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Re: [nv-l] servmon and itmquery in NV 7.1.4

To: nv-l@lists.us.ibm.com
Subject: Re: [nv-l] servmon and itmquery in NV 7.1.4
From: Jane Curry <jane.curry@skills-1st.co.uk>
Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2003 20:00:34 +0000
Delivery-date: Sat, 06 Dec 2003 20:13:04 +0000
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Sorry but I think the NetView for Unix 7.1.4 Admin Guide, P177 sets a definite expectation that I get service icons at the interface level:

"Service objects are represented at the interface level of the node. The label assigned to a service object is the Service Label Name field from the corresponding servmon configuration file entry. The status of each service is checked at the interval specified by the corresponding servmon configuration file entry to update the
service objects."

This is the new Admin Guide, FOR UNIX! I really don't have the heart to raise a documentation PMR to request that they undocument the function that several of us have really been waiting for!!!!!

OK - so service icons at the interface level is broken as (not-yet) designed. Getting back to my original questions, what HAVE we actually got in 7.1.4? servmon entries to test for ITM-monitored services (where only DB2, WAS and MQ are actually supported), but these servmon entries actually only do one discovery test, using some sort of java "black box", undocumented program, that seems to use itmquery to test that an ITM Resource Model exists (but isn't necessarily active) on Tivoli endpoints????. No periodic status checking. SmartSet creation actively prevented for this sort of service discovery. I take Leslie's point that you can get a <node>:<service>.CF object in the NetView object database, PROVIDED I manually create the service smartset, but nothing seems to use that.....

This doesn't sound like the sort of full-function NetView solution that would have been at the top of many NetView customers' wish lists!!!!

Then there's some new events to TEC that can be generated, to do with services. However, it doesn't seem to be NetView that generates these, it's a TEC State Correlation Gateway adapter that I am guessing is somehow the backend of nvserverd (but there's no documentation and no architecture diagram.......). There's a bucket load of new rules in TEC 3.9 that work with these SCE-generated events but - guess what? Since they are generated by the SCE, NetView users don't get to see them at all! And presumably this wonderful hierarchy of correlated rules depends on this one discovery test done by servmon at some stage????? (I can't work out whether a non-functioning ITM monitor can ever be detected as such by servmon; since there seems to be NO status polling because we don't have SmartSets by default, I suspect not).

Please - can someone fill in some of the blanks! I've seen lots of marketing presentations talking about the new NetView / TEC / ITM integration - there has to be more to it than I have found??? And from the ITM point-of-view, there really is almost diddly-squat for the pure NetView user!

Cheers,
Jane

Leslie Clark wrote:


Where we disagree is in the expectation that the function would be there. We were never told that it would be there. I'm sorry you had that expectation. Unmet expectation leads to dissatisfaction. I did not have that expectation. I am however developing an expectation for Counter64 support. Now if that doesn't show up soon I will be feeling some dissatisfaction! :{

Cordially,

Leslie A. Clark
IBM Global Services - Systems Mgmt & Networking
Detroit



        *"Barr, Scott" <Scott_Barr@csgsystems.com>*
Sent by: owner-nv-l@lists.us.ibm.com

12/05/2003 03:24 PM
Please respond to nv-l

To: <nv-l@lists.us.ibm.com> cc: Subject: RE: [nv-l] servmon and itmquery in NV 7.1.4




I don't disagree with you at all.
That's not the point. The point is no one who bought NetView v7.1.4 would have assumed these "limitations" were part of the plan. As I stated in my response, I could build the necessary support for this but I don't feel like I should have to spend the time when the product is supposed to do it already. Instead of using the functionality I comitted to using to our Event Management Executive Council (no, really, we have one) I have told them it will have to wait until I can write the automation package. Sorry if I seem upset about this. Again, no reflection on Leslie or James or Level 2 support. You guys are all superb in your support. Developers on the other hand.....

I am having another go at these new NV 7.1.4 features and I am really struggling. Before I start raising calls with support, I would appreciate any input or clarification from anyone else working with them....

servmon can be used a s a straight replacement for nvsniffer and, as a port sniffer, I have no issues on a Windows platform. SmartSets get created and populated; object fields get created and set; service icons are created at the interface level for each node that supports the service - business as usual. On Unix NetView (tested AIX and Linux so far), everything works other than service icons at the interface level.

From the documentation, I believe that this service-icons-at-interface-level stuff should also work on Unix, but it doesn't. I believe Scott Barr has already opened PMR13988 to cover this - anyone else have comments?

It is where servmon and itmquery are used together that things seem very strange. I can cope with the itm_servers.conf file, though I feel more documentation is required as to what exactly the userid and password are used for? I am guessing that this is for authentication as a Tivoli Administrator??? The itm_attributes.conf file has 2 fields - the first is a user specified product name; the second is a pattern matching field. My understanding is that either servmon or the itmquery command then talks to the Managed Nodes that are running ITM, that you have configured in itm_servers.conf, using the userid and password configured, and presumably does something like a wdmlseng to find out what ITM Resource Models (RMs) are distributed to what Endpoints (not sure that these RMs actually have to be active or anything....). I have added a line in itm_attributes.conf with:
Standard_ITM| ^DMX.*$
This picks up any standard Unix resource models and itmquery shows that the appropriate endpoints are indeed running the appropriate RMs.

The last part of the comments in itm_attributes.conf is where I really lose it! It says that if you want to take the next step and have servmon automatically set a capability...... set up a line like this..... I have added a line in servmon.conf to match my itm_attributes.conf:
isStandard_ITM|Standard_ITM|Standard_ITM|Standard_ITM_Label|/usr/OV/jars/nv_itm.jar@com.tivoli.netview.itm.servmon.DiscoveryMonitor||*|0

This sample line in itm_attributes.conf, which is pretty well a duplicate of the lines provided for WAS, DB2 and MQ in servmon.conf, ONLY creates an attribute field and runs a discovery Java script. No SmartSet is created; no status checking is done. The comments in itm_attributes.conf rather coyly say that servmon does NOT automatically create a smartset for service attributes. My experience having tried an entry that DOES specify a Smartset and SmartSet label is that creation of such a smartset is actively prevented!! If you do manually create a SmartSet using the SmartSet editor in Unix, based on isStandard_ITM=TRUE, then you get a SmartSet but you certainly don't get a service icon at the interface level. So far, I have totally failed to manually create such a SmartSet with my NetView on Windows!

What is the point of this thing if you cannot create SmartSets and you cannot do periodic status monitoring??????

There is no documantation (that I have found) for these Java scripts that servmon uses for discovery - I hate "black box" stuff with no information!

Anyone else got more information????

--
Tivoli Certified Consultant & Instructor
Skills 1st Limited, 2 Cedar Chase, Taplow, Bucks, SL6 0EU, UK
Tel: +44 (0)1628 782565
Copyright (c) 2003 Jane Curry <jane.curry@skills-1st.co.uk>.  All rights 
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