Minion Enterprise (ME) bundles together all of the Minion modules:
- Minion Core
- Minion Security
- Minion Space Tracker
- Minion Backup
- Minion Reindex
- Minion CheckDB
You can purchase one or more of the Minion modules as you need them, or get the whole group as a homogenous install in Minion Enterprise.
Email us at Support@MidnightDBA.com to get a 90 day trial of Minion Enterprise today!
Minion Space (also known as Minion Space Enterprise) is $100 per managed server. Minion Space Enterprise allows you to centrally configure, manage, and report on disk space for all managed servers across your enterprise. Email MinionWare for a quote!
Short answer: xp_cmdshell is not unsafe. Once turned on, it’s limited to system administrators by default. And we give you information on locking it down here in Sean’s article: Security Theater.
Medium answer: Chances are, if you have a free backup and maintenance system in place that isn’t Minion, it’s using sqlcmd steps in the SQL Agent jobs. (We’re talking about the Ola Hallengren maintenance solution, now.) This is actually not at all secure; it’s turned on by default, and anyone who has rights to alter jobs can make changes to the step. See the Security Theater article for more information.
Long answer: You guessed it-the long answer is the Security Theater article!
We have extensive documentation that includes full explanations, examples, and more, on our Support site.
If you’re a better visual learner, check out our Training page for videos that teach the concepts, and also discuss nuances and advice for configuring features. If you still need help after all that, feel free to contact us.
Absolutely. Just enter a ticket on our support site, and we’ll help you out.
System requirements for the repository are:
A default instance of SQL Server 2012 or above. (Managed instances can be SQL Server 2005 or above.)
The SQL Agent service account requires sysadmin rights on all managed SQL Server instances, and access to run system-level WMI queries on all managed servers (which can be accomplished by granting the SQL Agent service account local administrator rights on each managed server). Note: Check your company’s security policies for compliance.
The sp_configure setting xp_cmdshell may need to be enabled for some features.
PowerShell 2.0 or above; execution policy set to RemoteSigned.
Note: Minion Space doesn’t install any objects on managed servers.
Setup: Run the installer on your repository server, install the license, and insert the names of your managed servers to the dbo.Servers table. That’s about it!
