Maximize the Power of the Admin Client

1. Maximize the Power of the Admin Client Rob Axelrod

2. What We'll Cover ... • Walking through the Admin client • Great features you never noticed In Admin • Working with little known but really useful console commands and techniques • Finding additional administration tools

3. Walking Through the Admin Client

4. People and Groups Renaming a Non-Notes User • The Problem • AdminP can't be used to update the Readers and Authors fields because the user needs to accept the name change in their ID • But, you can "trick" Domino into doing it!

5. People and Groups Renaming a Non-Notes User (cont.) • Here is the trick • Create a group by the same name as the person • Run the Action "Rename Group" • Force Adminp to process the request -- Issue the command "Tell Adminp process all" twice • Once to process the rename group request, and once to process the changes in the Authors and Readers fields Tip

6. People and Groups Renaming a Non-Notes User (cont.) • Here is the trick (cont.) • Manually rename the person in the Person Document • Delete the group

7. People and Groups Speeding Up User Registration • Use 'create file in background' to speed up registrations

8. People and Groups Speeding Up User Registration (cont.) • Take advantage of 'import from text file' to register large numbers of users • Particularly good if you can get human resources to dump you a text file of new hires in a format that is close to the required format in Administrator • Control separator with ini parameter BatchRegSeparator= • See Domino Administrator help for details

9. People and Groups Registering Non-Notes Users • Quick way to register a non-Notes user. • Uncheck both ID options • Be sure to change the Mail System from Notes anything else • This will allow you to create a person document and mailfile without generating a Notes ID Secret

10. People and Groups Validate Internet Address • Compares all Internet addresses and looks for duplicate addresses • Will recurse through additional directories that are configured in Directory Assistance • Dumps the output into your local Log.nsf database

11. People and Groups Managing Group Membership • Use the Group Management tool to discover all group privileges that an individual has regardless of whether they actually appear in the group • From the Groups view open Group Manager and select 'Only Member Hierarchies' • This lets you select an individual and see all of the groups they belong to either directly or through nesting Great Feature

12. People and Groups Managing Group Membership (cont.)

13. Files Resorting Files without the Directory Structure • Awesome for finding files • Quick way of comparing properties Good Thing

14. Files Managing Files • Create and delete subdirectories from the files tab • View files other than .nsf and .ntf • Pretty handy if you don't have easy OS level access to the box • Launch any .nsf or .ntf right from the files tab by double clicking on it

15. Files Manage ACLs • Use the ACL Manager in Administrator to add entries to multiple databases • Use the right click in the files tab to copy and paste ACLs (This is my favorite feature) Great

16. Server Monitoring Servers • Configure which servers will be monitored by right clicking on the servers list • Add or remove tasks as needed • Add or remove statistics • Select any statistics that are important to your environment

17. Server Monitoring Servers (cont.)

18. Server Broadcasting a Message • When broadcasting a message, it shows up in the status bar • No one looks at it! • Broadcast a message with a popup • From Server Status tab • Choose the Broadcast Message task • Just precede the message with a '(!)'

19. Server Viewing Statistics • From the Statistics Tab • Use F9 to refresh • Gives the same results that you would get with a 'Show Stats' but without the info scrolling off of the screen

20. Messaging Creating Messaging Reports • You should see the reports database in the messaging tab • If you don't, either you don't have ACL rights to it, or it doesn't exist • Reports.nsf creates great detailed reports on messaging usage, but ... • On a very active server they seem to bring the server down after time (assuming they are running on the server) • Uses the MTC task, but this is another server killer

21. Messaging Tracing Mail Routing • Mail Trace from messaging tab is nice since it doesn't drop an email into the user's mailfile so they don't need to know that you are testing mail

22. Bookmark Pane -- Favorites Getting Server Information • The Server Properties box is an awesome place to get quick stats on a server • Right click on the server name from the Favorites pane and choose Properties

23. Bookmark Pane -- Favorites Getting Server Information (cont.) Use the server properties window to configure ports on the server too!

24. Additional Administrative Tips Directory Customizations Worth Making • Adding Views to the Directory • Modifying the Directory is a pain • Every time you upgrade you need to worry about your design elements being stomped by the template • A concern with adding views is that they will degrade server performance • The following views are really worth having • You can solve the above problems by creating them either as 'Private' or 'Desktop Private on First Use' Issue

25. Additional Administrative Tips Directory Customizations Worth Making (cont.) • View of People by ID Expiration Date • People view sorted by a column with the formula @Certificate( [expiration] ; Certificate) • This gives you the expiration date of each users ID

26. Additional Administrative Tips Directory Customizations Worth Making (cont.) • View of Groups By Member • Groups view sorted and categorized by the member field.

27. Additional Administrative Tips Directory Customizations Worth Making (cont.) • Accessible View of $Users • Create a copy of the $Users view • Rename the view • To see what $Users looks like hold down ctrl-shift while opening names.nsf.

28. Additional Administrative Tips Another Trick People Ask About All the Time • Creat a replica on a server when you don't have network/security access to the server that has a copy of the file • Go to the R4 workspace • Make sure that no database is selected • Choose File -- Replication -- New Replica • Type in the server and file name of the target database • Click select • Fill in the New Replica dialog as normal Hidden Bonus

29. Working With the Console

30. Cool Console Tricks • Pipe the output from the console to a text file • show statistics >stats.txt • The file name is relative to the Domino program directory

31. Cool Console Tricks • You can launch a batch of console commands from a batch file that resides on the server • Great for triggering replication from a hub to a large number of servers manually • Keep text files of the commonly used commands in the Domino program directory of the server • Syntax is > batchfile.txt Good Thing

32. Cool Console Tricks Great But Seldom Used Commands • show database dbname.nsf • Displays the # of deletion stubs by Note type and the byte size of every view • Quicker than using NotesPeek when working with deletion stubs

33. Cool Console Tricks Great But Seldom Used Commands (cont.) • show transactions • Provides detailed statistics on all NRPC transactions occurring on the server • Gives you an idea of what kind of things your users do • Use this data when you want to build benchmarking scripts

34. Cool Console Tricks Great But Seldom Used Commands (cont.) • TRACE servername/org or trace port !!! servername/org • Returns exactly the same information that you get from a client network trace in the 'preferences' dialog • Great for confirming connectivity and resolving connectivity problems • Once I discovered this -- I use it almost every day Great Feature

35. Finding Other Tools

36. Other Tools • Two options for automating tasks • Know LotusScript/Java (or have a friend that does) and write your own tool anytime you need one • Know where to look for tools that other people made (often for free)

37. Other Tools www.notes.net • Iris Sandbox • If you want to automate a common task, odds are you aren't the first to think of it and odds are someone posted their cut at it here • Almost all code is open for you to edit and improve and free for your non-commercial use • Bad news is it is all unsupported and without warrantee Re-use

38. Other Tools www.notes.net (cont.) • Iris Sandbox (cont.) • Some tools I can't live without from Iris • NPing/NotesConnect -- This utility tests network availability over a specific port • Antrid -- Allows you to either copy or change replica ID's of databases • Awesome for the standard NTF files as well as for building test environments • NotesPeek -- This is great for looking at the guts of an NSF • It lets you see deletion stubs as well as profile documents • A Domino detective's best friend (When the user says "duh, I didn't delete anything)

39. Other Tools • Some 3rd party tools that are helpful for administrators and worth a look -- especially for large environments • Percussion ServerAdmin Plus • ACL Management / User Management / Monitoring and Database Management • GSX Utilities • Includes all kinds of cool monitoring tools as well as an ID management tool • TeamStudio Delta (The whole TeamStudio suite is super) • Not just for developers, really useful for comparing templates to find differences in design as well as comparing individual documents • Useful in making sure that server configurations are consistent • Help Software Power Tools • This has a bunch of utilities for automating day to day admin tasks

40. Other Tools • Tons more tools -- check out: • www.notes411.com • www.searchdomino.com • www.lotus.com/partners • www.dominopower.com

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