Task Administration
Task administrators and system administrators have some tools both within the Task feature itself and in IdentityIQ's Administrator Console, to help them manage where and how tasks are run, and to troubleshoot common task issues.
Running Tasks on Specific Hosts
If your IdentityIQ instance is configured to use multiple hosts, you can configure tasks to run on specific host machines. This is done in the Task definition.
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Navigate to Setup > Tasks and either create your new task, or select an existing task you want to edit.
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In the Host field, enter the name of the host to use. You can specify more than one host in a comma-delimited list, to provide alternative options if the first-choice server is unavailable. Note that IdentityIQ does not validate the host names you enter; if you enter an invalid or inactive host, the task will fail.
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If you specify more than one host, the task service will run the task on the first host in the list which responds (that is, which has an active heartbeat).
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When the task is run, either manually or based on a task schedule, the host configuration you have specified will be used.
The task results include information about which host the task ran on.
Tracking Task Run Length for Troubleshooting
IdentityIQ keeps track of how long a task takes to execute, both per execution and on average. This is useful for evaluating when a task is running longer than normal, so that administrators can investigate and troubleshoot system or network problems.
IdentityIQ reports the number of runs and the average run time in the task definition (that is, the UI where you configure parameters and other settings for the task) and in the task results. The task definition shows the number of times the task has been run since the last reset of run statistics, along with the average run time for the task across those task executions.
The task result shows both the current run time and the average run time, as well as the percent change in run time of this execution vs. the average. The Average Run Time value indicates the average not including the current task run. The Run Time and Run Time Change values are not updated until the task completes (they are valued at zero during task execution). See Task Results Page.
The Tasks page in the Administrator Console also shows this information for completed tasks. Average Runtime reflects the average time of runs prior to this execution. Tasks will only have average and difference values once they have been run multiple times.
Restarting Run Time Average Calculations
When system configuration changes occur which should substantially impact a task's run time, you may want to reset the statistics to ensure the average run time value represents clean and meaningful data. Within the task definition (Setup > Tasks > select the relevant task), click Reset Run Statistics to clear out the saved run count and average run time.
It is recommended that you reset run statistics any time you change the options selected for a task, since the selected options will directly impact the set of activities the task is performing and therefore its execution time. Likewise, changes to the designated Host for the task (if you have chosen to select specific host(s) for running the task) should also prompt resetting run statistics, as should any hardware changes on the host(s) which would affect task (and overall system) performance.
Administrator Console: Tasks Page
The Administrator Console page for managing tasks is accessible through the gear menu > Administrator Console > Tasks. On this page, administrative users can postpone a scheduled task, terminate a running task, or dump a stack trace of a running task to see what is currently happening in it (typically used when the task is running long and the administrator wants to diagnose problems).