After an upgrade the request for a new client policy fails with an unexpected response

Products

• IT Management Suite

Issue/Introduction

After upgrading or after a fresh installation, when agents/client machines attempt to request a new policy configuration nothing happens, even when they should receive a new configuration due to a policy change or software update made available etc.

An examination of the local agent logs are showing a warning similar to the following:

RequestPolicies failed: Unexpected response from URL http://NSserver/Altiris/NS/Agent/GetClientPolicies.aspx: Host Resource 491a9e63-6072-445d-b366-1d583ae59397 was blacklisted from receiving policies. Member of 40ae9358-6b46-42e4-9928-693f8f76f1cf collection. (-2147213300)

A close examination of a profiler trace taken from the Notification Server may show an exception code error when filtered on the category "Altiris.Web.NS.Agent" and sub category "GetClientPolicies"

exceptionCode: -532459699

 

Environment

ITMS 7.x, 8.x

Cause

The computers were somehow added to the Blacklisted Host Computers filter and the NS was rejecting their requests.

It is not known how the computers ended up in the filter.

Resolution

• In the Symantec Management Console go to "Manage > Filters > Computer Filters".  Select the filter "Blacklisted Host Computers"
• If the computer(s) that should be receiving a configuration update are listed in the filter membership then click "Edit"
• Select the "Resources included in this filter" link in the "Explicit Inclusions and Exclusions" section.
• Remove the desired computers from the list in the right pane. Click OK,  Save Changes.
• Click the "Update Membership" button in the filter tool bar.

Test to see if the agent computers can receive a response to a configuration update request.