Automatic backup and restore mechanism for Core settings for SMP 7.5 SP1 and later

Products

• IT Management Suite
• Client Management Suite

Issue/Introduction

 The customer wants to make sure his coresettings.config is backed up in case of corruption.

Environment

ITMS 8.x

Resolution

Starting with SMP 7.5 SP1 release, an automatic backup and restore mechanism for Core settings in case of corruption or deletion was added:

 

CoreSettings.config is located under C:\ProgramData\Symantec\SMP\Settings

• Automatic backup of Core Settings is called CoreSettings.config.backup
• Now added also automatic restore from existing backup in case of accidental corruption
• Followed by "Configuration file restored using backup: ...“ informational message in the NS logs

SIM (Symantec Installation Manager) also creates a backup of this file, called coresettings.config.sim.bak, during major upgrades

Usually, a corruption (or empty file) of this file can be caused by:

• Failure during an upgrade
• Lack of disk space
• Inappropriate saving of the file after manual changes to it

Some side effects of having issues with the coreSettings.config:

• Altiris Services will not start
• Altiris Service service stays in a "starting" state
• AeXConfig.exe fails or will not run/start
• SMP Console will not load

Manually restoring coreSettings.config file if missing or corrupted:

1. Stop the Altiris Service from Start > Run > type services.msc.
2. Create a copy of "CoreSettings.config.backup" file (under C:\ProgramData\Symantec\SMP\Settings).
3. Rename "CoreSettings.config" to "CoreSettings._config" if it is corrupted.
4. Rename "CoreSettings.config.backup" to "CoreSettings.config" name.
5. Start the Altiris Services.
6. Check whether the console is started to open properly.

Note:
Starting with ITMS 8.5 and later, you can also schedule to backup important information like Notification Server Configuration and Software Library files:

Go to Settings>All Settings>Notification Server>Notification Server Settings>Critical Data Backup

Additional Information

Backing up and restoring Notification Server KMS encryption keys