-SQL script that you can run in lieu of walking through the SSMS screens, to create this particular policy:

[code lang=”sql” wraplines=”true”]
Declare @object_set_id int
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_object_set @object_set_name=N’Ad-hoc Workload Check_ObjectSet’, @facet=N’IServerConfigurationFacet’, @object_set_id=@object_set_id OUTPUT
Select @object_set_id

Declare @target_set_id int
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_target_set @object_set_name=N’Ad-hoc Workload Check_ObjectSet’, @type_skeleton=N’Server’, @type=N’SERVER’, @enabled=True, @target_set_id=@target_set_id OUTPUT
Select @target_set_id
GO

Declare @policy_id int
EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_syspolicy_add_policy @name=N’Ad-hoc Workload Check’, @condition_name=N’adhoc optimization check’, @policy_category=N”, @description=N’This policy checks the server setting to see if Optimize for Ad-Hoc Workload is enabled. The default setting is disabled.’, @help_text=N’To learn more about this policy check out Jorge Segarra”s blog post on this’, @help_link=N’https://sqlchicken.com/2011/01/policy-for-ad-hoc-workloads/’, @schedule_uid=N’00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000′, @execution_mode=0, @is_enabled=False, @policy_id=@policy_id OUTPUT, @root_condition_name=N”, @object_set=N’Ad-hoc Workload Check_ObjectSet’
Select @policy_id
GO[/code]

Conclusion

Again, I can’t iterate enough NOT to blindly go changing settings on your servers without understanding the effects of your actions! Policy-Based Management is a very powerful and easy-to-use tool but be sure to use it wisely! In a later post I will show you how to modify even more server-level settings and let you customize policies to check exactly the settings you want audit.