We published a new hotfix today for ConfigMgr 2012 to correct the following issue:

Consider the following scenario:

• You have a Microsoft System Center 2012 Configuration Manager site environment. 
• You import a third-party root certification authority (CA) certificate by using the Configuration Manager console. 
• There is an ampersand (&) or other nonalphanumeric character in the CertificateIssuers string.

In this scenario, site assignments may not work.

You can find the complete article as well as download information for the hotfix here:

KB2841764 - FIX: Site assignments do not work in a System Center 2012 Configuration Manager site environment (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2841764)

J.C. Hornbeck| Knowledge Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

Microsoft’s own Santos Martinez (Premier Field Engineering) recently wrote a great blog post describing his experience troubleshooting the inability to create custom reports in System Center 2012 Configuration Manager. What he ran into was the issue where  you get “The Request Failed with HTTP status 503: Service Unavailable” when clicking on Create Report. He does a really nice job explaining his troubleshooting process and what he did to eventually fix reporting in his environment so whether you’re hitting this exact scenario or not it still makes for a good read. You can check out his post at the link below:

System Center 2012 Configuration Manager: 'Create Report' doesn't work, so what do I do now?

J.C. Hornbeck| Knowledge Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

Just a quick FYI on a new Knowledge Base article we published today. This one talks about an issue where using ConfigMgr 2007 to patch the passive node of a cluster fails with exit code -2068578304. You can get all of the details in the article below:

KB2855474 - Patching a passive cluster node using a Configuration Manager 2007 Software Update fails with exit code -2068578304 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2855474)

J.C. Hornbeck| Knowledge Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

- Adeel Mohd | Configuration Manager Support Engineer

I recently came across an interesting issue that I had never witnessed before in System Center Configuration Manager 2007 (ConfigMgr 2007) and while troubleshooting I learned it had to do with one of the new features included in System Center 2012 Configuration Manager (ConfigMgr 2012). If you’re new to ConfigMgr 2012 then you might take a minute to read through this one and learn how this new feature may affect client reboots in your software deployments.

Consider this scenario:

You deploy Software Updates or any type of deployment to a specific collection that has a maintenance window configured. The deployments succeed, however the client machines do not reboot inside or outside of their maintenance window even though a reboot is required per the deployment. In such a case, the only option left is to reboot the machines manually which can be very painful in a large environment.

When analyzing Rebootcoordinator.log we saw the following entries:

ServiceWindowsManager has allowed us to Reboot– means the Maintenance window has permitted to reboot
System restart turnaround time is 36600 seconds - means the total time of maintenance windows on the client is 610 minutes
Scheduled reboot from agent UpdatesDeploymentAgent - means updates were deployed and a reboot is required

Then straight after that the log shows the following entries:

ServiceWindowsManager has not allowed us to Reboot
ServiceWindowsManager says that we will not be able to Reboot in the future
We may not Reboot ever. Sending 'System May Never Reboot' Status Message

When we checked the Computer Restart client setting under the Administration node in the console (New in ConfigMgr 2012) we found that the total time of all applicable maintenance windows was 610 minutes and the time configured for the restart temporary notification interval and for the final countdown interval was also 610 minutes. This was our problem.

As a rule, the value for the restart temporary notification interval and the value for the final countdown interval should be shorter in duration than the shortest maintenance window that is applied to the client computer. In our case the shortest maintenance window was configured for 30 minutes.

To resolve this, we opened the console and went to Administration –> Client settings –> properties-> Computer restart settings and changed the value for temporary notification interval and for final countdown interval to 15 minutes.  This was less than the shortest maintenance window of 30 minutes and it fixed our issue. So if you have a deployment that’s not triggering a reboot when you think it should, make sure your temporary notification interval and final countdown interval is less than the shortest maintenance window for the targeted client. Chances are this will fix your issue.

Adeel Mohd | Support Engineer

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

~ John Thekkethala | Senior Program Manager

I am happy to announce that we have released Cumulative Update 1 to the System Center 2012 Configuration Manager Service Pack 1 clients for Linux/UNIX.

This release delivers the following additional capabilities/features to the System Center 2012 SP1 release.

• Support for managing additional operating systems: AIX, HP-UX, Solaris 11, CentOS, Debian, Oracle Linux and Ubuntu.
• Open Management Infrastructure CIM server (OMI Version 1.0.6.5) that enables customers to create their own inventory providers.
• A simplified common Universal Agent that supports a broad set of Linux distributions.
• Miscellaneous bug fixes.

The release is posted on the Download Center here: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=36212

To find more details on what’s new in this release go to http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/gg682132.aspx#BKMK_LinixUNIX and look under the subsection titled What’s New in Cumulative Update 1 for the Client for Linux and UNIX

A complete list of supported Linux and UNIX distributions and the installation packages can be found in Supported Configurations for Configuration Manager.  Look under the subsection titled Computer Client Requirements \ Client Requirements for Linux and UNIX Servers \ Supported Distributions of Linux and UNIX.

John Thekkethala| Senior Program Manager | Microsoft

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

Just a quick FYI on a new Knowledge Base article we published today. This one talks about an issue where PXE boot mail fail for a client if one of the Management Points is in an untrusted forest. This is really an issue/explanation regarding how Distribution Points select Management Points in alphabetical order but you can get all of the details in the article below:

KB2858397 - System Center 2012 Configuration Manager client PXE boot may fail if the Management Point is in an untrusted forest (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2858397)

J.C. Hornbeck| Knowledge Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

Just a quick FYI on a new Knowledge Base article we published today. This one talks about the following scenario:

- You use the Add-CMDistributionPoint PowerShell cmdlet introduced in Cumulative Update 1 for System Center 2012 Configuration Manager Service Pack 1 to create a new remote Distribution Point (DP). 

- You deploy content to the new DP and then create a deployment that requires that content for a client in the same remote location as the new DP.

In this scenario you find that the client tries to download the content from the first server installed in the hierarchy (the CAS or stand-alone Primary).

You can get all of the details in the article below:

KB2860244 - The Add-CMDistributionPoint cmdlet in Configuration Manager sets an incorrect ServerRemoteName value (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2860244)

J.C. Hornbeck| Knowledge Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

~ Luke Ramsdale| Support Escalation Engineer

Hi everyone, Luke Ramsdale here. In System Center 2012 Configuration Manager Service Pack 1, new functionality was introduced for prestaged media that allows you to specify applications, packages and driver packages to deploy with the operating system.

The documentation states that the task sequence will check the cache for valid content first, and if the content cannot be found or was revised, the content is downloaded from the distribution point.

Ref: Microsoft TechNet. What’s New in Configuration Manager SP1 - Operating System Deployment.  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj591552.aspx.

However, while this check does occur, the new content for packages is never downloaded and the cached content will continue to be used.

An issue has been identified where packages and driver packages do not download revised content after the pre staged media has been created in Configuration Manger 2012 SP1. It should be noted that applications are not affected by this issue, they will still continue to download content after they have been updated.

It is recommended that the prestaged media should be regularly updated if packages and driver packages are updated frequently.

Luke Ramsdale| Support Escalation Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

Hi everyone, Winds Wu here. I had a case recently and found that Microsoft Windows Management Framework 3.0 (KB2506143) is not completely compatible with System Center 2007 Configuration Manager. The issue is that it may cause a reinstall of a Management Point to fail as you cannot compile mof files using the version of wmiutils.dll that is installed via KB2506143.

Here is the detailed information and workaround for your reference. If anything is unclear please feel free to let me know.

Problem Description

A Management Point failed to be installed and generated the following error in mpMSI.log:

[17:29:08] Failed to compile 'E:\Program Files (x86)\SMS_CCM\LoggingDefaults.mof' (Phase: 3, Object: 1, Lines: 21 - 29, Error: 80041002)
MSI (s) (38!40) [17:29:08:125]: Product: SMS Management Point -- Error 25140. Setup was unable to compile the file LoggingDefaults.mof
The error code is 80041002
Error 25140. Setup was unable to compile the file LoggingDefaults.mof
The error code is 80041002
CustomAction CcmRegisterWmiMofFile returned actual error code 1603

Analysis & Action Plan

1. We found that wmiutils.dll (under C:\Windows\System32\wbem) had the wrong version. It should be something similar to this which was what was on my server:

After checking with a WMI engineer, we found that it was probably caused by the hotfix in KB2506143 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2506143 ). We already know there is another issue regarding this update in System Center 2012 Configuration Manager but it seems to affect Configuration Manager 2007 as well.

See KB2796086 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2796086) for more information.

To resolve the issue we uninstalled the update.

2. We then found that we could not compile LoggingDefaults.mof manually as it failed with the following error:

Microsoft (R) MOF Compiler Version 6.2.9200.16398
Copyright (c) Microsoft Corp. 1997-2006. All rights reserved.
Parsing MOF file: LoggingDefaults.mof
MOF file has been successfully parsed
Storing data in the repository...
An error occurred while resolving the alias for object 1 defined on lines 21 - 29:
0X80041002 Class, instance, or property 'CCM_Logging_GlobalConfiguration' was not found.
Compiler returned error 0x80041002

This occurred because some dependent mof files had not been compiled successfully. We checked the mpmsi.log from the working environment and saw that the compile sequence should be this:

mofcomp ccmclasses.mof
mofcomp PolicyClasses.mof
mofcomp LoggingClasses.mof
mofcomp Scheduler.mof
mofcomp CcmExec.mof
mofcomp PolicyProvider.mof
mofcomp PolicyProvider2.mof
mofcomp PolicyNamespaces.mof
mofcomp EventClasses.mof
mofcomp StandardEventForwarderClasses.mof
mofcomp SmsEventClasses.mof
mofcomp LoggingDefaults.mof
mofcomp CcmDefaults.mof
mofcomp EventProvider.mof
mofcomp FrameworkEvents.mof
mofcomp StandardEventForwarderDefaults.mof
mofcomp CcmExec_Global.mof
mofcomp ccmauthmessagehook.mof
mofcomp LocationServices.mof
mofcomp PolicyDefaults.mof
mofcomp PolicyAgentEvents.mof
mofcomp StateMsgSchema.mof
mofcomp DataTransferService.mof
mofcomp CcmExec_MPFramework.mof
mofcomp SmsCommon.mof
mofcomp XmlStore.mof
mofcomp InventoryAgentEvents.mof
mofcomp SWMtrEvents.mof
mofcomp SWDistEvents.mof
mofcomp SrcUpdateEvents.mof
mofcomp PatchMgmtEvents.mof
mofcomp SMSNapEvents.mof
mofcomp MpStatusForwarderDefaults.mof
mofcomp CcmExec_MP.mof
mofcomp mp_pss.mof
mofcomp mp_ccmConfig.mof
mofcomp mp_ccmConfig_Defaults.mof
mofcomp MpEvents.mof
mofcomp OSDEventClasses.mof
mofcomp PeerDPStatus.mof
mofcomp ImgDeployEvents.mof
mofcomp DCMClientEvents.mof
mofcomp SUMEvents.mof
mofcomp OOBMgmtEvents.mof
mofcomp VAppEvents.mof

To fix this we wrote a .bat file and compiled them one by one.

Once this was done, the only thing left to do was reinstall the Management Point. This time it was successful and we were good to go.

Winds Wu | Support Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/

When you use custom port settings in Microsoft System Center 2012 Configuration Manager Service Pack 1 (SP1), the task sequence may not run. For example, when you configure the site to use port numbers other than port 80 or port 433 as the default ports, the deployment fails because the operating system image cannot be downloaded. Additionally, the following error message is logged in the Smsts.log file:

Error downloading file from http://siteserver.sccm.local:80/SMS_DP_SMSPKG$/CMnnnnnn/sccm?/install.wim to C:\_SMSTaskSequence\Packages\CMnnnnnn\install.wim ApplyOperatingSystem 1996 (0x07CC)

There is a new downloadable hotfix available for this issue and you can get all the details here:

KB2838585 - FIX: A task sequence to install an operating system does not run when you use custom port settings in System Center Configuration Manager 2012 SP1 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2838585)

J.C. Hornbeck| Knowledge Engineer | Microsoft GBS Management and Security Division

Get the latest System Center news onFacebookandTwitter:

System Center All Up: http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/
System Center – Configuration Manager Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/configurationmgr/
System Center – Data Protection Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/dpm/
System Center – Orchestrator Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/orchestrator/
System Center – Operations Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/momteam/
System Center – Service Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager
System Center – Virtual Machine Manager Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/scvmm

Windows Intune: http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsintune/
WSUS Support Team blog: http://blogs.technet.com/sus/
The AD RMS blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/rmssupp/

The Forefront Endpoint Protection blog : http://blogs.technet.com/b/clientsecurity/
The Forefront Identity Manager blog : http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ms-identity-support/
The Forefront TMG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/isablog/
The Forefront UAG blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/edgeaccessblog/