ASA scheduled reports

[kieranmc]

I've been trying to use the schedule feature in ASA 6.0 > Advanced > Report, I have configured ASA for automatic login and all goes well while I'm logged in. For this purpose I am running ASA on a Windows 12 server, so I RDP to it, set up the scheduled Report and close (ie, click on X) the RDP session. If I go back in a few minutes later, my ASA session is still there and I can see the job in the Schedule tab, or if the start time has passed then I can see the success in the Schedule tab and I can pick up the resulting csv that was output. I then confidently leave it to run overnight and on a daily schedule, only to log in the next day and see that there is nothing in the scheduled tab (not even a failure message) and my report hasn't run. Any idea what's happening to it when I leave it to run overnight?

Connection Properties > Advanced tab:
Login(ms): 500
Command(ms): 50
Write(ms): 0
Timeout(ms): 120000
Idle disconnect (secs): 0

 

[Sean655]

That is odd. See if there's any sort of entry in the event viewer regarding ASA terminating or the system restarting. The setup of the reports shouldn't be lost but try setting up a report and then reboot or log off of your session. Log back in and see if the report is lost. The next thing I would do is build a report then go to File > Save Configuration. Reboot or log off from it then log back in and see if there's still a report there.

 

[kieranmc]

Hi Sean

thanks for the advice. There's nothing happening nightly so far as I can see in the Event Viewer, and I have tried scheduling the report then logging off - the report disappears and there is nothing in the scheduled tab. However, I tried scheduling the report and did File>Save Configuration, logged off RDP, left it for 5 minutes and when I went back in the report had run and the success was showing in the Schedule tab. I'll test that now with an overnight report and see if it sticks! Will come back with result

Cheers

 

[kieranmc]

Update: didn't quite work as the scheduled report didn't run overnight, but the job is still showing in the Schedule tab so it hasn't disappeared. When I logged in this morning the History tab has a Warning that "Repeated task: Report shows no record of execution at its last scheduled time". I suspect that is because I logged off the RDP session rather than just clicking X, which should leave ASA still running for me. Will try that again tonight

 

[kieranmc]

Still no report! It's still there in the Schedule tab, waiting to run overnight tonight. But in the History tab yesterday's failed scheduled report is there with a Warning saying "Repeated task (list measurements announcements all yesterday-peak)shows no record of execution at its last scheduled time. Next run: 30/06/2020 00:00:30" That Warning only appears when I log back into ASA. So no matter what I do with the RDP session, the ASA session always ends and the scheduled report doesn't run

 

[Sean655]

Not sure why your RDP session terminates but maybe there's some GPO setting that kills the session. Make sure the server isn't rebooting overnight either. You could also try using a remote access program and then lock the session to see if there's any improvement.

Worst case: set the same reports up on your machine and run them in the morning. You'd miss some data for the weekend.

 

[kieranmc]

A Group Policy is killing any inactive RDP session after 5 minutes inactivity! You were spot on with that Sean. Trying to get the policy removed from that server. Is there any way of running ASA or the report as a background process, or in some persistent way so that it doesn't rely on an active Windows session?

Thanks again for the help and the earlier tips

 

[Sean655]

I don't think it can run the reports unless it's on an active windows session. Do you have any sort of remote access tool that you can use besides RDP? It would act as a local console session and should allow you to lock that login and not have it disconnect.

I don't know anything about it but I've read about OSSI stuff that allows commands to be run. Not sure if that would be of any use to you or applicable in this scenario.