Monday, October 21, 2013

How to Change the Drilldown limit in Maximo

1. Go to the Application Designer application
2. Select the Action "Export System XML"
3. Highlight the line Library in the Export System XML dialog and click on the Export XML icon,.

4. Using the "save as" option, save two copies of this file. Name one of them library.xml and the other library.xml.bk, which will serve as a backup.
5. Open library.xml in a text editor 
6. Find the string 
7. insert maxchildren="200" directly after it.
Note: this will change the display limit for Location children to 200. You may designate another limit by selecting another numeric value.
Note: You should find only one "non commented" occurrence of the string
The changed section of the library.xml file should look like the section below. The inserted string is shown in bold:
8. Find the string 
9. insert maxchildren="200" directly after it.
Note: this will change the display limit for Asset children to 200. You may designate another limit by selecting another numeric value.
Note: You should find only one “non commented” occurrence of the string

10. Save library.xml
11. On the Application Designer main tab, select the Import icon, and browse to the library.xml file that you have updated.
12. Click OK to import the file.

Capturing the Hostname on a Ticket

You can configure the SmartCloud Control Desk to automatically store the hostname/IP of a user's workstation (client machine or machine connection to SmartCloud Control Desk) in a ticket (Service Request, Incident or Problem) when the ticket is created by following these steps.

1.     Add new field to TICKET named CREATEDBYHOST
2.     Set the default value of CREATEDBYHOST to 127.0.0.1
3.     Create a relationship named 'CREATEDBY' on object SR (of INCIDENT, PROBLEM) with child object: PERSON
where clause: personid=:createdby)
4.     Create a crossover domain named SESSION2TKT on object MAXSESSION
from field CLIENTHOST to field CREATEDBYHOST and
validation where clause:userid=:CREATEDBY.USER.MAXSESSION.userid
list where clause:userid=:CREATEDBY.USER.MAXSESSION.userid
5.     Associate the SESSION2TKT domain with CREATEDBYHOST
6.     Save all changes and run configdb

In order to capture the hostname of the user's workstation (client machine) and not just the IP address, your web server must be configured to perform reverse DNS lookups.

To enable reverse DNS lookups in the IBM HTTP Server do the following:

1.     Edit the httpd.conf file (located in Program Files\IBM\HTTPServer\conf\httpd.conf on Windows
2.     Find the line that says: HostnameLookups off
3.     Change the line to say: HostnameLookups on
4.     Save the file and restart the web server

Troubleshooting Forgotten Password and User Self Registration Problems in Maximo

Problem

From the main login page, if a user clicks the "Forgot Password" or "Register Now" hyperlink, the error BMXAA4038E "Cannot log in to perform this action" may be displayed.

Symptom

BMXAA4038E "Cannot log in to perform this action" when selecting "Forgot Password" or "Register Now", or other errors upon completing the Forgot Password or Self Registration screens.


Resolving the problem

The system property mxe.system.reguser is used internally to connect to the system for the Forgotten Password and User Self Registration applications. The value of this property should correlate with a user record on the database (maxuser.loginid) which has permissions for the FORGOTPSWD and SELFREG applications.
In the 6.x release, properties are stored in the maximo.properties file. In later releases, properties are stored on the maxpropvalue table (or overridden in maximo.properties) and can be seen in the System Properties application. If you change any properties via the System Properties application, make sure that you check the box next to the property and use the Live Refresh menu option to make the changes take effect.
Follow the list below to identify the cause of the "Cannot log in to perform this action" problem.
1) Find the value for the mxe.system.reguser property and ensure that a user exists having a loginid equal to this value.
2) Find the value for the mxe.system.regpassword property and ensure that the user found above has a password equal to this value. If you are not sure, you can reset the user's password and/or the property. (Users and passwords are managed via the Users application.)
3) Ensure that the mxe.system.reguser property is in the proper case. If it is in the proper case, find the value of the mxe.convertloginid property. When this property equals 1, the entered value of loginid is internally converted to upper case prior to authentication. If this property is 1 and the value of maxuser.loginid is not upper case, the user will not be able to log in.
4) Ensure that the user belongs to a security group that has permissions for the Forgotten Password and User Self Registration applications. (Use the Profile tab in the Users application.) Out of the box, the reguser belongs to the MAXREG security group, which has these permissions. If your reguser does not have these permissions then either add the user to the MAXREG group or configure the MAXREG group to have permission for these applications. (Group permissions are maintained via the Security Groups application.)
5) If the system is in Admin Mode, then Forgotten Password and User Self Registration are not permitted (by default). A superuser can access the Database Configuration application, Admin Mode option to see whether Admin Mode is on. Alternatively, you can perform a sql query "select value from maxvars where varname = 'ADMINRESTART'". If the value is ON then Admin Mode is on or in the process of being turned on.
If your end user is able to access the Forgotten Password or User Self Registration applications, but encounters errors when completing the transaction whose cause is not self-evident, then follow the steps below.
6) Ensure that email has been set up properly. The mail server is identified by the property mail.smtp.host. Later versions of 7.x support authentication to the email server. If your email server requires authentication, ensure that the properties mxe.smtp.user and mxe.smtp.password are correct.
7) If the problem is with Self Registration, ensure that the workflow process is configured. The maxvar SELFREGWF identifies the name of the workflow process (select varvalue from maxvars where varname = 'SELFREGWF'). The default value is SELFREG. Find this value in the Workflow Designer application and ensure that this is active and enabled. If you have Communication Templates associated with this workflow, ensure that Send From is a valid email address and that the Communication Template is active.

8) To complete the workflow process, the administrative user should log in and look at the Workflow inbox. There should be entries labeled "Review and approve/reject the self-registered user." Click Route on the notification inbox and approve or reject the self-registration. If the registration is accepted, then assign the new user to the appropriate security groups.

9) The approved new user should receive an email with notice of the registration approval. By default, the first time the user logs in, there will be a prompt to change the password.

IBM Maximo -- Useful Links

IBM Documentation

IBM Resources


Unofficial Maximo information sources

Public Demo sites

Run an .exe file from an Escalation in Maximo

An escalation may be set up in order to run an executable file at a specified interval of time.
The steps are:


1. Log in into Maximo as maxadmin user.
2. Go to -> System Configuration -> Platform Configuration -> Escalations
Create a new escalation with the following information:
Escalation: autonumber; description: any;
Applies To: ACTIONGROUP
Schedule: 1m – just for the test case, otherwise the needed interval;
Check “Create Successful Execution Entry” check box.
3. On the Escalation Points tab, click New Row;
Make sure to set
-Applies To – ACTIONGROUP
-Elapsed Time Interval to a value of -1 DAY (a negative value will indicate a time period in the future)
-Repeat check box checked.
4. On the Action tab, click New Row;
5. Action -> Go to Actions application
6. On Action application, create new Action, with the following information:
Action: autonumber ; description: ;
Object: ACTION
Type: Command Line Executable
Value: C:WINDOWSSystem32notepad.exe (or any .exe file you want to be launched)
Accessible From: ALL
This new Action will automatically be assigned to an Action Group, which is visible on the escalation tab under the Actions section (upper right corner), and it’s also present in the Actions application. It is essential in order for the executable to be run only once that the Action running the .exe file is only present once as Member in the ACTIONGROUP table.
7. Save Action;
8. “Return With Value” to Escalation application
9. Save Escalation
10. Select Action -> Validate; (should display a pop-up with “Validation successful.”)
11. Select Action -> Activate/Deactivate Escalation (should set the escalation to Active)
12. Save.
13. Log out/ Log back in.
Wait for 1 or 5 minutes, depending on time scheduled on the escalation.
The executable should be launched.