ePolicy Orchestrator Server tasks do not expire after reaching the abort time

Technical Articles ID: KB83384
Last Modified: 2022-03-18 15:29:44 Etc/GMT

Environment

McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator (ePO) 5.x

Problem 1

If ePO is unable to connect to a client system, certain server tasks can remain in an In Progress state indefinitely.

Server tasks include:

Agent Wakeup Call
Agent Deployment
AD sync

This issue occurs when an 'abort after' time is configured in the task. When the 'abort after' time is exceeded, ePO fails to expire the task.

Problem 2

The ePODataChannelData table can become large. This situation occurs because old entries are meant to be removed from the ePODataChannelData table by the maintenance task.

Troubleshooting shows:

The task is no longer running.
After you correct the issue, and see that many entries exist in this table.
It takes several hours for the maintenance task to purge the orphaned entries.
During this time, the ePO Data Channel might be slow or non-functional.

System Change

The time was changed back to an earlier time on the ePO server.

For example, you observed this issue soon after the Daylight Savings Time (DST) change that occurred in the United States on November 1, 2015.

The Daylight Savings Time change occurs on different dates for different regions. So it’s possible for this issue to start occurring on a different date for ePO servers that reside in a different country. For example, in Mexico City, Daylight Savings Time occurred on October 25, 2015.

Cause

The problem is with the DB-Cleanup internal server task. The DB-Cleanup task expires other server tasks that haven’t completed by the configured 'abort time'. This task runs every minute. But, after a time change, this task could stop executing.

NOTE: The issue doesn’t occur if you change the time forward. So, the Spring DST time change that occurred in March 2016 didn’t cause the issue.

Solution

Apply the scripts below. The scripts resolve the issue and prevent it from occurring again unless you change the time on the ePO server back to an earlier time.

NOTE: It’s possible that the same issue might occur again if you change to an earlier time on the ePO server. If this change happens, you can reapply the following steps.

Back up the ePO database. See KB52126 - How to back up and restore the ePolicy Orchestrator database using SQL Server Management Studio for details about how to back up and restore the ePO database using SQL Server Management Studio.
Stop the ePO services:
1. Click Start, Run, type services.msc, and click OK.
2. Right-click each of the following services and click Stop:

McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator 5.x Application Server
McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator 5.x Event Parser
McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator 5.x Server

Run the following SQL statements against the ePO database using SQL Server Management Studio:
1. Open SQL Management Studio.
2. Expand Databases, right-click on the ePO database, and click New Query.
3. Enter the following commands in the blank area:
  
  For 5.10:
  update OrionTaskQueueMT set RunTime=GETUTCDATE() where taskdescription like '%db clean-up%'
  update OrionTaskQueueMT set RunTime=GETUTCDATE() where taskdescription like '%task.queue%'
  
  For 5.9.x:
  update OrionTaskQueueMT set RunTime=GETUTCDATE() where taskdescription like '%dbclean%'
  update OrionTaskQueueMT set RunTime=GETUTCDATE() where taskdescription like '%task.queue%'
4. Click Execute to run the query.
Restart the ePO services:
1. Click Start, Run, type services.msc, and click OK.
2. Right-click each of the following services and click Start:
  
  McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator 5.x Application Server
  McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator 5.x Event Parser
  McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator 5.x Server
To verify that the solution worked, run the following query in SQL Server Management Studio:
1. Open SQL Management Studio.
2. Expand Databases, right-click on the ePO database, and click New Query.
3. Enter the following command in the blank area:
  
  For 5.10:
  Select * from OrionTaskQueueMT where taskdescription like '%DB Clean-up%' or taskdescription like '%task.queue%'
  
  For 5.9.x:
  Select * from OrionTaskQueueMT where taskdescription like '%dbclean%' or taskdescription like '%task.queue%'
4. Click Execute to run the query.
  
  When the query results are returned, look for the column named EnqueuedTime and the column named RunTime. If you refresh the above query every minute, you notice that both the EnqueuedTime and RunTime are changing every minute. If so, the issue is resolved and you now no longer see server tasks stuck in an In Progress state.

NOTE: ePO 5.10 added another internal task that runs every hour, instead of every minute.

Affected Products

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Knowledge Center

ePolicy Orchestrator Server tasks do not expire after reaching the abort time

Environment

Problem 1

Problem 2

System Change

Cause

Solution

Affected Products

Languages:

Title

Title

Knowledge Center

ePolicy Orchestrator Server tasks do not expire after reaching the abort time

Environment

Problem 1

Problem 2

System Change

Cause

Solution

Affected Products

Languages:

Choose your region

Title

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