Powershell as well as Powershell DSC Tips and Troubleshooting

Powershell DSC.md

Enable Debug Logging if you want to see verbose logs.

https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/heyscriptingguy/2014/10/16/use-powershell-and-dsc-to-enable-logging/ You can also enable Debug and Analytic logs in Windows Event Logging. https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/powershell/2014/01/03/using-event-logs-to-diagnose-errors-in-desired-state-configuration/

How do I kill a running DSC process?

E.g. if you want to reapply a DSC resource

rm C:\windows\system32\Configuration\*.mof*
gps wmi* | ? {$_.modules.ModuleName -like "*DSC*"} | stop-process -force

How do I view status of DSC operations?

Ref: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/dsc/troubleshooting#using-xdscdiagnostics-to-analyze-dsc-logs

Note: you need a DSC Module for this: https://github.com/PowerShell/xDscDiagnostics Install it Install-Module -Name xDscDiagnostics, then import it into your session as Import-Module -Name xDscDiagnostics.

Get the tasks that failed:

PS > Get-xDscOperation

ComputerName   SequenceId TimeCreated           Result   JobID                                 AllEvents            
------------   ---------- -----------           ------   -----                                 ---------            
VVAAPOCDB2     1          6/13/2018 7:13:43 AM  Failure  ff0a92a6-6ed8-11e8-a94a-000d3ab266f4  {@{Message=Deletin...
VVAAPOCDB2     2          6/13/2018 5:57:06 AM  Failure  99ac233d-6ece-11e8-a94a-000d3ab266f4  {@{Message=Getting...
VVAAPOCDB2     3          6/13/2018 5:57:11 AM  Success  99ac233e-6ece-11e8-a94a-000d3ab266f4  {@{Message=Getting...
VVAAPOCDB2     4          6/13/2018 5:57:15 AM  Success  99ac233f-6ece-11e8-a94a-000d3ab266f4  {@{Message=Getting...

Use its JobID to trace it.

Trace-xDscOperation -JobId ff0a92a6-6ed8-11e8-a94a-000d3ab266f4

Where do the raw logs of Invoke-DSCResource go?

Ref: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/37177678/desired-state-configuration-verbose-logging

C:\Windows\System32\Configuration\ConfigurationStatus

• Outputs are stored in JSON files.
• The relevant filename contains the JobID of the failed job.

Read the output with more E.g. more "C:\Windows\System32\Configuration\ConfigurationStatus\{FF0A92A6-6ED8-11E8-A94A-000D3AB266F4}-0.details.json"

  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:35.492+00:00", "type": "verbose", "message": "[VVSPPOCDB2]:                            [[xSqlServer]DirectResourceAccess] Changing the SQL system database default log path to 'L:\\LOGS' ..."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:35.492+00:00", "type": "verbose", "message": "[VVSPPOCDB2]:                            [[xSqlServer]DirectResourceAccess] Changing the SQL system database default file path to 'F:\\DATA' ..."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:35.555+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "F:\\DATA: The system cannot find the file specified."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:35.586+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "L:\\LOGS: The system cannot find the file specified."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:38.935+00:00", "type": "verbose", "message": "[VVSPPOCDB2]:                            [[xSqlServer]DirectResourceAccess] Changed database context to 'master'."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:38.950+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "The path specified by \"F:\\DATA\\tempdb.mdf\" is not in a valid directory."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:38.950+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "The path specified by \"L:\\LOGS\\templog.ldf\" is not in a valid directory."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:38.966+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "The path specified by \"F:\\DATA\\model.mdf\" is not in a valid directory."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:38.966+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "The path specified by \"L:\\LOGS\\modellog.ldf\" is not in a valid directory."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:38.966+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "The path specified by \"F:\\DATA\\msdbdata.mdf\" is not in a valid directory."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:38.982+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "The path specified by \"L:\\LOGS\\msdblog.ldf\" is not in a valid directory."},
  {"time": "2018-06-13T07:11:40.138+00:00", "type": "error", "message": "Exception setting \"StartupParameters\": \"STARTUPPARAMETERS: unknown property.\""},

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