Working with Snapshots

As an Operator, the snapshot functionality allows you to detect any manual modifications that were made after a deployment via CDA so that you can reveal non-compliance of your Environment, specifically of your Application servers.

Important! The actions that you can perform depend on your folder permissions, see: Folder Permissions.

This page includes the following:

About Snapshots

What is a Snapshot?

Certain Components of installed Applications may be manually altered on target systems outside CDA due to several reasons, for example, non-compliance, emergency, CDA system not available and so on. The snapshot functionality allows to detect any manual modifications made after an Application has been deployed.

Environment & Target Snapshots

An Environment Snapshot captures the state of an Environment at a certain point in time for an Application. It groups all deployment target Snapshots created for a specific Application within an Environment. Target Snapshots collect information for any Component of the Application on a Deployment Target (for example, application binaries, configuration files, registry keys, ...).

Types of Environment Snapshots

You can create, view and validate the following Snapshots (provided the appropriate Action Packs have been installed).

Filesystem

This Snapshot type captures the state of a whole directory with files included in it recursively.
Microsoft Windows Registry

This Snapshot type can be used to create Snapshots from the Windows Registry.
Java EE Application Server

This Snapshot type can be used to take Snapshots from Tomcat, JBoss or WebSphere.
IIS Application Server Snapshot

This Snapshot type can be used to take Snapshots from your internet Information Server

Snapshot Reports

Snapshot Reports allow you to browse the content of Snapshots, or compare the Snapshot to the actual Environment and browse through the differences.

Reports are generated by applying the xslt that is referenced by the overview report to the report data XML. The following Snapshot reports are available:

Snapshot Overview

Shows an overview of what information is included in the Snapshot (for example, the list of files).
Snapshot Compare

A comparison of the Snapshot against the Environment which shows an overview of all differences (for example, which files have changed).
Snapshot Compare Detail

Compares one object of the saved Snapshot against the current Environment (for example, a diff of a configuration file)

Viewing Snapshots

Executing a Component Workflow containing a Snapshot Action creates a new Snapshot. You can monitor the progress using the Workflow Monitor.

Viewing Environment Snapshots

Go to the Advanced / Snapshots section of an Environment to view all Environment Snapshots that belong to the Environment.

Drilling down to the Snapshot taken shows the files contained in the Snapshot. Files are listed with their size and last modification dates.

Viewing Target Snapshots

The Components section of the Snapshot shows all Components of the Application for which target snapshots exist and the snapshots available. Click on the details button to see all target Snapshots for a Component.

Drilling down to the Snapshot taken shows the files contained in the Snapshot. Files are listed with their size and last modification dates.

Creating Snapshots

Snapshots are created within normal application workflows with snapshot CDA Actions. Upon execution, the CDA Action creates a target Snapshot which can capture any information about the Target on which it gets executed.

Ad-hoc snapshots are created automatically when comparing a snapshot with the present state.

To Create Snapshots of Type Filesystem

Add the File Create Snapshot Action to your Component Workflow.
Set the following PromptSet parameters:
- Archive Path
  Defines the location where the snapshot archive should be stored
- Source Path
- Snapshot Include Filter
  By default all files/directories contained recursively in this folder are contained in the Snapshot. However you may define a comma-separated list of include patterns using regular expressions to focus only on a specific subset of files. For example, use .*.txt, .*.config to include all text and config files with extensions .txt or .config.
- Snapshot Exclude Filter
  Defines the set of files which should be excluded from the Snapshot. Files are defined using a comma-separated list of regular expressions. For example: .*.png excludes all PNG-files from the snapshot.

To Create Snapshots of Type Microsoft Windows Registry

Add the Create Snapshot Action of a Component Workflow.
Set the following PromptSet parameter:
- Registry Key
  Defines the namespace of the keys where you want to take the Snapshot. Snapshots of all keys contained in the namespace are taken recursively.

To Create Snapshots of Type Java EE Application Server

Add the Create Snapshot Action of a Component Workflow.
Set the following PromptSet parameters:
- Snapshot mode
  Defines the part of your application server where the snapshot should be taken. Choose one of the following options:
  - Application
  - Server
  - Both
- Server Source Path
  Defines the root directory of your server installation.
- Application Source Path
  Defines the directory where the application is deployed.
- Application Exclude Filter
  Defines the set of Application-level files which should be excluded from the Snapshot. Files are defined using a comma-separated list of regular expressions. For example: .*.png excludes all PNG-files from the snapshot.
- Server Exclude Filter
  Defines the set of files which should be excluded from the Snapshot. Files are defined using a comma-separated list of regular expressions. For example: .*.png excludes all PNG-files from the snapshot.

To Create Snapshots of Type IIS Application Server Snapshot

Add the Create Snapshot Action to your Component Workflow.
Set the following PromptSet parameters:
- Site Name
  Defines the name of the site where you want to take the snapshot.
- Application Name
  Defines the application you want to take the snapshot from.
- Snapshot mode
  Defines the part of your application server where the snapshot should be taken. Choose one of the following options:
  - Application
  - Server
  - Both
- Snapshot Exclude Filter
  Defines the set of files which should be excluded from the Snapshot. Files are defined using a comma-separated list of regular expressions. For example: .*.png excludes all PNG-files from the snapshot.

Changing Properties of Snapshots

The properties of a Snapshot can be changed:

Via the Snapshot Sidebar that is displayed next to the table that list Snapshots.
In the General / Properties section of a Snapshot.

You can change the following Snapshot properties:

General
- Is Active: you can activate/deactivate the snapshot by selecting this checkbox.
  Note: Validations can be also performed on inactive snapshots.
- Recent Validations
  
  The Recent Validations panel displays the last 5 snapshot validation reports. Click on the date to jump to a report or click View All to go to the list of the snapshot reports.
  
  The result can be:
  - Pending
    
    If the validation is still in progress (the Automation Engine process flow that carries out the validation of all target snapshots is still running).
  - Consistent
    
    If none of target snapshot comparison reports detected a deviation.
  - Inconsistent
    
    If a least one of the target snapshot comparison reports detected a deviation.
  - Failed
    
    If for at least one of the target snapshots no result was returned after the process Workflow ended, or if the process Workflow itself returned with an error.
- Actions
  
  Actions are located in the toolbar. They can be also triggered from the context menu displayed after right-clicking the entity. You can trigger the following actions (depending on your permissions):
  - Delete clicking the link deletes the snapshot.
  - Validate clicking this button validates the Environment consistency compared to the Snapshot.

Comparing Snapshots

Snapshots can be compared in the Advanced / Comparisons view of an Environment.

Click on the Details button to view the detailed validation result for each target snapshot.

The properties of a target snapshot comparison can be changed:

Via the validation report sidebar that is displayed next to the table that lists target snapshot comparisons, or
In the General / Properties section of a target snapshot comparison

Deleting Snapshots

Right-click the entity and select Delete.

Note: You may only delete the entity when you have the appropriate permission on the containing folder (see Security Concept) and all of the listed conditions are met.