SOTI Pulse Logo

What is the deal with Search Sync?

MD
Matt Dermody Diamond Contributor
Zebra (OVS) - Manhattan Associates

I'm fed up with how often Search Sync fails in a cloud environment and I have to open a case with SOTI to have them fix it on the back end. Why is this so consistently unreliable? There has to be some reporting in the SOTI Case Management system that shows this is a super common problem. I've seen this across multiple versions of MC. Am I alone in this or does the rest of the community run into similar issues?

Even if a technical solution is not available, SOTI is providing a cloud hosted solution and I would expect better monitoring and proactive maintenance of our environments. 

2 years ago
SOTI MobiControl
ANSWERS
RC
Raymond Chan Diamond Contributor
2 years ago

I alone have four similar cases across different MobiControl server versions in the last two weeks.  My colleagues said they also had some others recently.  There is no well-defined occurrence pattern or common cause of the problem found from all these recent cases.  However, the common solution is to rename/clean up the whole search data directory and then restart all services or reboot the whole MS-Windows server instance, which only take less than 5 minutes to complete if the servers are on-premises.   For cloud instances, my customers and I have to open support ticket, and inefficient follow-up call/remote debug session arranged for some cases.  It would be nice if the cloud instance web-console includes extra button(s) on top of the current "SYNC NOW" button for MobiControl Search Index Sync item in Global Settings tab  to initiate the clean-up and restart/reboot action.  Of course, it would be even better if such problem won't happen too often or if there is some detection mechanism so that relevant re-sync/clean-up action can be started automatically.

MD
Matt Dermody Diamond Contributor
2 years ago

Thank you for providing your personal experiences with this Raymond! I had to open two cases on this type of issue this morning and I have a colleague that reported three himself just in this past week. All MobiControl Cloud instances so we have to open a ticket with SOTI each time and wait on a response. The responsiveness is generally pretty good so I don't necessarily have a complaint there. My complaint is that the environments are allowed to get to that state in the first place to warrant a call at all. It seems like some basic server monitoring tools could help SOTI in managing these environments that they cloud host on our customer's behalf. It is my opinion that a cloud hosting provider should be responsible for the environments that they are hosting as part of the service that they are providing and that should generally include monitoring systems and proactive maintenance. It is incredibly frustrating to have a customer open a support issue with my team on device issues only to have to pause any investigation while we wait for SOTI to first clear up any Search Sync issues so that the actual troubleshooting can begin.

My ultimate ask is for there to be a better technical solution to the problem of Search Sync always failing. The mere fact that there is a Search Sync button is an indication to me that something is fundamentally wrong with the architecture if they feel there is a need for a manual sync button. If a technical solution can't be found I would at least want some better server performance monitoring put in place by SOTI for their cloud hosted instances so that these issues could be taken care of in the background proactively.

ZC
Zafer Cigdem Platinum Contributor
2 years ago

Hi Matt,

Until there is a proper solution regarding the Support cases and JIRAs related to MC Seach index, one of the alternative solutions would be using the API Calls if possible at least for the cases that can be solved without needed to rename/delete the search folder, to automate the process little bit more.

There are some API calls (the list of the API can be accessible from your_Mobicontrol_FQDN/api/; example https://zafercigdem-localhost.com/MobiControl/api/), it looks like we may use below 2 of them. I did a quick test and it looks like okay on my environment 15.6.1.

- One is to get search sync index percentage, let's say %17.83

- The other is doing the "Sync Now" to update the index, to make the ~%17 higher as close as %100, step by step

we may create a powershell script by collecting the percentage first and if it is lower than %90 we can trigger search sync. We can also execute this powershell Script periodically by using Windows Task Scheduler and let it run daily/weekly etc.

 

Even if I did not prepare the powerhsell script for this one yet, I've done something similar for profile re-installations earlier, and it worked well for our case. I hope it helps. Thank you

Zafer

L
LCRMOD@SOTI
2 years ago

Hi Matt, 

Thank you for bringing your concerns regarding Search Sync failures in your environment to our attention. We understand the frustration you've experienced and are committed to addressing this issue.

We noticed that you have encountered several issues with Elastic Search in the last few months, and we appreciate your patience as we work diligently to address these concerns comprehensively. I would be happy to raise a case on your behalf to expedite the process for you and investigate the Root Cause and minimize the impact on you. 

In the spirit of continuous improvement, we are excited to announce that at the upcoming SOTI Sync event, we will be unveiling major enhancements to our search capability. These improvements aim to provide a more robust, reliable, and performant search experience, addressing the challenges you and others in the community have faced. We encourage you to stay tuned for this exciting news.

Once again, we apologize for any inconvenience you've experienced and thank you for your valuable feedback. If you have any further questions or need assistance, please do not hesitate to reach out to our dedicated support team.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Regards, 
Technical Support | SOTI Inc. |1.905.624.9828 | Log a Case Webform | SOTI.net | Facebook | LinkedIn | Twitter

SOTI SYNC

Similar Discussions