Dispatcher Detection settings

At Setup > Global Settings, you can define the general settings of your Ivanti Automation environment, and the default settings of Dispatchers and Agents.

In Ivanti Automation 2019.0, the dispatcher autodetect functionality that was present in previous versions is no longer supported. It is considered obsolete and not secure. All autodetect configuration from global settings, team, and the agent level needs to be removed in order to successfully upgrade to 2019.0 or later from versions prior to 2019.0.

The Ivanti Automation Upgrade Pack provides a list of autodetect configurations it finds so you can remove them first. If you have a large amount of settings that need changing, contact Ivanti support for an SQL script that autmates the changes.

Modules, projects, and runbooks containing tasks to deploy Ivanti Automation Agents with autodetect settings will NOT be evaluated by the Upgrade Pack. You will need to manually make that change where needed. Also, preconfigured MSIs with autodetect configuration should not be used anymore.

Dispatcher Detection settings

Dispatcher discovery

Specifies the Agents' search method for Dispatchers.

Dispatcher locations

Specifies where Agents should search for Dispatchers.

Dispatcher recovery

Specifies which action Agents should take if no Dispatchers can be contacted:

If you select Revert to cached list of all known Dispatchers, any other Dispatchers known to the Agent may be used if no Dispatcher can be contacted. You can prevent this by selecting Retry discovery.

Configuration

Dispatcher discovery and Dispatcher locations are closely related. Use their options to create a combination that specifies how and where an Agent should search for a Dispatcher.

  • Use Dispatcher Address List and Retrieve Complete Dispatcher Address List After Discovery. Use this combination to let an Agent search only for the Dispatchers that you specified in the Dispatcher address list. Once the Agent is connected to one of the Dispatchers specified in the Dispatcher List, it will then receive the list of all online Dispatchers available in the environment. This new list is what the Console is presenting in the Topology > Dispatchers node. The Agent will then try to randomly connect to one of the Dispatchers from the Retrieved Complete Dispatcher Address List.
  • Use Dispatcher Address List and Only Use Discovered Dispatchers. Using this combination, Agents will not receive the Complete Dispatcher Address List and will try to connect to one of the Dispatchers specified in the Dispatcher Address List. Specify at least one Dispatcher in the list.
  • When you configure the Dispatcher discovery settings, the Dispatcher address list must be created manually, by clicking Add in the Dispatcher discovery window and specifying the Dispatcher addresses.
  • When you change any of the Dispatcher detection settings, either at global level or at Agent level, the Agent will store the previous Dispatcher detection settings as the Last Known Good Configuration(LKGC). These are the settings with which it is certainly possible to connect to a Dispatcher.
    • The Agent will only revert to the LKGC if it is not possible to connect to any Dispatcher immediately after changing the Dispatcher detection settings.
    • The Agent will not revert to the LKGC if it is not possible to connect to any Dispatcher at a later stage (for example, because the Dispatchers get offline).
    • When an Agent has reverted to the LKGC, it will retry the new settings every 5 minutes. The Agent will keep trying with these settings until it can connect to a Dispatcher or until it receives new Dispatcher detection settings.