Task Servers are showing consistent messages for "Package server package delivery task" almost every minute under Task History in the Task Status tab.

Products

• IT Management Suite
• Software Management Solution

Issue/Introduction

We started noticing in all Task Servers running the following task (under the Agent UI>Task Status tab> Task History) too frequently:

"Package server Package Delivery Task"

According to the agent logs, the only thing that matched those times were for entries like these ones:

Download urgent packages. Input: '<Packages><Packageid="{f461b105-2350-4ef4-85d2-0190184720b6}" name="Firefox Extension" version="1543707605" priority="normal" packageVersion="2.9.1.1" packageSize="815716" originator="NS" /></Packages>'
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Date: 7/8/2019 12:28:01 PM, Tick Count: 1233592548 (14.06:39:52.5480000), Size: 504 B
Process: AeXNSAgent.exe (4276), Thread ID: 10112, Module: AeXNSCPackageServer.dll
Priority: 4, Source: Package Server Agent
 

Adding as 'In Progress' to urgent packages list. Id: '{f461b105-2350-4ef4-85d2-0190184720b6}', xml: '<Package
id="{f461b105-2350-4ef4-85d2-0190184720b6}" name="Firefox Extension" version="1543707605" priority="normal" packageVersion="2.9.1.1"
packageSize="815716" originator="NS"/>'
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Date: 7/8/2019 12:28:01 PM, Tick Count: 1233592548 (14.06:39:52.5480000), Size: 549 B
Process: AeXNSAgent.exe (4276), Thread ID: 10112, Module: AeXNSCPackageServer.dll
Priority: 4, Source: Package Server Agent
 

On the SMP, you may notice something like this one:

Time-critical task instance 'Package Server Package Delivery Task' (e30f72ee-12b4-49d1-a4fc-6e98b5e17ee1) from 'Package Server Package Delivery Task' (89dd282d-f98c-4914-b4dc-6458a74b577b, 7096c4b1-2ed2-497f-8321-2adfabc365eb) (7/8/2019 11:28:49 AM) - has timed out.
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Date: 7/8/2019 12:29:24 PM, Tick Count: 201673439 (2.08:01:13.4390000), Size: 557 B
Process: AtrsHost (10528), Thread ID: 509, Module: Altiris.TaskManagement.dll
Priority: 2, Source: Altiris.TaskManagement.ClientTask.BaseClientTask.CheckExecutionStatus

Is there an issue because of those multiple entries?

Environment

ITMS 8.x

Cause

Working as designed.

Resolution

The 'Package server package delivery" task is run on a Package Server as many times as a Quick Delivery task is run on the SMP Server side.  This is true for situations where no Sites are defined or a Package Server is located in the SMP Site.  Otherwise package assignment (the selection of Package Servers for running ''Package server package delivery" task ) is dependent on the Quick Delivery's agent's IPs in the target and site topology.

If a number of Quick Delivery task instances (server side) launched during the day is no less than the amount of "Package server package delivery" task rows in the Task history on the Package Server, then everything is working by design.

You can use the following query to have an idea of how many Quick Delivery tasks are running:

Note: just change the date '2019-07-11' to something like yesterday or the day before just to have an idea what was happening:

--To find number of Quick Delivery tasks run during the day X please run the following query – it will display the name of Quick Delivery task and start time

select ic.Name, ic.Guid, ti.StartTime
 from Evt_Task_Instances ti
join  ItemVersions iv
on ti.TaskVersionGuid = iv.VersionGuid
join vItem ic
on ic.Guid = iv.ItemGuid and ic.ClassGuid = '98ED4AEB-6C8E-472f-8AEE-E213016CA4FF'
where ti.InstanceType = 'Server'
and (ti.StartTime >= '2019-07-11' and ti.StartTime < dateadd(day, 1,'2019-07-11') )
order by ic.Name, ti.StartTime

So, in short, what you are seeing is expected due to the amount of Quick Delivery tasks triggered by manual runs.