| Help.. Installing an Openview Operations agent |
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| Written by Saskia Jean-Schroders: source Datacrash, Thursday, 27 April 2006 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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* An Openview Operations for UNIX agent version 7.x for Windows servers So you were asked to install an Openview Operations agent (OVO agent) on one of your servers in order to monitor the server proactively. The installation is the easy part, especially if you were provided with a script that takes care of all the post-configuration automatically. But now that the agent is installed, don’t you wonder what you did install? What does the OVO agent do on the server? The OVO agent creates a service: the HP ITO Agent. ITO stands for IT Operations, which is one of the previous names of the OVO agent. One of the other names you might see is Vantagepoint Operations agent, depending on the version of Openview Operations installed, but the service is always called HP ITO Agent service. This service will start up automatically at boot and can be used to start, stop or disable the OVO agent. The OVO agent consists of a number of processes, which all have a specific task to perform. Some processes are started during the installation of the OVO agent; others will only be started at the distribution of certain Openview templates. To check which processes are running, you can enter the following in a command prompt: “opcagt –status”. If you see this output, you probably have just installed the OVO agent: VPO Managed Node status : ------------------------- Control Agent opcctla (720) is running Message Agent opcmsga (2116) is running BBC Local Location Broker llbserver (2128) is running Subagent 1: Action Agent opcacta (2152) is running Subagent 12: Performance Agent coda (253) is running Once Openview templates are distributed successfully, you might see the following: VPO Managed Node status : ------------------------- Control Agent opcctla (868) is running Message Agent opcmsga (1104) is running BBC Local Location Broker llbserver (1112) is running Subagent 1: Action Agent opcacta (1128) is running Logfile Encapsulator opcle (1152) is running Monitor Agent opcmona (1164) is running Message Interceptor opcmsgi (1176) is running Subagent 12: Performance Agent coda (253) is running Did you notice most processes start with the letters “opc”? This makes it easy to find them in Task Manager, doesn’t it? Let’s take a closer look at all those processes. opcctla.exe This is the process of the Control Agent, which stops and starts all the other processes. No other OVO processes can run without the Control Agent. If you ever see another process run without this process, it is probably hanging and no longer in control. opcmsga.exe This is the process of the Message Agent, which is responsible for sending messages to the Openview Operations Management server. If this process stops running, no messages are being sent to the management server. When the OVO agent can not reach the OVO management server, the Message Agent will buffer the messages until the management server is reachable again. llbserver.exe This process is called the Local Location Broker. It allows multiple applications to communicate via a single network communication configuration, and is mainly responsible for communication with the coda.exe process, which is the lightweight performance agent of the OVO agent as of version 7. It is not present in earlier agent versions. If you don’t use the Coda Agent, then you don’t really need this process. opcacta.exe This is the process of the Action Agent. It will execute actions on the server, when they are called for from an application call, or when automatic actions or operator-initiated actions are configured in a template for a specific event. opcle.exe This process belongs to the Logfile Encapsulator. It is a difficult name for the subagent which is responsible for executing logfile templates. This process is only started when a logfile template is distributed to a server. opcmona.exe This is the Monitor Agent, which is responsible for executing Monitor templates. This process only is started when a monitor template is distributed to the server. opcmsgi.exe This is the process of the Message Interceptor. This process is only started when a Message Template is distributed to the server. coda.exe This is the process of the Coda Agent, which is the lightweight performance agent which comes with version 7 of the OVO agent. If you also have the Openview Performance Agent (or Measureware Agent if you prefer) running on the server, then you might choose to disable this Coda Agent. I have mentioned Openview templates a few times now. Templates are like work instructions for the OVO agents; they tell the OVO agents what to do and when to do it. Templates are created, assigned and distributed to a server on the Openview Operations management server. Without templates, the agents would hardly do anything. Templates come in a few different types. The most common types on a server are: - logfile templates - monitor templates - message templates (OPCMSG) Logfile templates tell the Logfile Encapsulator process to scan logfiles or event logs at a specified interval (for instance every 15 minutes) and to check whether any of the events in the logfile match a condition specified in the template. If there is a match, the condition specifies whether you want the OVO agent to send a message to the Openview management server and/or execute an automatic action. Monitor templates tell the Monitor Agent to execute scripts at a specified interval (for instance every 10 minutes) and to check whether the output of the script (mostly numbers) match a condition in the template. For instance, if the output of the script is lower than a threshold specified in a condition, the OVO agent can be told to send a message to the Openview management server and/or execute an automatic action. Message templates capture all output from the command opcmsg.exe which can be used in scripts or by Openview Performance Agents to send messages and look if the output matches a condition in the template. And here again, if there is a match, the OVO agent can be told to send a message to the Openview management server and/or execute an automatic action. The severity, the text and the attributes of each message are specified in the template conditions. The messages are displayed, for instance in the HP Openview Java Console, in the way the conditions of the templates created them. To check which templates are active on your server, you can enter the following in a command prompt: “opctemplate –l” (l for list). Only templates with the status “Enabled” are active on your server; “Disabled” templates are not executed on the server. Hopefully your Openview administrator has named the templates in such a way that you can tell what the templates are supposed to do, because you can’t read the templates or the contents of the templates from the command prompt or in the Openview files on the hard drive. This brings us to the files of the Openview Operations Agent. All files concerning the OVO agent are created in the folder structure \usr\OV\. By default this folder structure is found on the C:\ drive, but it can have been installed on another drive if you have specified this before the installation (before, not during!). Not all folders will be of interest to you; however, you might need to go to these folders from time to time: \usr\OV\conf\OpC location of the file nodeinfo \usr\OV\bin\OpC\install location of the file opcinfo \usr\OV\log\OpC location of the file opcerror \usr\OV\tmp\OpC location of the queue files and pipes When do I need to go there, you might ask. Well, the first two files, nodeinfo and opcinfo, are configuration files of the OVO agent. In these two files, you can set and change parameters to change the behavior of the agent. You might have to go there when you are manually configuring the Openview agent after installation, or when you change the IP-address of the server. The file opcerror is the logfile of the OVO agent. You would need to check this file when the OVO agent is not working correctly, which hopefully will never occur to you. The folder with the queue files might be of interest to you in case of a problem with message buffering or a message storm (suddenly sending more messages than OVO can handle), which is also something I hope you will never see. You have read about the service, the processes, the templates and a few useful files of the Openview Operations agent. You should have a fair idea of what the OVO agent is doing on your server. I would like to conclude with a few useful commands, which allow you to manage the Openview agent and its templates without the help of the Openview administrator; I want to check the status of the OVO agent: opcagt -status I want to stop all OVO processes except the Control Agent: opcagt -stop I want to stop all OVO processes including the Control Agent: opcagt –kill I want to disable the coda agent: opcsubagt –disable coda I want to check the templates of the OVO agent: opctemplate -l I want to disable a template: opctemplate –d “<template name>” I want to enable a template: opctemplate –e “<template name>” Saskia Jean-Schroders April 24th 2006
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