Discovery Process in Configuration Manager 2012 SP2

Discovery Process in Configuration Manager

Hope you have seen my previous post on Installing configuration Manager 2012 console. So after installing configuration manager, it’s recommended to discover Active directory resource. The Computer and user resource that are planned to manage through Configuration manager is discovered using Configuration Manager 2012 Discovery method. Once the discovery is run, a discovery data record (DDR) for each discovered object are created and stored in the Configuration Manager database. Once discovery successful, it puts information about the resource in a file that is referred to as a discovery data record (DDR). DDRs are in turn processed by site servers and entered into the Configuration Manager database, where they are then replicated by database-replication with all sites. Active Directory Forest Discovery is a new discovery method that can discover subnets and Active Directory sites, and can add them as boundaries for your hierarchy.

There are six different discovery methods available to discover Active directory resource.

Active Directory Forest Discovery 

This discovery method is used to discover Active Directory sites and subnets, and then create Configuration Manager Boundaries for each site and subnet from the forests that you have configured for discovery. When Active Directory Forest Discovery identifies a supernet that is assigned to an Active Directory site, Configuration Manager converts the supernet into an IP address range boundary.. 

Active Directory System Discovery 

This discovery method is used to discover system from the specified locations in Active Directory Domain Services. Active Directory System Discovery Account or the computer account of the site server is used to run this discovery

Active Directory User Discovery

This discovery Discovers user accounts from the specified locations in Active Directory Domain Services. Active Directory System Discovery Account or the computer account of the site server is used to run this discovery 

Active Directory Group Discovery

This discovery Discovers local, global, and universal security groups, the membership within these groups, and the membership within distribution groups from the specified locations in Active directory Domain Services. Distribution groups are not discovered as group resources. Active Directory System Discovery Account or the computer account of the site server is used to run this discovery

Heartbeat Discovery

Used by active Configuration Manager Clients to update their discovery records in the database. This discovery is enabled by default. Computer account of the agent is used to run this discovery. Heartbeat Discovery can force discovery of a computer as a new resource record, or can repopulate the database record of a computer that was deleted from the database. 

Network Discovery 

This discovery Searches your network infrastructure for network devices that have an IP address. This can discover devices that might not be found by other discovery methods. This includes printers, routers, and bridges.

How to Run Discovery?

Once you installed the Configuration Manager console,

Administration > Hierarchy Configuration > Discovery methods

Select Each Discovery and enable the status. For example,

Right click Active Directory Forest Discovery > properties

You will be seeing screenshot like below, check the option Enable Active directory forest and apply to run AS soon as possible.

Active Directory Group Discovery

Right click Active Directory Group Discovery > properties

You will be seeing screenshot like below, check the option Enable Active directory group discovery and select the specific group that you want to discover. 

Specify the Name of the group to be discovered and browse the respective Active directory group you are interested to discover.

Similar to Group discovery, you can perform user Discovery by enabling and selecting Active directory User Discovery in configuration Manager 2012 Sp2.

Active Directory System Discovery

Right click Active Directory OU Discovery > properties

You will be seeing screenshot like below, check the option Enable Active directory System discovery and select the specific container that you want to discover. 

Once you selected the container, clicks apply and run the discovery immediately.

Logs to very Discover status

ADforestDisc.log – The log file that logs information about forest discovery

adsgdis.log - The log file that logs information about group discovery

adsysdis.log - The log file that logs information about system discovery

adusrdis.log - The log file that logs information about user discovery

These site server Logs available in site server from where you are performing discovery, and the path should be %Program Files%\Microsoft Configuration Manager\Logs.