Cluster information (Clinfo) program

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Clinfo is a cluster monitoring program. It requests information about the current cluster state from the Cluster Manager. The Cluster Manger updates data using internal, dynamically allocated data structures that are accessible to Clinfo clients applications that use Clinfo API functions.

By default, Clinfo receives information from the Cluster Manager by polling. The time between polling is set by an argument to Clinfo, which defaults to 15. Clinfo can also receive information asynchronously through traps. In response to traps, Clinfo sends a request for more information to the Cluster Manager. It does not parse the trap message data itself; instead, Clinfo employs a trap-directed polling policy.

To enable Clinfo to receive traps, call it using the -a option. Since Clinfo is started through the System Resource Controller (SRC), the best way to do this is by entering:

chssys -s clinfoES -a "-a"

Then use the lssrc command to ensure this change occurred. Enter:

lssrc -Ss clinfoES | awk -F: '{print $3}'

Traps provide more timely information to Clinfo clients. The clients simply register to receive various events. Clinfo notifies the traps by using signals when those events occur. However, that Clinfo's polling interval is doubled when traps are enabled.

SNMP community names and Clinfo

The default SNMP community name for Clinfo is public. You can override this by using the following command to force the SRC to start Clinfo with the -c switch by entering:

chssys -s clinfoES -a "-c abcdef"

here abcdef is an SNMP community name defined as such in the snmpd configuration file.

Then use the lssrc command to ensure this change occurred. Enter:

lssrc -Ss clinfoES | awk -F: '{print $3}'
The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) community name used by PowerHA® SystemMirror® depends on the version of SNMP you are running on your system. The SNMP community name is determined as follows:
  • If your system is running SNMP V1, the community name is the first name found that is not private or system in the output of the lssrc -ls snmpd command.
  • If your system is running SNMP V3, the community name is found in the VACM_GROUP entry in the /etc/snmpdv3.conf file.

The Clinfo service still supports the -c option for specifying SNMP community name but its use is not required. The use of the -c option is considered a security risk because doing a ps command could find the SNMP community name. If it is important to keep the SNMP community name protected, change permissions on /tmp/hacmp.out, /etc/snmpd.conf, /smit.log and /usr/tmp/snmpd.log to not be world readable.

Important notes on snmpdv3.conf file

AIX® snmpdv3 has three functions or parts: One is the SNMP v3 agent, one is the SMUX server, and the last is the DPI2 agent. The DPI2 agent has to use community "public" to get a port number from DPI2 subagents ( hostmibd , snmpmibd , aixmibd ) to communicate with them. For this reason you should still keep the community name as public and give the public a view of only this dpiPortForTCP.0 (1.3.6.1.4.1.2.2.1.1.1.0) MIB variable so that the DPI2 agent can get the port number from subagents. See the example in the following snmpdv3.conf file.

Sample snmpdv3.conf file with nonpublic community name

VACM_GROUP group1 SNMPv1  YourLongNameHere  -
VACM_GROUP group2 SNMPv1  public  -

VACM_VIEW defaultView internet  - included -
VACM_VIEW dpi2view 1.3.6.1.4.1.2.2.1.1.1  - included -

VACM_VIEW defaultView snmpModules  - excluded -
VACM_VIEW defaultView 1.3.6.1.6.3.1.1.4- included -
VACM_VIEW defaultView 1.3.6.1.6.3.1.1.5- included -

VACM_VIEW defaultView 1.3.6.1.4.1.2.6.191 - excluded -

VACM_ACCESS  group1 - - noAuthNoPriv SNMPv1  defaultView - defaultView -
VACM_ACCESS  group2 - - noAuthNoPriv SNMPv1  dpi2view - - -

NOTIFY notify1 traptag trap -

TARGET_ADDRESS Target1 UDP 127.0.0.1traptag trapparms1 - - -

TARGET_PARAMETERS trapparms1 SNMPv1  SNMPv1  YourLongNameHere  
noAuthNoPriv -

COMMUNITY YourLongNameHere YourLongNameHere  noAuthNoPriv 0.0.0.0 
0.0.0.0  -
COMMUNITY public public  noAuthNoPriv 0.0.0.0  0.0.0.0  -

DEFAULT_SECURITY no-access - -

logging  file=/usr/tmp/snmpdv3.logenabled
logging  size=4194304level=0

smux  1.3.6.1.4.1.2.3.1.2.1.2  gated_password  # gated

smux 1.3.6.1.4.1.2.3.1.2.3.1.1 muxatmd_password #muxatmd
smux  1.3.6.1.4.1.2.3.1.2.1.5clsmuxpd_password #PowerHA SystemMirror/ES for 
AIX clsmuxpd