Agent Icon

The agent icon will always remain visible in the system tray for systems configured to show the icon. Prior to this release, Windows would hide the icon if it had not been accessed in a while.

Status Icon

Added a new status icon to represent that an agent is online and that someone is logged into that machine. If someone is logged in, then the tool tip for the icon lists the login name.

Machine ID / Group ID filter -

Machine Count

The machine ID / group ID filter area now lists the number of machines matching the current machine/group/view filter. Use this information as a quick reference to identify the number of machines potentially effected by any action.

View Definitions - Collections

Collections are now defined using the View Definition window in the machine ID / group ID filter. A new check box labeled "Only show selected machine IDs" lets you specify an arbitrary list of machine IDs seen when using this view. Collections, as with all View Definitions, can be private, shared or public.

View Definitions - Missing Patches

The View Definition window includes a new "Use Patch Policy" check box showing machines missing patches greater than or equal to a specified number to optionally apply the patch policies. If this box is checked, only missing approved patches will be counted.

View Definitions - Patch Scan Options

The View Definition window includes the following new options for patch scan scripts:

• Patch scan scheduled / not scheduled
• Patch scan success / failure
• Patch scan has / has not executed in last x minutes/hours/days

All alert email functions have database access

All alert email functions now include data pulled from the database. The same format provided in the Get Variable script function may be used in any alert formatted as follows: <db-view/column>. For example, to include the computer name of the machine generating the alert use <db-vMachine/ComputerName>

SW License

The Audit > SW Licenses function highlights when duplicate licenses are found on the same group. The duplicate license count is now a link that lets you drill down and get a list of machines that share the same license code.

Machine Summary

Added the following to the Machine Info tab:

• currently logged in user
• domain/workgroup
• Last check in time
• last reboot time
• first check in time

Added new log type Log Monitoring

Machine Summary -

New Ticket link

The Machine Summary page now includes a New Ticket link at the top of the page. Clicking the link opens a new ticket assigned to this machine id. An optional interface allows you to configure this link to access external systems as well. See the Machine Summary online user assistance topic for details.

External Link to Machine Summary

The following URL displays the Machine Summary web page for a specific machine ID: http//servername?machName=MachineID.groupID
You are first prompted to login, if you are not already.

Packager

The application Packager function used for creating custom installations now supports output packages larger than 2 GB.

Distribution

The Distribution function, under the Scripts tab, histograms the recurring schedules for scripts. This function quickly highlights potential server loading by showing peaks where multiple machines are scheduled to run the same script at the same time. This release adds a drill down capability to the histogram such that you can click any peak on the histogram and get a list of machines that make up that peak.

Scripts -CheckVariable - Evaluated Expression

A new script IF EvaluateExpression command evaluates expressions consisting of script variables from a parent script and six mathematical operators +, -, *, /, (, and ) to perform the comparison to determine whether to execute the THEN or ELSE statements.  For example, you can evaluate the expression

IF (#variable1# + #variable2#) * 100 > #variable3#

where the variables contain numeric values from a parent script that obtained them using GetVariable commands.

Scripts -

OS Type

The OS type selection for script steps now includes the options for "Mac OS X" and "All Windows Operating Systems".

Scripts -

GetFile

A new option sends an alert for the GetFile script command when the file is identical to the one that was retrieved the last time.

Scripts -

GetVariable - Expressions

Added the ability to specify an expression that consists of script variables and six mathematical operators +, -, *, /, (, and ) that will be evaluated and assigned to a new script variable.  For example, ((#variable1# + #variable2#) + 17.4) / (#variable3# * 4). The script variables must contain numeric values.

Scripts-

GetVariable - WMI Values

Added the ability to specify a WMI namespace, class, and property and assign the retrieved value from a managed machine to a script variable.  The format of the specified WMI property is NameSpace:Class.Property.  For example, root\cimv2:Win32_OperatingSystem.FreePhysicalMemory

Scripts -

Set Registry Value

Added ability to set registry values with the data type REG_MULTI_SZ. Separate each string with the two character sequence of "\0".  Use the three character escape sequence of "\\0" to include "\0" as part of a value string. This capability requires the Kaseya 2008 agent.

Dashboards and Dashlets

Added a new Dashboard List function to manage configurable monitoring windows called "Dashboards". Each administrator can create their own dashboards and add one or more custom "Dashlets" in each dashboard. Each dashlet has the following customizable attributes; position, size, machine filter, header and refresh rate. Dashlets include:

• Alarm Summary
• Alarm Rotator
• Alarm Ticker
• Network Status
• Group Alarm Status
• Monitoring Set Status
• Monitor Status
• Machines Online
• Top N - Monitor Alarm Chart
• KES Status
• KES Threats

Alert -
Format Alert Email

The Alert > Agent Status > Format Alert Email window now has two new formats. One for a single machine going offline. The second when multiple machines in the same group go offline. Note that a separate alert is generated for each machine group.

Pre-Packaged Monitor Sets and Event Sets

Kaseya 2008 features a wide variety of performance and service monitor sets and event sets. These sets monitor server and workstation performance objects including SQL, Exchange and other key performance objects such as DNS, DHCP and disk drives. Event sets monitor the Windows event logs for a variety of application, security and system event entries. Events set alerts are defined using Monitor > Alert > Edit Event Sets. Sample monitor sets and events sets are loaded with the installation of Kaseya 2008 or by using the System > Configure page. Sample monitor sets and sample event sets can be identified by the naming convention. Each name begins with ZC-.

Monitor Set Naming Example:

    ZC-SV3 – DHCP Server – DHCP Services

Event Set Naming Example:

    ZC-CM1-E1 Antivirus Events

Monitoring - General

• Alarms are now optional.
• Alarm state (Open, Closed) and notes no longer exist for monitor alarms. This data is now a read-only log.
• New alarm state data contains current state of monitor counters, services, process and SNMP. Alerts, system check and log monitoring data are not included in this state data.
• Monitor view consoles are updated to use the new alarm state data appropriately.

Log Monitoring

Added new function to monitor the parsing of log files. 

• Ability to parse log files created from specific machines and syslogs from devices.
• Ability to pull log data into custom field parameters for reporting.
• New log called Log Monitoring to view and report on log data returned.
• Added to monitor alarms with the new alarming criteria; if event happens once, if number events happen over a duration, and if an event doesn’t occur for a duration.
• Alarm is not required.
• Added Log Monitoring to Logs report.
• Added Log Monitoring list to Machine Summary.
• Added Log Monitoring results to Executive Summary Report sections; System Activity and Network Health Score.

Windows Event Logs

Enhancements to Windows Event Logs:

• Added support for all Windows event logs. Update List By Scan function pulls event log types from the machine scanned.
• Added new Windows Vista event log types of Critical and Verbose.
• Event Alerts – alarms are optional
• Event Alerts – added new alarming criteria, if event happens once, if number events happen over a duration, and if an event doesn’t occur for a duration.
• Event Alerts – Added re-arm time
• Event log reports support all event logs.

Monitor Sets - Counters

In the Counter Thresholds tab of Monitor Sets enter an instance of *ALL for a monitor set object, as opposed to selecting *Total which combines the results. For example, if multiple drives are determined to exist on a machine, based on the Audit function, the monitor set with an instance of *ALL will dynamically select a counter for each drive.

Monitor Sets - Services

In the Services Check tab of Monitor Sets, select the *ALL selection to monitor all services set to automatic on a monitored machine, instead of having to address each service individually.

Monitor Sets - SNMP

In the SNMP Sets wizard in SNMP Sets select an instance of All to address each SNMP instance in an SNMP object separately. These instances are identified by the last SNMP walk perform during a LAN Watch.

SNMP Sets – Percentage Comparison

SNMP Sets now provides a percentage comparison of one SNMP Object to another, for example, if ifInErrors is greater than x% of total UcastPackets.

SNMP Quick Sets

An SNMP walk during a LAN Watch identifies all SNMP objects that apply to an SNMP device. Using Assign SNMP, you can click the link of a discovered SNMP device and create an SNMP "quick set" to monitor that device.

Monitor Sets and SNMP Sets -
Auto Learn

Monitor sets and SNMP sets can to set to automatically adjust their alarm thresholds based on real word data for a specfied time period. Once an auto-learn session has been completed, the alarm thresholds can be fine-tuned manually.

Monitor Sets and SNMP Sets -Individualized Sets

An "individualized" monitor set or "individualized" SNMP set can be created for a specific machine or SNMP device, based on a "standard" monitor set, a "standard" SNMP set or a "standard" SNMP quick set. From that point forward changes made to the individualized set apply only to the machine or device it is monitoring.

System Check - Custom Name

Added custom name to system check. The name is used in alarm and email format templates.

Email Reader

Ticketing > Email Reader can now be customized to ignore emails containing specific text strings. Use this feature to prevent ticket creation when emails are received from things like email bounces. Typical bounced emails contain the string "Undeliverable: ".

External Link to View Ticket

The following URL displays the Ticketing > View Ticket web page for a specific ticket:
http//servername?ticid=ticketnumber
You are first prompted to login, if you are not already.

Product Identification

Added a Product column to various patch screens to help identify the product category associated with the specific patch. Also added this attribute to the Patch Details screen. For those cases where a specific patch is used across multiple operating system families (i.e., Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Vista, etc.), the product category is "Common Windows Component". Examples of the "Common Windows Component" product include Internet Explorer, .Net, Windows Media Player, MDAC, MSXML, etc. This attribute has replaced the patch name on those screens where patch name was previously displayed.

Patch Status -
Reboot Button

Added a "Reboot Now" button next to the "Reboot Pending" notification on the Patch Status page. Clicking the button schedules an immediate reboot on the machine. A confirmation dialog box is presented to prevent inadvertent reboots.

Automatic Updates

Added capability to schedule automatic updates on a monthly basis.  Automatic Updates can be scheduled daily, weekly on a specified day of the week, or monthly on a specified day of the month (1-31).

NOTE: When processing monthly automatic updates, if the current month has fewer days than the scheduled day of the month, the automatic updates is processed on the last day of the month. For example, if the current month is April and the scheduled day of the month is 31, the patches are scheduled on April 30^th.

Patch Alerts

Added a new machine level patch alert. This alert, when configured, is generated when the Windows Automatic Update Policy on the machine is changed to a setting (disabled, enabled, user control) that is different from that specified in the Windows Auto Update function under the Patch Mgmt tab. The Windows Auto Update function displays the current Windows Automatic Update Policy setting on the machine. This setting is obtained during each patch scan, and the alert is generated, if necessary, during the processing of patch scan results.

Patch Update

A "Patch Group By" dropdown list has been added to allow the user to change how the displayed patches are grouped. Before this release current grouping was based on the update classification and could not be changed. Now, the user can group by either update classification or product. The screen layout was modified to include both product and update classification in the presented data. Patches are still sorted by KB article within each grouping so that patches having the same KB article number are next to each other.

Patch Policy

Changes to approval/denial of patches include:

• The former "collections" functions on the System tab have been moved to the Patch Policy section under the Patch Mgmt tab.
• These former collections are now called "patch policies".
• Standard administrators can only see patch policies that contain machines they have rights to see or patch policies they create. This should allow standard administrators to now safely manage patch polices without interfering with administrators restricted to a different set of machines.
• When a new patch policy is created, all active patches in that policy are now automatically set to pending approval rather than the previous default behavior of approved.
• The "Patch Approval" function has been renamed "Approve by Policy" to distinguish it from the new "Approve by Patch" function.

Approval by Policy -  Group By

Modified the screen to be able to select the view of the status table based on update classifications or based on products. Both views are presenting totals from the same data source, so the total patch count for each approval status are the same, just distributed differently depending on the view selected. When a drill down is selected to the patch details page, the patches are grouped by the classification (sorted within classification by product) or by product (sorted within product by classification) based on the view selection.

Approval by Policy - Save As

Added "Save As" capability to copy the current patch approval policy as a new policy with identical settings. All patch approval/denial statuses are copied as are the default approval statuses for the policy.
NOTE: Machine membership is NOT copied to the new policy.

Approval by Policy - Default Approval Status

Default approval status can now be set for each update classification and each product within a patch policy rather than just for the policy.  This allows setting patch policies to automatically approve selected update classifications such as security updates while automatically denying other update classifications such as service packs and automatically setting the rest of the update classifications to pending approval. It alsos allows setting patch policies to automatically deny patches for selected products such as Office 2000 while automatically approving patches for products such as Office 2007 while automatically setting patches for the rest of the products to pending approval.

NOTE: If there is a conflict between the two default values, the more restrictive default value is used. For example, if one default is denied, the patch is set to denied. If one default is pending approval, the patch is set to pending approval. Both defaults must be approved for the patch to be set to approved.

Approval by Policy - Drill Down Details

• Added the ability to add an optional short note (max 500 characters) to document why a patch was approved or denied.  This note is displayed under the patch title when the "Show Details" check box is checked. The note is added to when the Approve or Deny buttons are selected.
• Added additional columns in the display to make the screen more informative.
• Added ability to filter list of patches on details view.

Approval by Patch

Added a new function under Patch Mgmt > called "Approval by Patch". The data displayed on this page is the same data available in "Approval by Policy". It is just displayed from the patch perspective rather than from the policy perspective. Approving or denying patches from this page provides an "approve or deny once" capability. Includes the ability to filter the list of patches.

NOTE: This function is only available for master administrators because it affects ALL patch approval policies.

KB Override

Added a new function under Patch Mgmt called "KB Override". Using this page, you can set a default patch approval status override (Approve or Deny) for a specific Microsoft knowledge base (KB) article. This override status is used rather than the patch policies' default approval status when adding a new patch to all patch approval policies. It also resets the approval status for the specified KB article in ALL patch policies. To add the KB override, a patch must already exist in the system with the specified KB article number.

NOTE: This function is only available for master administrators because it affects ALL patch approval policies.

Chat

A new option in Remote Cntl > Chat, "Automatically close chat window when either party ends chat" lets you control how the window behaves at the end of a chat session. Uncheck this box to leave the chat session open after the other side closes the window. This gives people a chance to read the last message or copy data into another file.

ActiveX

ActiveX installs all remote control views for the admin and the remote control server for the user when the admin uses the Video Streaming function. This can cause problems if the user’s browser blocks ActiveX controls from running. With this release, if the user’s browser detects the ActiveX control could not run, then the user is presented with a link to manually download and run the remote control package manually.

K-VNC

K-VNC is now supported on Windows 2000, XP, and 2003 in addition to Vista.

Backup Status

Added a new Backup Status dashboard, which provides:

• A list of backups in progress including % complete
• A backup summary pie chart showing scheduled, skipped, failed or canceled backups
• Backup status by machine showing status backups scheduled, skipped, failed or canceled for each machine

The time period over which to collect results is selectable.

Backup Sets

Enhancements to backup set management include:

• Option to delete backup set before running backup. This reduces the amount of disk space necessary on the backup server.
• Additional folder and volume backup set data detail. Report now includes type of backup performed (full, incremental, differential) as well as the number of disk volumes backed up for volume backups.
• Access to full log detail from backup set detail page via hyperlink.
• Canceling a backup in progress using an option from the backup set detail page.

Backup Alerts

Alarms are now optional for alerts. Additionally, two new alerts have been added:

• Skip recurring backup for offline machines. An alert is generated if a recurring backup is skipped on a machine a designated (user set) number of times
• Alert when image location hard disk used reaches user defined number of Mbytes free.

Backup Logs

Enhanced error detection and recovery.

• If the original full backup is missing when performing an incremental or differential backup, the backup is now reported as a full backup.
• More robust detection of errors when end-user has uninstalled the Acronis agent locally

Reports -

Backup

Backup report now offers option to include or exclude machines without data.

Reports -

Patch Management

• Added "Manual Install Updates" to patch management report filtering to include all patches that require manual installation, including those patches that can only be installed via the Windows Update web site.
• Added ability to filter patch reports by either the existing standard filter selections or a custom filter for a specified comma delimited list of KB Article Numbers and/or Security Bulletin Numbers.
• Added a summary table of machines and count of installed patches to the "Patches Installed in Last x Days" report segment.

Reports -

Logs

• Added a new checkbox to the Logs report named "Preserve plain text formatting". Check this box to display plain text logs with the formatting from plain text files preserved in the HTML page.
• New Log Monitoring Report - Reporting on data returned from the new log monitoring feature. Allows for filtering on log text and custom fields by log parser.
• New Event Log Frequency Report - Report gives the most occurring eventIDs for the selected event log types for each machine ID.

Reports -

Monitor Action Log

New log describing the actions that occur when a monitor alarm threshold is met. Contains information on alarm created, ticket created, scripts scheduled, and emails sent.

Reports -

Event Log Frequency

New report displaying top number (N) of windows event logs per machine ID.

Reports -

Executive Summary

Added Log Monitoring to system activity.

Added Log Monitoring Custom allowing to count, total, average, min and max of log parser custom number fields.

Report – Monitor Action Log

Added monitor action log to monitor reports section.

DNS Computer Name

The fully qualified DNS computer name is now available for any machine that is a member of a domain. Members of workgroups return the computer name only in this field. Display the DNS Computer Name in either the Agent > Agent Status function or in the Aggregate Table report.

CPU Count

The CPU Count number, returned by audit, is now available on both the Agent > Agent Status function or in the Aggregate Table report.

Log History

Added capability for the following to be aged and/or archived:

• Agent Log
• Configuration Changes
• Network Statistics
• Script Log
• Remote Control Log
• Alarm Log
• Event Log
• Monitor Log
• SNMP Log
• Log Monitoring

The archiving of logs places log table data into text files. These text files are stored at a specified location and categorized by log table and machine ID.

Agent Install Packages - Standard Administrators

Standard administrators are now restricted to creating agent install packages using existing group IDs.

Macintosh Agents

A Macintosh agent is now supported. The agent type is specified in the Create Package wizard in the Agent > Deploy Agents function. If an administrator password is omitted from the Macintosh installation package, the installer prompts for administrator credentials during the installation as long as the silent option is not selected.

Rename Group

The Agent > Rename Group function under the agent tab, lets you rename any machine group ID or subgroup.

Rename Agent

Agents now check in using a GUID instead of the machine ID. Old agents can still check in using the machine ID and are fully supported except for renaming capability. Renaming now just changes the display name of the agent. The agent GUID stays the same. So in order to rename agents in the new system, the agent must be upgraded to Kaseya 2008 first.

Hide Common Computer Names

Typical laptop computers may have multiple MAC addresses and LAN Watch may detect both MAC addresses for the same laptop, for example, wireless LAN vs. direct connect LAN. So an additional checkbox has been added to hide machines that have a common computer name in the same group ID. Only the MAC address used by the agent to connect to the Kaseya Server is reported.

vPro

This release supports Intel’s vPro-enabled processors.

• vPro enabled machines can be discovered using LAN Watch.
• LAN Watch discovery can include an audit of the hardware assets of vPro enabled machines.
• Remote Cntl > Power Mgmt provides scheduling of power ups, power downs, and reboots of vPro-enabled machines.

Active Directory

LAN Watch has been extended to integrate with Active Directory. Running LAN Watch on a primary domain controller automatically discovers all computers and users listed in AD. Two new functions, View AD Computers and View AD Users, display Active Directory results. You may also deploy agents to Active Directory computers found by LAN Watch as well as update user information pulled from Active Directory.

AD Logon

Any user discovered by LAN Watch may be tagged as a new Administrator logon or User logon to the VSA using View AD Users. These logons are all authenticated by the domain controller the logon is attached to. So now you can use a single logon on both your network and the VSA, all controlled by Active Directory.

NOTE: You can remove both the Domain field and the Remember Me checkbox from the logon page by checking the appropriate boxes on the Logon Policy function under the System tab.

Copy Settings - Exclude Patch File Source

A new Agent > Copy Setting option, Patch File Source, lets you exclude or replace the patch file source. The patch file source is frequently a customer-specific setting and should not be overridden when copying settings.

Import/Export

The System > Migrate function has been replaced with a new Agent > Import/Export function. Exported accounts capture all machine settings, including script schedules, into an xml file. Use Import/Export to move settings attached to any agent. Note that Import/Export only moves settings and not data attached to a machine. Log data is not moved with Import/Export.

Suspend Agent

Suspend all agent operations (scripts, monitoring, patching, etc...) without changing the agent settings. Use Suspend to disable accounts without deleting the agent or modifying any of the agent’s settings.

Admin Role Management

Administrator management has been enhanced with this release to allow non-master administrators to more securely manage other administrators. The administrator management functions under the System tab, restrict non-master administrators to only seeing other administrators that are members of the same roles. Note that master administrators rights may never be removed by standard administrators. Effected functions are:

• Admin Roles – Create/Delete
• Membership
• Group Access
• Function Access
• Login Hours
• Admin Accounts – Create/Delete
• Enable/Disable
• Set Password
• Admin History

Function Access

A new Enable All/Disable All button gives you a quick way to turn access on or off for all functions for an admin role. Click Disable All when configuring an admin role that does not have access to many functions.

Function Access -

Summary Page

Access to the tabs on the Machine Summary page can now be granted or blocked on a per admin role basis using Function Access.

Function Access -

Lock Settings to Match

Function Access settings for an admin role may now be locked to some other admin role. Any changes to the Function Access list for one admin role are automatically applied to all roles locked to it. If you create unique admin roles in order to isolate access to machine group, but want to give each role the same list of functions, then you can use this new feature to manage all function access from a single role.

License Manager

License limits now flow down to subgroups. Subgroups now inherit the license limit applied to their parent groups if the subgroup does not have a limit specifically applied.

Login Policy

The login policy is now enforced for both user and administrator logins. Prior releases only applied login policy to administrator accounts.

Customize

The customize function now lets you further customize the logon screen. You can add additional links on the left edge of the screen. This may be a useful spot to place a link to the Video Streaming page (/getHelp.asp) for example.

Database Views -

vBackupLog view

Added a new column to the vBackupLog database view. imageSize shows the size in bytes of the backup file. If the log entry does not relate to a backup then this column returns a zero.

API Web Service

Added a web service that provides an API (application programming interface) to the VSA. Enable the web service using the System > Configure function. Once enabled, the web service may be queried from the URL http://<your-vsa-server>/vsaWs/KaseyaWS.asmx using a valid administrator credential. A test client example, access control rules, and further details may be found in the directory <kaseya-install-dir>\vsaWs.