Installing and configuring the IBM MQ Agent

The IBM® MQ Agent can help you find and fix problems with messages building up on message queues.

Before you begin

Check that your system meets the requirements described in Support and entitlement for the IBM MQ Agent.

Procedure

  1. Set up access to large language models (LLMs) by following the instructions in Preparing an AI runtime for the IBM MQ Agent.
    The IBM MQ Agent requires access to the LLMs in an AI runtime (IBM Cloud®’s IBM watsonx.ai™ Runtime) to understand your questions. To get access you create an IBM Cloud account, add an IBM watsonx.ai runtime, then create a project in the runtime.
  2. Grant the necessary access to your queue managers by following the instructions in Granting the IBM MQ Agent access to queue manager resources.
  3. Deploy the IBM MQ Agent by following the instructions in Deploying the IBM MQ Agent into your cluster.
    This task includes creating objects within your cluster that contain information about your IBM MQ queue managers, then downloading and installing the IBM MQ Agent Helm chart to deploy the IBM MQ Agent into the cluster. This process creates the resources that are required for the IBM MQ Agent to connect to your IBM MQ installation and the AI runtime.
  4. Configure your IBM MQ Console to connect to the IBM MQ Agent, by following the instructions in Configuring the IBM MQ Console to connect to the IBM MQ Agent.

Results

You can use the IBM MQ Console to talk to the IBM MQ Agent. The agent uses the LLMs to understand your questions, and the information you gave it during deployment to query your IBM MQ installation to provide answers.