Drill Service Troubleshooting

Overview

For institutions that use Drill to extract data from the SIS, the user/password assigned to the Drill service must be active and the service itself must be running properly.

For example:

If the user password expires, this will prevent current ALL data from importing into SS&E.

If some data streams are executing, and the error shows "Connection refused", there may be an underlying issue where there is not enough available CPU on the Connect server which is causing the drill service to drop connections.

• In most cases, the same user is set on the Connect server for running the Drill service and the Connect Scheduled Task(s).
• If the drill user password expires periodically, then it must be reset both on the drill service and all Connect scheduled tasks.
  • • If Auto Update is installed, there will be two Connect scheduled tasks (Aviso Connect and Connect Auto Update). 
    • If Auto Update is not installed, there will only be one Aviso Connect scheduled task.
• If Task Manager on the Connect server show high CPU usage on one process this may be affecting drill. In order to resolve this, on the Connect server:
  • 1. Open Task Manager to check what Processes are running and using the most CPU.
    2. Check the resources and check for any errors that are popping up on other services running on the Connect server.
    3. Fix the underlying issue(s) and monitor task manager to make sure that there are enough resources for all processes to run successfully.

Troubleshooting Steps

1. When all data feeds are out of date and External Logging and/or the Application Log (found here) shows:

• • "Failure in connecting to Drill..."
  • "Connection refused: no further information..."
  • "A dependent service is unavailable..."

Most likely, restarting the Drill service or rebooting the Connect server will resolve this.

• To restart Drill, open Services on the Connect server and then use the right-click menu or select Properties to restart the Drill service.

2. When all data feeds are out of date, and the Connect server Windows Log has an error message for the Apache Drill service similar to:

• • "The service did not start due to a logon failure"

Most likely, this message indicates that the Drill service user password changed, and resetting the drill user password will resolve this.

To reset the Drill user password:

• 1. Open Services on the Connect server.
  2. Right-click on the Apache Drill drillbit service and select "Properties".
  3. Select the "Log On" tab and update the user password.
  4. Apply the changes.
  5. Restart the Drill service.

Note:  If the password is reset, and the same user is assigned both on the Drill service and the Connect Job/Auto Update Scheduled Task, then the new password must be entered on the Connect server both for the Drill service and all Aviso Connect scheduled tasks.

3. Something else that may happen is that Drill is not successfully starting on the Connect server.

• Services show the Drill service is running but the Windows Event Log shows a logon failure.
• Checking the Drill service properties shows that the Drill service user is set to a local system user instead of the actual SS&E/Connect Task user.
  • This may have changed as a result of a Windows patch/update.
• To fix this, change the user back to the original Connect user and then restart the Drill service.

Note: The Connect user must be assigned permissions to run SS&E-related services and export data used by SS&E. For this reason, it should not be changed to another user unless set up correctly by the institution.

4. Something else that may prevent the Connect job from running in the Windows task scheduler is when the security settings in the AD group policy are updated to prevent PowerShell from running. When this is the case, there is a message stating "This program is blocked by group policy" and the job will run manually (by right-clicking on the Connect job and selecting "Run"), yet will not run from the task scheduler. To fix this, once PowerShell is allowed to run on the Connect server, the process will run on schedule and update SS&E properly.

5. If the above items do not help, please open a ticket with SS&E Support, copying all error messages and listing the steps taken.

Connect Job - Scheduled Task

How to check/change the user assigned to the Connect job:

1. From the Windows Start menu on the Connect server, search for the "Task Scheduler" Application.
2. Highlight the Aviso Connect job.
3. Check the General tab to view the user that is "running" the task scheduler Aviso Connect job.
4. If you need to change the user on the scheduled task, right-click on the Connect job and select "Properties". Then, from the General tab, change the user if needed.
   • We recommend setting the Connect task user account to not expire or changing it to a service account on the Connect server (local machine), and validating the task security options so that this does not change/reoccur.