Deploying IBM Tivoli Monitoring operating system agents using ITCAM for Microsoft Applications is a quick and easy process. ITCAM for Microsoft Applications v6.2.3 is supplied with a number of workspaces and utilities that  discover unmanaged servers on your network, and allow you to deploy operating system agents to servers from a single screen.

The Launchpad is the main entry point for ITCAM for Microsoft Applications and is a selection of links to ITM components such as the Situation Event Console, Deployment Status Workspace etc. The main link of note is the ‘Discover Systems and Deploy OS Monitoring’ workspace which allows you to enter a range of IP addresses to scan. The Launchpad can also show you the status of the servers in your estate, both Windows and non-Windows, and can show you all running situations, all open events, and the status of the other agents that are bundled with ITCAM for Microsoft Applications.

 

You can enter either a single IP address or a range of addresses to scan.

 

The returned list can be filtered by operating system and displays the hostname, operating system, and whether the server is currently managed by ITM (with caveats – see below).

For any unmanaged agents, it’s simply a case of right-clicking and choosing to deploy an OS agent. After supplying the logon credentials and install path for the target server, as long as the binaries are in the ITM depot, the deployment will use the standard ITM remote installation mechanism which can be tracked through the Deployment Status screens from the physical navigator, or from a link from the Launchpad. It does seems odd though that you can only install OS and agentless monitors using this method, and not the other agents for Active Directory, IIS, Sharepoint etc., that come with the ITCAM for MS Apps bundle.

Installing an OS agent on the discovered server W2K8Standard:

Success!

 

Deploying OS agents in this manner is extremely quick,  and the ability to scan the network to identify unmanaged servers from within ITM itself is a great timesaver. I did come across some things during testing that do need a bit of attention. The IBM help documentation needs to be updated as it references post-installation tasks that need to be run such as KM1_ImportDnDviews.sh and ConfigureDnDApp.sh, but the installer handled these steps for me, and weren’t required. Also, the online help within the Launchpad  refers to the deployment piece as ‘Tivoli Foundations Application Manager’ which is where this functionality must have been lifted from. ITCAM for MS Apps installs nmap on the server to handle the network scanning, but make sure to install the latest version of nmap manually, as the instructions for unpacking and installing nmap 5.21 are wrong, with incorrect filenames and paths referenced. If you do use a downlevel version of nmap on the ITM server, the results returned will be missing the operating system version, so it’s best to get the latest version available.

I used the command below to update my CentoS 5.5 server:-

[root@itm nmap-5.21]# rpm -vhU http://nmap.org/dist/nmap-5.51-1.x86_64.rpm Retrieving http://nmap.org/dist/nmap-5.51-1.x86_64.rpm Preparing...                ########################################### [100%] 1:nmap                   ########################################### [100%] [root@itm nmap-5.21]# nmap Nmap 5.51 ( http://nmap.org ) Usage: nmap [Scan Type(s)] [Options] {target specification}

Another niggling issue is how ITM decides whether a server is ‘managed’ or not. I use the hosts file on the TEMS to resolve the names of my servers, and in my testing, ITM ignores any aliases you might have set up and takes the first entry to ascertain whether that server has an ITM OS agent installed. This comparison appears to be case-sensitive, as,  in the example below, server1 is displayed as ‘managed’, while server2 is unmanaged, despite them both running ITM OS agents that are visible and online within the physical navigator, and within the System Availability and Performance workspace from the Launcher.

192.168.100.100   server1 SERVER1 server1.local
192.168.100.101   SERVER2 server2 server2.local

This issue may not arise if your DNS is looked after, but it’s worth pointing out in case you do find servers that are allegedly unmanaged.

One other thing to note is the “IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Servers VMware, VI, KVM and NetApp Storage Agents 6.2.3” agent has been refreshed since it was released in March. I don’t know what has been changed between when it was first released, and the one that has just come out, but the part numbers are different, and the agent build number is a later revision. If you jumped on the latest VI agent when it first came out, you might need to reapply the agent support files and re-install the VI agent. The differences between the two are undocumented though, as far as I can tell, so I’m not sure if a reinstall is necessary.

Old

IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Servers VMware, VI, KVM, and NetApp Storage Agent Support Files V6.2.3 Multiplatform English (CZV5QEN) .tar.gz

IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Servers VMware, VI, KVM, and NetApp Storage Agents V6.2.3 Multiplatform English (CZV5PEN).tar.gz

Build Level 201102142359

New

IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Servers VMware, VI, KVM and NetApp Storage Agents 6.2.3 Windows Linux English (CZWM3EN).tar.gz

IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Servers VMware VI, KVM and NetApp Storage Agents Support Files 6.2.3 Multiplatform English (CZWM5EN).tar.gz

Build Level 201103071814

 

 

 

 

ITCAM for Microsoft Applications 6.2.3 Documentation