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MicroStrategy Health Center Frequently Asked Questions

  1. What is MicroStrategy Health Center?
  2. What are the main benefits of MicroStrategy Health Center?
  3. What are the components of MicroStrategy Health Center?
  4. How can I select a Master Health Agent for a Health Center system?
  5. What are the security mechanisms that MicroStrategy Health Center uses?
  6. How can I get MicroStrategy Health Center?
  7. How do I install MicroStrategy Health Center?
  8. Can Health Center be installed on Unix/Linux Operating Systems?
  9. Can I use MicroStrategy Health Center even if there is a firewall in my network?
  10. What is a System check?
  11. How often are System checks performed?
  12. How can I update MicroStrategy Health Center with the latest System checks?
  13. What is a Diagnostic Package?
  14. What is the Metadata Slice Collector?
  15. What is the Customer Experience Improvement Program?
  16. What are the benefits of the Customer Experience Improvement Program?
  17. How can I participate in the Customer Experience Improvement Program?
  18. Can I still join the Customer Experience Improvement Program even after declining on the first installation?
  19. What type of information will be submitted as part of the Customer Experience Improvement Program?

1. What is MicroStrategy Health Center?

MicroStrategy Health Center allows users to prevent, diagnose and fix problems in a MicroStrategy system. It detects known problems and provides an immediate solution to many of them. Health Center can email a system administrator if it encounters a problem with the system. In cases where Health Center cannot fix a problem immediately, it enables users to bundle relevant system information, such as log files, into a diagnostic package and transmit the package to MicroStrategy Technical Support for review and troubleshooting.

2. What are the main benefits of MicroStrategy Health Center?

MicroStrategy Health Center provides three main benefits:

  • Proactive Health Diagnosis: automatically scans Servers, alerts Administrators and fixes known issues.
  • Expedite Technical Support Collaboration: simplifies troubleshooting on issues that require assistance from MicroStrategy Technical Support.
  • Improve BI System Performance: provides insight and benchmark information about your performance data.

3. What are the components of MicroStrategy Health Center?

MicroStrategy Health Center has three main components:

  • Master Health Agent: The Master Health Agent machine serves as the hub of the Health Center system. It keeps track of the scheduled system checks for itself and the connected Health Agents, and triggers those system checks at the appropriate times. It also stores the network topology for the system, and transmits diagnostic packages to MicroStrategy Technical Support.
  • Health Agent: These machines perform system checks on themselves when scheduled to do so by the Master Health Agent, and report the results of those checks.
  • Health Center Console: It is the interface from which the system will be monitored and accessed and consists of a navigation pane on the left and a main pane on the right.

4. How can I select a Master Health Agent for a Health Center system?

It is recommended to follow the best practices below for choosing a Master Health Agent machine:

  • The machine should be always available on the network, so that users can run diagnostic tests at any time.
  • The machine should have HTTPS access, so that it can download Health Center updates.
  • The machine should have FTP access so that it can send diagnostics packages to MicroStrategy Technical Support.
  • The machine should not have a heavy additional workload. For example, a production environment Intelligence Server machine may not make a good Master Health Agent.

5. What are the security mechanisms that MicroStrategy Health Center uses?

There are three security mechanism implemented in a Health Center System:

  • Encrypted traffic between a Master Health Agent and Health Agents. The encryption level is AES which is the same as the data exchange between MicroStrategy Web/Web Server and MicroStrategy Intelligence Server.
  • Access Code for each Health Agent and the Master Health Agent. Users can assign an access code for each Health Agent and/or the Master Health Agent. When building connection among Health Agent and Master Health Agent, the Health Center Console prompts users to enter Access Code.
  • Action History Panel in the Health Center Console. The panel gives a list of the actions that users have performed to resolve errors that have been reported from system checks.

6. How can I get MicroStrategy Health Center?

MicroStrategy Health Center is available at no cost to MicroStrategy customers as part of their installation.

7. How do I install MicroStrategy Health Center?

MicroStrategy Health Center gets installed automatically with the MicroStrategy platform. Extra configuration is required in order to set up the MicroStrategy Health Center system. This configuration can be completed by using the Health Center Configuration Wizard.

8. Can Health Center be installed on Unix/Linux Operating Systems?

Yes. In Windows, the Master Health Agent and Health Agent processes are run as background services. In UNIX or Linux, these processes are run as daemons and must be configured by a user with root access.

9. Can I use MicroStrategy Health Center even if there is a firewall in my network?

Yes. If a Health Agent machine is behind a firewall from the Master Health Agent, the Master Health Agent may not be able to connect directly to the Health Agent. In this case, users must configure the Master Health Agent to receive a connection from the Health Agent.

10. What is a System check?

A System Check is a Health Center scan of a specific component of a MicroStrategy product or machine configuration. System checks can report errors or potential errors, and in many cases can provide ways to fix these problems.

11. How often are System checks performed?

Users can execute these system checks manually from the Health Center Console, or users can schedule them to automatically run daily or weekly at a specified time. The Master Health Agent handles the scheduling; and, at the appropriate times, it triggers the scheduled system checks on all Health Agents in the system.

12. How can I update MicroStrategy Health Center with the latest System checks?

Health Center checks for updates every week, beginning 24 hours after users configure the Master Health Agent. If updates are available, the Health Center Console notifies users at the bottom of the main pane. Users can then review and download the available updates by selecting Health Center Update from the File menu.

13. What is a Diagnostic Package?

A diagnostics package is a zip file that contains system information, including log files, collected from one or more Health Agent machines. When users create a diagnostics package, users can choose what machines to include log files from, and what log files to include in the package.

Once users have created a diagnostics package, users can save it as a Zip file in the local disk, or send it directly to MicroStrategy Technical Support.

14. What is the Metadata Slice Collector?

It allows users to obtain a report or document with all dependents and output to an Object Manager package (.mmp). Along with the Cache Collector, users can create a Health Center Diagnostic Package and upload it to MicroStrategy Technical Support to replicate the report/document execution related issues. The Metadata Slice Collector is contained in MicroStrategy Health Center Update Package Release 1.

15. What is the Customer Experience Improvement Program?

MicroStrategy Health Center gives you the option to automatically send information about your MicroStrategy environment and usage to MicroStrategy in order to better understand your system installation. A data collector is included as part of the program in order to assess configuration settings and make recommendations that will improve performance in a BI system.

16. What are the benefits of the Customer Experience Improvement Program?

The Customer Experience Improvement Program has three main benefits:

  • To provide a better customer support experience by allowing MicroStrategy Support engineers to quickly understand the customer's environment.
  • To help organizations that participate in the program improve their MicroStrategy environments by comparing their systems with other similar implementations in the industry.
  • To perform research and analysis of customers environments in order to improve MicroStrategy's products and services.

17. How can I participate in the Customer Experience Improvement Program?

You can decide to opt-in to the program when configuring the Master Health Agent through the Health Center Configuration Wizard.

18. Can I still join the Customer Experience Improvement Program even after declining on the first installation?

Yes. If you decline to participate in the program, you can decide to opt-in into the program at a later time by selecting the opt-in option from the Health Center Update dialog.

19. What type of information will be submitted as part of the Customer Experience Improvement Program?

No report data or prompt answers will be sent to MicroStrategy. A detailed list of the information that can be collected by MicroStrategy Health Center can be found in the MicroStrategy Health Center's Customer Experience Improvement Program Overview.