I've written a few blogs on the topic of discovery in the last few days. Very simple stuff aimed at getting a basic home lab environment up and running and discovered.
That's mainly because I wanted to build on that, and experiment with and learn a little more about some of the newer capabilities that I've as yet had little to no experience with.
One of those capabilities is the Digital End-User Experience, or DEX.
DEX is an agent based solution, designed to be installed on EUC devices. It provides proactive monitoring and oversight of applications, devices and networks on the EUC endpoints. I'll probably go into detail on some of the funkier capabilities DEX brings to the table in a different article. This article is about setting it up, with an aim to trialling/experimenting with it.
The first thing I need to do, is install the DEX Plugins.
I install the DEX playbook, desktop assistant and application and device health. I make sure I install the demo data (in case I need it) because the docs do call out that if you do not install it at plugin install time, you cannot install it later.
Next, I create an Agent registration key. You only need to supply a name, and optionally a group (who will be informed when the key is about to expire). The key itself is generated on save.
Next, I need to install DEX on my Windows PC. I'm going to use a laptop - not the system I previously installed ACC on through A MID. As with MID Servers, or ACC agents, there is a link provided in the instance itself to the downloads. From the docs; you're directed to hit the </> link next to commands without MID…
I logged into my ServiceNow instance from the desktop I wanted to install ACC on, downloaded the MSI and copied the string as the docs suggested - modifying the file path and executing the command from an admin prompt.
The installation is completely silent, so I had to check it had worked by looking in add/remove programs a few minutes later. Sure enough, ACC 4.2.1.3 was now in place.
For me, and perhaps because I have (a long time ago) previously installed and (I think) stopped/removed an old version of ACC on my desktop, the service was already started.
I added the ServiceNow user account to the list of users who can remote desktop, and added the debug program role too in the local policies.
Next, I am going to install the DEX browser extension. And I restart the agent service. This is where things stop,going so smoothly. The service starts, but the instance cannot see my Agent. Looking at the config on windows laptop, it seems fine. Except, there is no registration key- and every time I add it back and restart the agent the value is blanked out.
I try exactly the same process but on a different device and get exactly the same result.
The logs are not conclusive; so this has the feeling of something complex. I'll need to dedicate time to debugging it properly; in the instance in the logs. In the ECC Queue, on the agent with debugging enabled. Frustratingly, that's going to be something I return to at a later date.
