xDscDiagnostics

This module contains cmdlets for analyzing DSC event logs and identifying the causes of any failure in a DSC operation.

Code of Conduct

This project has adopted this Code of Conduct.

Releases

For each merge to the branch master a preview release will be deployed to PowerShell Gallery. Periodically a release version tag will be pushed which will deploy a full release to PowerShell Gallery.

Contributing

Please check out common DSC Community contributing guidelines.

Description

The xDscDiagnostics module exposes cmdlets that aid in diagnosing DSC errors.

Here, we use the term DSC operation to indicate the execution of any DSC cmdlet from its start to its end. For instance, Start-DscConfiguration and Test-DscConfiguration would form two separate DSC operations. The cmdlets also let you diagnose operations run on other computers. More details about their usage is given below in the Details section.

Install the module

Install the latest released version

For Windows PowerShell run the following steps.

Install-Module xDscDiagnostics -Scope 'CurrentUser'

Install the latest released preview version

For Windows PowerShell run the following steps.

Install-Module xDscDiagnostics -Scope 'CurrentUser' -AllowPrerelease

Cmdlets

Get-xDscOperation

This cmdlet lists statuses of the last few run DSC operations. It returns an object that has information about the time that operation was created, whether the operation was successful or not, a handle to all the events generated by that operation, and the unique job identifier for that operation.

For more information read the article Using Event Logs to Diagnose Errors in Desired State Configuration to understand the role of the job ID in DSC events.

Parameters

• Newest: Number of past operations you want to output. By default, it will display details of the last 10 operations
• Credential: Credentials required to access the computer given in the ComputerName property
• ComputerName: Name of the computer from which you'd like to collect the event diagnostic details. The input can be an array of strings. You would need to execute the following command on the remote computer in order to execute this operation on it.

  New-NetFirewallRule -Name "Service RemoteAdmin" -Action Allow

Trace-xDscOperation

Once we run Get-xDscOperation, we can see which of the operations were a failure/success. Also, we can note a correlation between SequenceID and JobID for each operation. Trace-xDscOperation takes either of these values as parameters and gives you a readable list of events generated by their respective DSC operation. By default, Trace-xDscOperation will list all the events generated by the most recent DSC operation. This cmdlet returns an object that contains properties such as event type, event message, and time of event creation.

Parameters

• SequenceID: This is a field present in the object returned from running Get-xDscOperation. It identifies an operation run in the computer. By specifying the sequence ID, all the events pertaining to the corresponding operation are returned.
• JobID: This is a GUID that is a prefix to all the events published by DSC, which uniquely identifies each operation. It is also a field present in the object returned from running Get-xDscOperation cmdlet. By specifying a JobID, this cmdlet will extract and display all events pertaining to the corresponding DSC operation.
• Credential: Credentials required to access the computer given in the ComputerName property.
• ComputerName: Name of the computer from which you'd like to collect the event diagnostic details. The input can be an array of strings. You would need to execute the following command on the remote computer(s) in order to execute this operations on it.

  New-NetFirewallRule -Name "Service RemoteAdmin" -Action Allow

Update-xDscEventLogStatus

This cmdlet helps us enable or disable any of the DSC event logs. When the cmdlets Get-xDscOperation and Set-xDscOperation are used, they will output details from events generated in the enabled channels. If the channel is disabled, a warning is issued on the PowerShell console. By using the cmdlet Update-xDscEventLogStatus, you could enable the channel required to collect DSC events.

Parameters

• Channel: This is a mandatory parameter that indicates which DSC channel status needs to be updated. { Analytic | Debug | Operational }
• Status: This is a mandatory parameter that indicates the final state of the channel. { Enabled | Disabled }
• Credential: Credentials required to access the computer given in the ComputerName property.
• ComputerName: Name of the computer on which you would like to set the log status. You would need to execute the following command on the remote computer(s) in order to execute this operations on it.

  New-NetFirewallRule -Name "Service RemoteAdmin" -Action Allow

New-xDscDiagnosticsZip

This cmdlet generates a zip of DSC and DSC Extension diagnostics to send to support. The output will be the name of the zip file. The cmdlet will confirm by default.

Parameters

• Session: This is an optional parameter of a PSSession to use to collect the diagnostics

Get-xDscDiagnosticsZipDataPoint

This cmdlet returns the list a zip data point.

Parameters

None.

Outputs

A data point has the following properties:

• Name: A unique name for the data point.
• Description: A description of the data point.
• Target: The general area of diagnostics the datapoint targets.

Examples

Display the status of last 20 DSC operations

This example will list the last 20 DSC operations to see if any of them failed.

Get-xDscOperation -Newest 20

Display the status of the last two DSC operations in computer XXYY after passing Credential $cred

This example lets you find the status of DSC operations run on another computer. Note: this requires a credential.

Get-xDscOperation -ComputerName Temp-Computer.domain.com -Credential $cred -Newest 2

Trace a DSC operation that has a specific job ID

This example displays all events generated by the DSC operation that was assigned a particular unique job ID.

Trace-xDscOperation -JobId aa6b4f3e-53f9-4f02-a502-26028e7531ca

Get events of the second to last operation run on the localhost machine

This example displays a list of events and their messages published by the DSC operation run second to last (i.e. the sequence ID assigned to it is 2).

Trace-xDscOperation -SequenceId 2 -ComputerName localhost

Get diagnostic events of operations run on multiple computers that use the same credential

This example displays the list of events and their messages from multiple computers, as long as the credential passed works for all of them.

Get-xDscOperation -ComputerName localhost, tempcomputer.domain.com -Credential $cred

Enable the DSC Analytic event log

This example shows how you can enable the DSC Analytic channel event log. By default, this channel is disabled. By using this cmdlet, you can enable the channel collect all DSC events using the other 2 xDscDiagnostics cmdlets.

Update-xDscEventLogStatus -Channel Analytic -Status Enabled

Gather diagnostics from the machine running DSC or DSC Extension

• Install the Module
• Open an elevated PowerShell Windows
• Run:

New-xDscDiagnosticsZip

• Email the Zip that pops up to your support contact

Gather diagnostics for the DSC Pull Server and Windows data points.

• Install the Module
• Open an elevated PowerShell Windows
• Run:

Get-xDscDiagnosticsZip -DataPointTarget 'DSC Pull Server','Windows'

• Email the Zip that pops up to your support contact

Gather diagnostics for only eventlog datapoints

• Install the Module
• Open an elevated PowerShell Windows
• Run:

Get-xDscDiagnosticsZip -includedDataPoint (@(Get-xDscDiagnosticsZipDataPoint).where{$_.name -like '*eventlog'})

• Email the Zip that pops up to your support contact

Gather diagnostics from a PSSession to the machine running DSC or DSC Extension

• Install the Module
• Open an PowerShell Windows
• Open the PSSession to the Azure VM as an administrator on the VM
• Run:

New-xDscDiagnosticsZip -Session $SessionToVm

• Email the Zip that pops up to your support contact

Get the details of the last operation DSC performed

• Gets the verbose details of the Configuration Status object you pass to it.

Start-DscConfiguration .\Example -Wait
Get-DscConfigurationStatus | Get-xDscConfigurationDetail

Example output

time                         type    message
----                         ----    -------
2016-03-16T12:45:17.756-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ Start  Set      ]
2016-03-16T12:45:18.272-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ Start  Resource ]  [[Log]example]
2016-03-16T12:45:18.273-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ Start  Test     ]  [[Log]example]
2016-03-16T12:45:18.273-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ End    Test     ]  [[Log]example]  in 0.0000 seconds.
2016-03-16T12:45:18.273-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ Start  Set      ]  [[Log]example]
2016-03-16T12:45:18.274-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]:                            [[Log]example] example
2016-03-16T12:45:18.274-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ End    Set      ]  [[Log]example]  in 0.0010 seconds.
2016-03-16T12:45:18.274-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ End    Resource ]  [[Log]example]
2016-03-16T12:45:18.278-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ End    Set      ]
2016-03-16T12:45:18.279-7:00 verbose [tplunktower]: LCM:  [ End    Set      ]    in  0.5230 seconds.

Decrypt the current mof

• Decrypts the current mof LCM is using. Must be run as administrator

Unprotect-xDscConfigurtion -Stage Previous

Example output

?/*
@TargetNode='localhost'
@GeneratedBy=tplunk
@GenerationDate=04/07/2016 16:54:16
@GenerationHost=localhost
*/

instance of MSFT_LogResource as $MSFT_LogResource1ref
{
SourceInfo = "::1::24::log";
 ModuleName = "PsDesiredStateConfiguration";
 ResourceID = "[Log]example";
 Message = "example";

ModuleVersion = "1.0";
 ConfigurationName = "example";
};
instance of OMI_ConfigurationDocument

                    {
 Version="2.0.0";

                        MinimumCompatibleVersion = "1.0.0";

                        CompatibleVersionAdditionalProperties= {"Omi_BaseResource:ConfigurationName"};

                        Author="tplunk";

                        GenerationDate="04/07/2016 16:54:16";

                        GenerationHost="localhost";

                        Name="example";

                    };