SQL Server On-Demand Assessment

setup and overview

Article • 02/28/2023

The SQL Server assessment allows you to diagnose potential issues with your SQL Server
environment running on-premises, on Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines (VMs), or on
Amazon Web Services (AWS) VMs. You can assess a single server, multiple servers, or
failover cluster running SQL Server 2012, SQL Server 2014, SQL Server 2016, SQL Server
2017 or SQL Server 2019 instances, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2,
Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2016, Windows Server
2019 failover cluster, or standalone server installations are supported.

The recommendations cover areas such as change control, monitoring, disaster recovery,
service-level agreements, configuration items, and the proper function of the major
components of the SQL environment.

This assessment is designed to provide you specific actionable guidance grouped in Focus
Areas to mitigate risks to your SQL Servers and your organization.

Key pillars of the SQL Server Assessment

SQL Server configuration
Database design
Security
Performance
Always On
Cluster
Upgrade readiness
Error log analysis
Operational Excellence

Run the SQL Server Assessment

Prerequisites
To take full advantage of the On-Demand Assessments available through Services Hub, you
must:

1. Have linked an active Azure subscription to Services Hub and added the SQL Server
Assessment. For more information, see Getting Started with On-Demand Assessments
or watch the how to link video.
2. Download and install the Microsoft Monitoring Agent and choose the appropriate
agent setup on a supported Windows Server machine. You can also watch the video
guides for how to install the agent and how to configure the gateway.
3. A domain account (User or Managed Service Account) with the following rights:

Member of the local Administrators group on all servers in the environment

SysAdmin role on all Microsoft SQL Servers in the environment.

4. Review the Pre-Requisites document for the SQL Server Assessment. This document
explains the detailed technical documentation of the SQL Server Assessment and the
server preparation needed to run the assessment. It also documents the different
types of data collected by the assessment.

７ Note

On average, it takes an hour to initially configure your environment to run an On-

Demand Assessment. After you run an assessment, you can review the data in Azure
Log Analytics. This will provide you with a prioritized list of recommendations,
categorized across six focus areas. This allows you and your team to quickly
understand risk levels, the health of your environments, act to decrease risk, and
improve your overall IT health.

Set up the SQL Server Assessment

Watch the Configure the SQL Server On-Demand Assessment video guide.

７ Note

You will only be able to successfully setup the assessment once you have linked your
Azure Subscription to Services Hub and added the SQL Server Assessment from
Health > Assessments in Services Hub.
 1. On the data collection machine, create the following folder:
C:\LogAnalytics\SQLServer (or any other folder you want).

2. If you're using a User Domain Account Open regular PowerShell (not ISE) in
Administrator mode and run the below cmdlet:

Add-SQLAssessmentTask -SQLServerName <YourServerName> –WorkingDirectory

<Directory>

where YourServerName is the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) or the NetBIOS

name of single server or failover cluster running SQL Server environment.

If more than one environment is assessed, “;” is used between the environments. For
failover cluster, check failover cluster virtual network name. Directory is the path to an
existing directory used to store the files created while collecting and analyzing the data
from the environment(s). Provide the required user account credentials that satisfy the
requirements mentioned in this article earlier.

3. If you're using a Group Managed Service Account Open regular PowerShell (not ISE)
in Administrator mode and run the below cmdlet:

Add-SQLAssessmentTask -SQLServerName <YourServerName> –WorkingDirectory

<Directory> -RunWithManagedServiceAccount $True

where YourServerName is the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) or the NetBIOS
name of single server or failover cluster running SQL Server environment. When

prompted for password just press enter, as you are using a gMSA you don't need to

provide a password as it is handled by the system

If more than one environment is assessed, “;” is used between the environments. For
failover cluster, check failover cluster virtual network name. Directory is the path to an
existing directory used to store the files created while collecting and analyzing the data
from the environment(s). Provide the required user account credentials that satisfy the
requirements mentioned in this article earlier.

4. Data collection is triggered by the scheduled task named SQLAssessment within an

hour of running the previous script and then every seven days. The task can be
modified to run on a different date/time or even forced to run immediately from the
task scheduler library > Microsoft > Operations Management Suite > AOI*** >
Assessments > SQLAssessment.
 5. During collection and analysis, data is temporarily stored under the Working Directory
folder that was configured during setup.
6. After a few hours, your assessment results will be available on your Log Analytics and
Services Hub Dashboard. You can navigate to see the results by going into Services
Hub > IT Health > On-Demand Assessments and then selecting View all
recommendations against the active assessment.
7. If you wish to get a Microsoft Accredited Engineer to go over the issues about your
SQL Server environment with you, you can contact your Microsoft Representative and
ask them about the Remote or Onsite CE Led Delivery.

Agreement Remote Engineer Onsite Engineer

Premier SQL Remote Datasheet SQL Onsite Datasheet

Unified SQL Remote Datasheet SQL Onsite Datasheet

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If you have general feedback on the Resource Center or its content, contact your Microsoft
representative. If you have any specific requests or content updates for Services Hub,
contact our Support Team .

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