IBM Tivoli Monitoring Agent Builder allows for the creation of custom monitoring agents using a JMX data source.  JMX data sources gather attribute metrics based on MBean data.  By default, custom agent attributes will not dig into a "CompositeData" MBean.  This post will explain how to define custom agent  attributes to gather the details for CompositeData MBeans by specifying the "Name" value for a sub-attribute to be passed to the "get" method.   For general example of creating a JMX monitoring agent with Agent... [More]

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The Agentless Monitoring agents - R2, R3, R4, R5, R6 - come with a set of predefined situations that are documented in the individual User's Guide manuals under the "Situations reference" section.   These situations are shipped as part of the application support definitions that are installed on the TEMS / TEPS infrastructure.   UNIX / Linux: /opt/IBM/ITM/bin/cinfo -i *********** Tue Jul 19 02:29:33 EDT 2016 ****************** User: root Groups: system Host name : TestSystem   Installer Lvl:06.30.06.00 CandleHome: /opt/IBM/ITM... [More]

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ITM monitoring agent for DB2 databases - UD - can be used to monitor DB2 usage for transaction logs. The UD agent contains two attribute groups - Database01 (KUD_DB2_Database01) and Log (KUD_DB2_LOG) - either of which can be used to monitor the Log Used Percent. The attributes in these two attribute groups for log use percent are calculated the same way.   Database01 (KUD_DB2_Database01) attributes Current Primary Log Used Percent The percentage of primary log space that is currently in use. Current Secondary Log Used Percent The percentage of... [More]

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IBM Tivoli Monitoring allows for collection of attribute data historically. Historical collections are defined through the Historical Collection Configuration editor in the TEP, and the short term historical (STH) files are stored at either the TEMS or the TEMA before the data is warehoused to the Tivoli Data Warehouse (TDW) database. STH data samples are written in binary to files named with the internal attribute group identifier, and a corresponding header file that has a .hdr extension. In order to review the actual historical sample data... [More]

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The UNIX OS agent - UX - has incorporated numerous attributes that were previously provided by the AIX Premium agent - PX - that was part of the System P package.  If experiencing problems with a "merged" metric, it is important to understand that different subsets of the "PX" metrics were incorporated at different levels of UNIX OS agent.  Depending on which attribute group is not able to be collected, the issue may be due to the version of the UX component on the endpoint (or the level of UX agent application support).  ... [More]

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In general with Tivoli Monitoring agents, problems related to "weak cyphers" or a specific "port" coming up in a security scan being cited as vulnerable are almost always related to Secure Socket Layer (SSL) communications (using IP.SPIPE or IP6.SPIPE communication method), or the IBM HTTP Server.  Both of these rely on The IBM Global Security Kit (GSKIT) embedded package to provide the SSL protocols / ciphers for communication.  The IP.SPIPE / IP6.SPIPE communication is a separate channel than the communication to the embedded... [More]

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IBM Tivoli Monitoring Agent Builder allows for the creation of custom monitoring agents. In order to be able to do a time comparison as part of a situation using the DATE function, the custom agent needs to define an attribute as a Timestamp field.  There is no function to interpret a string as a date / time and then do a comparison. DATE: Compare Date and Time http://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSTFXA_6.3.0/com.ibm.itm.doc_6.3/adminuse/formulafunction_date_tep.htm   *** Use the DATE formula function in a situation, query, query-based... [More]

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Newly installed Agent Builder on Windows can fail to start with pop-up window indicating an error occurred:   Example contents of this log: !SESSION Tue Mar 01 21:18:08 EST 2016 ------------------------------------------ !ENTRY org.eclipse.equinox.launcher 4 0 2016-03-01 21:18:08.763 !MESSAGE Exception launching the Eclipse Platform: !STACK java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: org.eclipse.core.runtime.adaptor.EclipseStarter     at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:666)     at... [More]

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"Hardware Events" attributes were added to HMC base monitoring agent as part of enhancement 215857 and shipped in interim fix level 6.2.2.3-TIV-ITM_HMC_BASE-IF0004.   IBM Tivoli Monitoring: HMC Base Agent 6.2.2.3-TIV-ITM_HMC_BASE-IF0004   "Hardware Events" gather data from the HMC through SSH using "lssvcevents" command.  The PH monitoring agent does not perform any calculations or other operations on the values returned by "lssvcevents", they are provided as-is.   Example showing equivalent "lssvcevents"... [More]

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This blog post is to provide a general procedure to update framework components using either a local silent install, or a remote deploy of components from TEMS depot using "tacmd updateFramework". Trying to use "INSTALL_FOR_PLATFORM=aix523" in a silent install response file will NOT work, the silent installation will still default to the detected 64-bit operating system and install components for aix536 platform.   Depending on the order of install performed from various ITM / ITCAM images, different versions /... [More]

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ITM / ITCAM agents ship "provisional fixes" and "interim fixes" as a "patch" install that does not contain full Common Installer components. If the "patch" maintenance package requires application support updates, the installation instructions in the README may provide details on using ITM Application Support Installer (ITMASI) to update the application support on the ITM infrastructure.   ITMASI can be used to update TEMS / TEPS / TEP Desktop application support definitions, but will NOT update TEP Browser... [More]

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The DB2 monitoring agent by design installs both 32 and 64 bit UD agent components (necessitating both 32 and 64 bit shared libraries - AX, and 32 and 64 bit JRE and GSKIT) because the bitness of the UD monitoring agent must match the bitness of the DB2 installation.  Since DB2 allows for both 32 and 64 bit databases, the monitoring agent must provide 32 and 64 bit UD agents.   The ITCAM for DB2 installation image packages back-level Common Installer components, which can result in older levels of AX / JR / GS components being installed for... [More]

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Code changes made for defect 105994 changed the default value for UD agent metrics gathered as part of "DB2 System Overview" and "DB2 System Overview (Superseded)" will result in -4 being returned for numeric fields that were not collected. Previous versions of UD agent would return a value of 0 (zero) when not collected, which could be confused with a valid value of 0 being returned for a metric that was successfully gathered as part of the sample. This change to clarify when metrics are not collected was first implemented in... [More]

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This post is intended to provide a beginning set of steps for gathering initial documentation to begin working a ticket when engaging IBM Support for problems being reported with Log File Agent - LO. The external symptom typically reported is the LO agent is not populating data in the TEP portal as expected. #1) Provide details to confirm overall ITM environment. The first step is confirming the ITM environment as different levels of LO agent may allow for different configuration parameters. The LO agent running on the endpoint should be the... [More]

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 ITM Oracle Extended Agent (RZ) requires Enterprise Edition Oracle WITH "Diagnostic Pack License" and "STATISTIC_LEVEL=TYPICAL/ALL"  to support gathering of Top SQL data with "KRZRDB TOP SQL" attribute group.   The ONLY environment that supports data being written to the "dba_hist_sqlstat" table is to be running Enterprise Edition of Oracle WITH "Diagnostic Pack License". With an Enterprise Edition of Oracle with "Diagnostic Pack License", in order for data to be in the... [More]

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The Log File Agent (LFA) is the recommended solution for general log monitoring with IBM Tivoli Monitoring. The Log File Agent is identified by product code LO and is often suggested to replace the deprecated UNIX Logs agent identified by product code UL.    Log File Agent - LO component - 5724C04LF    UNIX Logs - UL component - 5724C04LA   Since the LO is suggested as a replacement for UL component, a brief comparison of the solutions is in order to understand why this recommendation is made.   #1: UL component is deprecated in 6.3 release:... [More]

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If "Tivoli Log File Profile" entries are missing from Tivoli Enterprise Portal (TEP) navigator tree for subnodes of the LO monitoring agent, verify the permissions / access to necessary applications for the account used to sign-on to the Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server (TEPS) to launch the TEP client .   If the user does not have "Tivoli Log File Profile" application or "All Applications" listed under "Allowed Applications", the subnode entries for profiles are not visible. permissions / access to necessary... [More]

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Tivoli Monitoring agent is off-line even though the agent process is running on the endpoint, and startup log shows it successfully connected to a TEMS.   Symptom: The managed system for the monitoring agent is greyed out or completely missing from the navigator tree in the Tivoli Enterprise Portal. Situation alerts generated for managed system off-line situation - "MS_Offline".    Cause: Missing application support for the type of monitoring agent on the TEMS the endpoint is connecting to.     Environment: Generic issue for Tivoli... [More]

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IBM Tivoli Monitoring ships both 32-bit and 64-bit monitoring agents for Windows platforms. Depending on the version of ITM package used, some specific agents are available as both a 32-bit (WINNT) and a 64-bit (WIX64) version. The Windows OS agent - NT, and Log File Agent - LO, are two examples that are available as both 32-bit and 64-bit agents. The 64-bit LO agent first shipped with 6.3 FP2 Log File Agent image: IBM Tivoli Monitoring 6.3.0 Fix Pack 2 (6.3.0-TIV-ITM-FP0002) https://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg24035402   The... [More]

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Product manuals and Software Product Compatibility Reports do not provide details on whether VMware Appliance based vCenter is supported with Tivoli "VMware VI" monitoring agent.   There is no mention of VMware vCenter Server Appliance - vCSA in any Tivoli Monitoring product documentation. There is no mention of adding support for vCSA in the "new in this release" information for the various releases of VMware monitoring for virtual servers:... [More]

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Can the LO agent be used to monitor a "circular" or "rolling" log file? Yes. But there are limitations. Is it recommended? No.   It is up to the user to determine if the need to montor a circular log can be accomplished with the LO agent given its design limitations.   The LO agent is primarily intended to read data that is appended to a monitored log, and works by periodically polling the identified file and making checks to determine if there is "new" data to process, and then processes those "new" entries. The... [More]

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In the TCR interface, under "Work With Reports" section, the "Resource Section" will contain the list of systems that the selected report is able to be run against under the "Servers" section.  If this list is blank, or missing a desired system, this indicates that there is no entry for this system in the ManagedSystem table or the ManagedSystem table is absent in the Tivoli Data Warehouse (TDW) database.   COGNOS based TCR reports run SQL queries against the contents of the TDW database, and rely on entries in the... [More]

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Gathering PING metrics requires "root" authority due to the underlying ICMP protocol.  Opening a raw socket to send / receive data on when issuing a "ping" request requires "root" authority. This applies even when running "ping" command manually. This is why the "ping" command has "setuid" bit set so that when it is issued by a non-root user, the setuid bit being set runs the command as if it had been initiated by "root": Example: $ ls -l /bin/ping -rw s r-xr-x 1 root root 38264 Nov 13 ... [More]

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There are numerous "agentless" agents: Agentless Monitoring for Windows Operating Systems 5724C04RW - KR2 Agentless Monitoring for AIX Operating Systems 5724C04RA - KR3 Agentless Monitoring for Linux Operating Systems 5724C04RL - KR4 Agentless Monitoring for HP-UX Operating Systems 5724C04RH - KR5 Agentless Monitoring for Solaris Operating Systems 5724C04RS - KR6 All of the "agentless" agents can be installed on Windows / UNIX / Linux platforms, and then configured to remotely monitor the type of endpoint remotely where the... [More]

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This blog post is to provide details to externalize known issue with signing algorithm used for DB2 monitoring agent certificates shipped in .jar files.   APAR IJ03816 - ITCAM FOR DB2 MONITORING AGENT - UD - SHIPS WITH CERTIFICATES IN KUD_RESOURCES.JAR               Installing application support for latest UD agent maintenance interim fix, or latest UD agent release, results in errors in TEP due to signing of certificate files in kud_resources.jar file using old MD5 signing algorithm. This forces customers to have to manually resign .jar files... [More]

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The Universal Agent allows for various data providers in order to create custom applications to gather monitoring metrics. The definitions for a custom application are specified in metafiles. This blog post is to provide debugging details for using the POST data provider, and utility program KUMPSEND.   Post Data Provider https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSTFXA_6.2.3/com.ibm.itm.doc_6.2.1/621uausers137.htm#postdp   #1)  Confirm the UM component version and platform for the environment On UNIX / Linux, check the "cinfo -i"... [More]

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Agentless Linux monitoring agent - R4 - does not display remote Linux endpoints under "Managed Systems" in TEP navigator:     Confirm that the R4 agent instance has been configured to communicate with remote Linux endpoints, and the specific details used for SNMP version / remote system IP. Reference: ITM Agent Insights: Agentless Linux monitoring agent (R4) configuration walk-through https://ibm.biz/BdZWex   Verify that SNMP daemon is running on the remote Linux endpoint and that the snmpd.conf is configured correctly to include... [More]

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