Running an Automation Plan

You run or schedule your Automation Plan from the Automation Plans dashboard in the Server Automation domain. If you run or schedule an Automation Plan from any other dashboard or panel, it will fail. The Automation Plan Engine runs the Automation Plan, one step at a time, by opening, processing, and then stopping each step in the order that you specify when you create the Automation Plan. The Automation Plan Engine calculates the state of each step and uses these states to control the execution of the Automation Plan. In the Automation Plans dashboard, you must specify one or more endpoints for each step in an Automation Plan. You must specify the correct value for each parameter in a step or a failure step to ensure that the step or failure step can run successfully. Only steps that are Fixlets or Tasks can have parameters.

Before you begin

You must log on to the BigFix console as a master operator or console operator. If you log on as a console operator, you must have permission to target each endpoint that you select. You must have Custom Content and Can Create Actions permissions set to Yes to run an Automation Plan. For more information about BigFix permissions, see Operator's Permissions.. You must run the Automation Plan in the Automation Plans dashboard in the Server Automation domain. If you run an Automation Plan in any other dashboard or panel, it will fail.

To schedule an Automation Plan, ensure that the latest version of the Automation Plan Engine is installed on your BigFix console. If the latest version is not installed, the Install Latest Automation Plan Engine Task is relevant. To upgrade to the latest version of the Automation Plan Engine, see Upgrade the Automation Plan Engine.

About this task

The Automation Plan Engine opens a step as it begins to process it. When the step processing is complete, the Automation Plan Engine stops the step. If the step is successful, the Automation Plan Engine then opens and processes the next step. If the step fails, the Automation Plan Engine then opens the associated failure step, if one exists, and processes it. To understand how the Automation Plan Engine calculates if a step is complete or not, review the state mapping information that is described here. To calculate the overall state of an Automation Plan step, the Automation Plan Engine gets the individual results that are retrieved from each of the endpoints. The Automation Plan Engine uses these results to calculate the overall state of the step. This state mapping information shows how that overall state of the step is used by the Automation Plan Engine to control the running of the Automation Plan. The Automation Plan Engine runs each step in the Automation Plan based on a wait, success, or failure status. The following table outlines the states that map to the wait, success, or failure status.

Table 1. Automation Plan state mapping
Status of action	Outcome of action status	Description
Running Evaluating Waiting Pending Downloads Postponed Pending Restart Pending Message Pending Login Not Reported	Wait	The action is still in progress or waiting for user input. The Automation Plan Engine waits for this status to change.
<Error> Failed Canceled Download Failed Invalid Signature Expired Completed Locked Constrained	Failure	The action cannot proceed. There might be an error or problem with the targeted endpoint. The Automation Plan Engine stops the Automation Plan.
Fixed Not Relevant	Success	The action completed successfully. The Automation Plan Engine proceeds to the next step.

A final state for the Automation Plan step is not calculated until all of the targeted endpoints report a state that maps to either a success or failure decision. Until that happens, the overall state of the Automation Plan step is wait. This includes the scenario where one or more targeted endpoints do not exist or are unavailable for some other reason, for example, if the endpoint is powered off, or if you do not have permission to target the endpoint. Unless all of the targeted endpoints report a status that maps to either a success or failure decision, the Automation Plan stays in a wait state. In the case of non-existent or unavailable endpoints, this results in an infinite wait state, and causes the Automation Plan to wait indefinitely.

When you run an Automation Plan, you must specify one or more endpoints for each step. You can assign endpoints to a step by using one of the following approaches:

Select one or more computers from the list of computers that are managed by the BigFix server.
Select one or more computer groups from the list of computers groups that are managed by the BigFix server.
Type the names of one or more computers.
Specify the same endpoints as another step in the Automation Plan.

Important: You must not add a Baseline as a step if it contains any Component that prompts for parameter values when run. You cannot specify the values of the parameters in a step that is a Baseline. If you run an Automation Plan containing a Baseline that has a Component with an unspecified parameter, the Automation Plan might fail or result in some other unexpected behavior. Only steps that are Fixlets or Tasks can have parameters that prompt for values when run.

Scheduling an Automation Plan, setting a stop time, and prefetching downloads

You can schedule an Automation Plan to run at a specific date and time. The date and time that you specify in the Take Automation Plan Action panel is the BigFix console local time. The BigFix console converts the specified time to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) and the Automation Plan Engine runs the Automation Plan at the specified UTC time. If the scheduled UTC time and date are less than or equal to the current UTC time and date, the Automation Plan Engine runs the Automation Plan immediately.

When you are scheduling an Automation Plan, you can specify a plan stop time as well as a scheduled start time. This helps you to set a limit on the length of time for which the plan runs. You can only set the plan stop time in the Take Automation Plan Action screen. You cannot set the plan stop time in the plan definition in Default Settings. You can only set the plan stop time if you have set a plan start time. The plan stop time is the console local time.

This graphic shows a screenshot of the Scheduling section of the Take Automation Plan Action screen. Start and stop times are configured for the plan.

Note the following important points about how the Automation Plan Engine handles step and Baseline actions that are in-process when the plan stop time occurs:

After the point at which the plan stop time occurs, no more plan steps are issued by the Automation Plan Engine but the engine completes any actions that are still running.
Target endpoints that are targeted by a step that is open at the time of exceeding the plan stop time continue to process the step action.
The Automation Plan Engine stops issuing Baseline components when the stop time occurs. The Automation Plan Engine waits for currently in-process component to complete. The remaining components in the Baseline are set to not relevant and are not run. If there is a further step in the plan, it is reported as not run. A status in the dashboard shows that all components of the baseline might not have completed because the plan exceeded the stop time. In addition, the engine log file pe_console.log, includes an entry to indicate that all components in a Baseline might not have been processed if the plan exceeds the plan stop time.
Any parallel steps being executed at plan stop time will run to completion. Fixlets or Tasks in parallel steps are handled the same way that sequential plan Fixlets or Tasks are handled. Baselines are handled according to how they processed in sequential plan steps, described in the previous bullet.
The Automation Plan Engine does not restart any endpoints that are in a Pending Restart state after the stop time occurs.
For parallel plans, the Automation Plan Action Status dashboard shows the next step that was due to be run for each branch in the parallel plan (if there were further steps to run). For sequential plans, the dashboard shows the next step that was due to run (assuming there were further steps in the plan).
The Automation Plan Action Status dashboard displays a status of Plan stop time exceeded for any actions that was running when the plan stop time is exceeded. If the action is a Fixlet, the Fixlet runs to completion, which can be Fixed or Failed. If the action is for a Baseline, the Baseline component currently in flight runs to completion but any remaining components are not run. The Baseline percentage completion is set to Partial.
If you are using the email notification service, email notifications include the plan step status at the point at which the plan stop time occurs.

If you are scheduling your Automation Plan, you can prefetch the content that needs to be downloaded and you can specify a start time for the prefetch. This allows you to download the content required as part of the Automation Plan in advance of the execution of the plan. This speeds up the execution of the Automation Plan so that when the plan runs, the content has been downloaded in advance and the plan runs much faster. The system evaluates the relevance of each step in the plan on the target endpoints and downloads only content that is relevant and required for the execution of the plan at the point of the plan submission. This helps minimize network traffic. If there are steps in the plan with download content that is not relevant until an earlier step has run, the content in these steps is not be prefetched and is downloaded at run-time. To prefetch downloads, select the Enable prefetching check box when you are scheduling your Automation Plan. To run the prefetch immediately, select the Starts immediately option. To schedule the prefetch, select the Starts on button and select a start date and time. If you select the Enable prefetching option, an open action is created for each step in your Automation Plan that has a prefetch or download statement. You can view these actions from the Automation Plan Action Status dashboard.

Important: If Enable prefetching actions run in parallel with Automation Plan steps to the same endpoints, the step waits until all prefetch download steps are completed. Because the step action and the step download action share the same download, the BigFix client detects this and waits for it to complete.

Important: There is a potential performance impact associated with using the Enable prefetching option because an additional action is created for each step that requires software downloads. The recommended maximum number of open actions on the system is 2,500. For any given Automation Plan, an action is open for the Automation Plan and also for each individual step in the Automation Plan. If you use the Enable prefetching option, additional actions are created and opened for each step that requires software downloads.

Note: If an endpoint does not yet exist, the Automation Plan Engine waits until the endpoint is created before executing the step.

Complete the following steps to run or schedule an Automation Plan.

Procedure

Open the Server Automation domain.
From the navigation tree in the Domain Panel, click Automation Plans. The Automation Plans dashboard is opened. A list of available Automation Plans is displayed in the dashboard. To sort the list, click any column title. To filter all columns in the list, use the filter field.
Select an Automation Plan from the list.
Click Take Action. The Take Automation Plan Action panel is opened. To schedule the plan, specify a stop time, and prefetch downloads:
- To schedule the Automation Plan, click Configure Plan, enable the check box under Execution and specify the start time and date for the Automation Plan by selecting a date and time from the Starts on menu. You can also type values for the date and time in the Start Time field and the Start Date field. The time and date that you specify is the console local time. The default values of the Start Date list and the Start Time list are the current BigFix console local time and date.
- To specify a stop time for the plan, check the Stops on button and select the time and data on which you want the plan to stop. You can only specify a stop time if you have scheduled a start time.
- You can select the Enable prefetching option to download the relevant content required for each step in the Automation Plan in advance of the execution of the Automation Plan. If you select this option, an open action is created for each step in your Automation Plan.
Select a step from the Steps list. By default, targets are not automatically loaded in the Available Targets list. If you want to load all available targets, click the search icon or press Enter. To view only the applicable endpoints for the selected step, select the Use applicability check box. To view all the endpoints that are managed by the BigFix server, clear the Use applicability check box. If there are no applicable endpoints for the selected step, the Use applicability check box is disabled.
To filter computers or computer groups that you want to target based on their properties, use the lists and the input box. To add or remove filters, click + or -. After you enter the relevant criteria to search, click the search icon or press Enter to search.
To assign one or more endpoints as targets for the step, use one of the following methods:
- Click Specific computers selected in the list below to select one or more computer names as endpoints for the step:
  1. From the Include list, select Computers and use the property filters as necessary to help you find the targets.
  2. Click the search icon or press Enter to search for the target computers.
  3. To add all of the computers in the Available Targets list to the Selected Targets list, click Add All Displayed Targets.
  4. To add selected computers to the Selected Targets list, select one or more computers in the Available Targets list and click Add Highlighted Targets.
- Click Specific computers selected in the list below to select one or more computer groups as endpoints for a step:
  1. From the Include list, select Computer Group.
  2. Click the search icon or press Enter to search for the target computers.
  3. To add all the computer groups in the Available Targets list to the Selected Targets list, click Add All Displayed Targets.
  4. To add selected computer groups to the Selected Targets list, select one or more computer groups in the Available Targets list and click Add Highlighted Targets.
- Click The computers specified in the list below (one per line) to specify one or more computers as endpoints for a step:
  1. Type or copy and paste the names of the computers that you want to target.
  2. Enter one computer name per line.
- Select a step name from the Use same targets as list to specify the same endpoints as another step in the Automation Plan.
Note: If the step has a set of default targets saved when the Automation Plan is created, these targets are displayed in the Selected Targets list.
Repeat steps 5, 6, 7, and 8 for each step in the Automation Plan.
To specify parameters for a step, select the step from the list and click the Parameters tab. For each parameter required by the step, a description and an entry field are displayed. If the parameter has a default value, the entry field contains the default. If the step has a saved default set of parameters, an icon is displayed to indicate this. To ensure the step runs successfully, each parameter displayed on the tab must have a valid value.
To specify parameters for a failure step, select the step from the list and click the Failure Step Parameters tab. If the selected step has a failure step that requires parameters, a description and entry field is displayed for each parameter. If a parameter has a default value, the entry field contains the default. To ensure the failure step runs successfully, each parameter displayed on the tab must have a valid value. The failure step parameters are independent of the step parameters.
To run or schedule the Automation Plan, ensure that all steps have one or more endpoints selected as targets and that all step parameters have values, then click OK. The following graphic shows an example of the Take Automation Plan Action screen.

Results

The Automation Plan runs and the Automation Plan Action Status dashboard is opened. In this panel, you can view the Automation Plan action and the corresponding step actions for the Automation Plan.