NTA Event: Database Maintenance Failed to Prepare Partitions for Future Data

5/29/2019 9:56 PM

7/1/2025 1:30 PM

When the database isn't able to prepare partitions for future data in SolarWinds NTA for multiple days, the following error message is displayed:

Database maintenance failed to create/delete data partitions for NTA data.

The NTA.BusinessLayer.log shows the following errors:

WARN  SolarWinds.Netflow.DataBaseMaintenance.PartitionsMaintenance.PartitionsMaintenanceOperationBase - Operation: 'Future Partitions Maintenance' failed on partition with date 16/01/2024 12:00:00 AM.
WARN  SolarWinds.Netflow.DataBaseMaintenance.PartitionsMaintenance.PartititonsMaintenanceOperationsProviderBase - Operation: 'Future Partitions Maintenance' failed. Roll backing transaction.
ERROR SolarWinds.Netflow.DataBaseMaintenance.PartitionsMaintenance.PartitionsMaintenanceOperationsRetryManager - Future Partitions Maintenance with retries didn't succeed.
ERROR SolarWinds.Netflow.DataBaseMaintenance.PartitionsMaintenance.PartitionsMaintenanceOperationsRetryManager - Future Partitions Maintenance in force mode with retries failed!

Netflow Traffic Analyzer

The issue is caused by heavy usage of NTA, as the database maintenance was unable to find a window for the partitioning work.

If this situation is not resolved immediately, flow data received in the following days will be lost.

There are three ways to address this situation.

Use NTA Service maintenance in Force mode (permanent solution)

1. Stop the NetFlow Service on the Main Polling Engine.
2. As a database administrator, assign the ALTER ANY CONNECTION permission for the NTA SQL Flow Storage database user.
   The permission applies to the entire SQL server instance, not just the NTA Flow Storage database. In many deployments, this option is therefore nonviable.
3. Start the NetFlow service

Use Force mode and the NTA database maintenance tool

This method requires temporarily granting of ALTER ANY CONNECTION permission for the SQL server user.

1. Stop the NetFlow Service on the Main Polling Engine.
2. As a database administrator, assign the ALTER ANY CONNECTION permission for the NTA SQL Flow Storage database user.
3. Launch the NetFlow Database Maintenance tool on the Main Polling Engine (by default, located in C:\Program Files (x86)\SolarWinds\Orion\NetFlowTrafficAnalysis).
4. Select Create partitions for future flows and select Force mode.
5. Select Delete flows specified by retention setting and select Force mode.
6. Click Next.
7. When the tool finishes, start the NetFlow service.
8. Schedule a periodical manual maintenance procedure to repeat this process at least every 100 days.

Use the NetFlow Database Maintenance tool with Soft mode

In case there are queries blocking the maintenance, this process might not work and you will need to follow one of the above procedures.

1. Stop the NetFlow service, Orion website, and the SolarWinds Information Service on all polling engines and website deployments.
2. Launch the NetFlow Database Maintenance tool on the Main Polling Engine (by default, located in C:\Program Files (x86)\SolarWinds\Orion\NetFlowTrafficAnalysis).
3. Select Create partitions for future flows and keep Soft mode selected.
4. Select Delete flows specified by retention setting and keep Soft mode selected.
5. Click Next.
6. After the tool completes, check if the operations were successful.
   If the operations are unsuccessful, follow one of the above procedures.
   If the tool is taking a long time to finish, click Cancel and follow one of the above procedures.
7. Start the NetFlow Service, Orion website, and the SolarWinds Information Service on all polling engines and website deployments.
8. Schedule a periodical manual maintenance procedure to repeat this process at least every 100 days.