Specifications

13
SQL maintenance
For your McAfee ePO server to function correctly it is very important to have a well performing SQL
database. It is the central storage place for all the data your McAfee ePO server uses and it requires
maintenance and care.
ePolicy Orchestrator SQL database maintenance
The SQL database used by the McAfee ePO server requires regular maintenance and back ups to
ensure ePolicy Orchestrator functions correctly.
On a regular basis, perform these tasks to make sure your SQL Server is maintained:
• Regularly back up of the ePolicy Orchestrator SQL database and its transaction log
• Reindex your database on a regular basis
• Rebuild your database on a regular basis
• Purge older events using server tasks as described in Purging events automatically.
The ePolicy Orchestrator SQL database houses everything that ePolicy Orchestrator needs to function.
Your System Tree structure, your policies, administrators, client tasks, and configuration settings for
the ePolicy Orchestrator server itself. Back up your SQL database regularly in the case your SQL
database or your McAfee ePO server environment fails. These backups ensure that if the McAfee ePO
sever needs to be rebuilt or restored there is a safe and current copy to revert back to. Plus, if you are
using the Microsoft Full Recovery Model for SQL, then your transaction log can continue to grow
indefinitely until a full backup is performed.
Table data fragmentation
Probably one of the most significant performance problems found in databases is table data
fragmentation. For example, table fragmentation could be similar to an index at the end of a large
book. A single index entry in this book might point to several pages scattered throughout the book.
This means you must then scan each page for the specific information you are looking for.
This is significantly different from the index of the telephone book that stores its data in sorted order.
A typical query for the name "Jones" might span multiple consecutive pages, but are they are always
in a sorted order.
In the case of a database, you start out with the data looking like a telephone book and, over time,
end up with the data looking more like a large book index.
Therefore, you need to occasionally re-sort the data to recreate the phone book order. This is where
re-indexing and rebuilding your ePolicy Orchestrator SQL database is critical. Over time your database
becomes more fragmented especially if it manages a larger environment where thousands of events
are written to it on a daily basis.
13
McAfee
®
ePolicy Orchestrator
®
4.0 and 4.5 Best Practices Guide
105