Sun N1 System Manager 1.1 Administration Guide

Enabling Monitoring

For all provisionable servers, that is to say for all physical servers that have been discovered by the Sun N1 System Manager software, management features are supported when the add server command is used to create monitorable objects. The management features are used to periodically retrieve CPU statistics, filesystem, and memory data, for monitoring purposes.

Monitored file system data for a provisionable server is not available unless an operating system is deployed on the provisionable server, and the management features have been added by using the add server feature command with the agentip keyword:

N1-ok> add server server-name feature basemanagement agentip agentip agentssh username/password

N1-ok> add server server-name feature osmonitor agentip agentip agentssh username/password

The agentip is the IP address of the provisioning network interface of the provisionable server that you want to monitor. See add server in Sun N1 System Manager 1.1 Command Line Reference Manual for details. See also To Add the Base Management Feature and To Add the OS Monitoring Feature for additional details on the syntax used in these commands.

When you specify or change features, you must use the add server command. The set server command cannot be used to specify a feature.

The add server command is useful for enabling OS resource utilization monitoring and network reachability monitoring, but not for monitoring hardware health. Hardware health is already monitored by default as soon as the Sun N1 System Manager software discovers a physical server.

Note –

The polling of network reachability is not possible if OS resource utilization monitoring is not enabled.

For more information about the agentip subcommand, see To Add the OS Monitoring Feature.

The add server command needs to be issued only once for a server and not each time you want to enable or disable monitoring.

Note –

If the provisionable server's IP address changes, use the set server command again before enabling or disabling monitoring.

The default status of monitoring in the Sun N1 System Manager for discovered servers and initialized operating systems is as follows:

Default status of hardware monitoring

When a server or other hardware is discovered, monitoring of the server or other hardware is enabled by default. Before a server can be monitored, however, it must be discovered and correctly registered with the N1 System Manager. This process is described in Discovering Servers. The monitoring of hardware sensors is enabled by default for all managed servers. If a server is deleted and then rediscovered, all states related to that server for the purposes of monitoring are lost. This is the case regardless of whether monitoring was enabled or disabled for that server when the server was deleted. When the server is rediscovered, monitoring is set to true by default. For more information about discovering servers, see To Discover New Servers.

Default status of OS resource utilization monitoring

Disabled by default. When an OS has been successfully provisioned on a provisionable server and the N1 System Manager management features are supported by using the add server feature command with the agentip specified, OS resource utilization monitoring is enabled. The OS provisioning can be performed either through the N1 System Manager or by an external OS installation.

If you are not interested in the values of some OS resource utilization attributes, you can disable the threshold severity for the monitoring of those attributes, while continuing to monitor other OS resource utilization attributes. This action prevents annoyance alarms. Example 5–4 shows how to accomplish this task. For general information about threshold values, see Monitoring Threshold Values.

Default status of network reachability monitoring

When the management interface of the provisionable server is discovered, monitoring of the interface is enabled by default. When the management features are added, monitoring of other interfaces is enabled by default.

To Monitor a Server

The following procedure describes how to use the command line to enable the monitoring of hardware health, operating system utilization, and network reachability of a server.

Before You Begin

To enable the management agent IP and security credentials on a server named server, add the management features on the server as explained in Adding Base and OS Management Features.

Steps

Set the monitored attribute to true by using the set server command.
N1-ok> set server server monitored true
In this procedure, server is the name of the provisionable server that you want to monitor.

View the server details.
N1-ok> show server server

To Monitor a Server Group

Before You Begin

To enable the management agent IP and security credentials on a server named server, add the management features on the server as explained in Adding Base and OS Management Features. This procedure is important for OS resource utilization monitoring but not for monitoring hardware health.

Steps

Set the monitored attribute to true by using the set group command.
N1-ok> set group group monitored true
This command is executed for the group of servers that you have already named. See set group in Sun N1 System Manager 1.1 Command Line Reference Manual for details. In this procedure, group is the name of the group of provisionable servers that you want to monitor.

View the server group details to determine if monitoring is enabled for each server in the group.
N1-ok> show group group

View the specific monitoring details for individual servers in the group.
N1-ok> show server server
Detailed monitoring information appears in the output. Information is displayed about polling intervals and threshold values for the monitoring of hardware health, OS resource utilization and network reachability. Polling intervals are explained in Setting Polling Intervals. Monitoring threshold values are explained in Monitoring Threshold Values.

To Disable Monitoring for a Server

You might want to disable monitoring of a hardware component to perform maintenance tasks without generating events.

Steps

Set the monitored attribute to false by using the set server command.
N1-ok> set server server monitored false
In this example, server is the name of the provisionable server that you want to stop monitoring. Executing this command disables monitoring of the server. With monitoring of a server disabled, the violation of threshold values by attributes related to that server does not generate events.

View the server details.
N1-ok> show server server
The output shows that monitoring is disabled.

If you are not interested in the values of some OS resource utilization attributes, you can disable the threshold severity for the monitoring of those attributes, while continuing to monitor other OS resource utilization attributes. This action prevents annoyance alarms. Example 5–4 shows how to accomplish this task. For general information about threshold values, see Monitoring Threshold Values. You can also completely remove the OS resource utilization monitoring feature. See To Remove the OS Monitoring Feature.

To Disable Monitoring for a Server Group

This procedure describes how to disable monitoring for a server group. You might want to disable monitoring of hardware components to perform maintenance tasks without generating events.

Note –

When you disable monitoring for a server, hardware health monitoring, OS monitoring, and network reachability monitoring are all disabled for that server.

Steps

Set the monitored attribute to false by using the set group command.
N1-ok> set group group monitored false
This command is executed for the group of servers that you have already named. See set group in Sun N1 System Manager 1.1 Command Line Reference Manual for details. In this procedure, group is the name of the group of provisionable servers that you want to stop monitoring. Executing this command disables monitoring for all servers in the group. With monitoring of a server group disabled, the violation of threshold values by attributes related to servers in that group does not generate events.

View the server group details to determine if monitoring is disabled for all servers in the group.
N1-ok> show group group