Topic Last Updated—August 2008

A number of methods exist in Configuration Manager 2007 R2 that can assist you in monitoring the status of client computers on your Configuration Manager 2007 R2 site. These methods are largely based on the date of the latest discovery and inventory data received from the client. The following Configuration Manager 2007 reports can help you to examine this data:

Although these reports can assist you in the diagnosis of potential problems, the reasons why an active client might not have reported discovery or inventory data include the following:

Using Client Status Reporting to Monitor Client Status

Client status reporting in Configuration Manager 2007 R2 provides up-to-date information on the manageability of clients in a Configuration Manager 2007 hierarchy. This information can be used by the site administrator to identify individual client problems and to maintain a more accurate site database. It can also help to increase software distribution success rates.

Note
The information in this topic applies only to Configuration Manager 2007 R2 and Configuration Manager 2007 R3.

Client status reporting in Configuration Manager 2007 R2 provides the following improvements over existing methods for diagnosing the status of Configuration Manager 2007 clients:

  • Identifies clients that are online but are not requesting policy.

  • Provides a number of reports that detail the status of clients on your site.

  • Identifies clients that are online but have nonfunctioning client components.

  • Identifies clients that are online but do not have up-to-date discovery or inventory records.

  • Identifies clients that are offline.

  • Is not dependent on Configuration Manager 2007 site systems. For example, client status reporting will not be affected by problems with backlogged site systems which could cause traditional reporting mechanisms to generate inaccurate results.

  • Uses a number of data sources for its analysis, including data from the Configuration Manager 2007 site database, such as inventory, discovery, and heartbeat data. Additionally, client status reporting components gather and analyze policy request log files from management points, and can also check the status and activity of Configuration Manager 2007 client components.

    Important
    Client status reporting can help you to effectively monitor and report the status of Configuration Manager 2007 clients in your site. However, be aware that this feature could impact the privacy of users in your organization. Client status reporting gathers data on your client computers, including NetBIOS names and IP addresses, that might raise privacy concerns. This information is reported only to your Configuration Manager 2007 site server, and no information is sent to Microsoft. You should consider these privacy issues before installing client status reporting.
  • Retrieves data from the Configuration Manager 2007 database, such as inventory and heartbeat discovery data records for clients. It compares the dates of these records to specified client status reporting periods. Clients that have records within these client status reporting periods are categorized as active clients. Clients that have their obsolete bit set to 1 are specified as obsolete clients.

    Clients that do not have records within the client status reporting periods are categorized as inactive clients.

  • Uses client pulse and client ping to retrieve information about the status of the client. Clients that are categorized as inactive are then further examined. Client ping then returns further information from the client computer such as whether a client component might be malfunctioning, or whether the client is offline.

Limitations of Client Status Reporting

Client status reporting has the following limitations:

  • Client status reporting is a reporting tool only; it cannot repair problems found with the Configuration Manager 2007 client.

  • Client status reporting cannot always determine the exact cause for a problem.

  • The client status diagnosis is based on the assumption that all Configuration Manager 2007 site systems are working correctly. If a server is offline, an otherwise active client might be incorrectly diagnosed as inactive.

After installing client status reporting, full documentation is supplied in a separate help file for this feature.

See Also