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Setting Up the Management and Monitoring Services

ZfS is made up of several components, some of which require certain setup tasks before you can use them, and others that do not.

The following components do not require any specific setup tasks:

The following sections describe the setup tasks that are required to get the following components up and running:

For more detailed information on these components, see the appropriate sections in Management and Monitoring Services.


Stopping and Starting Management and Monitoring Services

If you need to install other software or perform other maintenance functions on your server, you may stop Management and Monitoring Services and down the server. After performing the maintenance, in order for the server to resume its Management and Monitoring Services, you must reboot the server and restart the services.

To stop and restart Management and Monitoring Services and down the server, complete the following steps at the management server console prompt:

  1. To stop and unload ZfS Management and Monitoring Services, enter unmw.

  2. To stop all JAVA processes, enter java -killall.

  3. To exit JAVA, enter java -exit.

  4. To down the server, enter down server.

  5. To start the server, enter restart server.

HINT:  Because the appropriate commands to start the back-end and discovery processes (SLOADER and NETEXPLOR) were inserted in the AUTOEXEC.NCF file when you installed Management and Monitoring Services, restarting the server will start these processes. If you modified the AUTOEXEC.NCF file and need to manually start these processes, see Manually Starting Discovery and Back-End Processes .


Setting Up Discovery and Starting Back-End Processes

The discovery software on the management server automatically discovers the nodes on your network. Network nodes include servers, desktops, routers, switches, and any other networked devices. Discovery starts automatically when the ZfS software is loaded on the management server and runs continually, 24 hours a day. The amount of time to build a complete database depends on the size of your network. Very small networks might take one or two hours; very large networks (several thousand nodes) might require several days.

HINT:  Database writing activities occur in the background. Network discovery might take longer when you are using your system. Therefore, you should allow the discovery to run overnight or over a weekend.

After installation, your servers are in one of the following states:


Manually Starting Discovery and Back-End Processes

The commands to start autodiscovery and load the back-end services are inserted into the AUTOEXEC.NCF file by the installation program. Restarting the server will automatically start these processes. However, if you removed these commands and need to manually start auto-discovery and load the back-end services (management site services), complete the following steps at the management server console prompt:

HINT:  All the .NCF files referred to in the following procedure are located in the volume:ZFS\MWSERVER\BIN directory. (If you installed to a different directory than the default, replace ZFS with the directory you specified.) During installation, a search path is added to the AUTOEXEC.NCF file to the management server program files.

Ensure that the SYS:\ETC\HOSTS file has the proper entry to map the host name to the IP address.

To manually start Discovery and the back-end processes:

  1. Start the database by entering mgmtdbs.

  2. Start other essential services by entering mwserver.

  3. Start the auto-discovery process by entering netxplor.ncf.

  4. Start the basic services on the management server by entering sloader.ncf.

    This process starts the services for processing data requests from management consoles and other ZfS components. This will also generate the network topology maps.


Setting Up the Alarm Management System

The ZfS Alarm Management System (AMS) can receive SNMP traps from any SNMP-enabled device or computer hosting a proxy SNMP agent. If your network device is using Management Agent for NetWare, Management Agent for Windows NT, NetWare LANalyzer® AgentTM, or LANalyzer Agent for Windows NT software, the device is discovered automatically for you. No setup is needed after installing the software.

Third-party SNMP agents require some setup before traps can be received. For information on setting up third-party SNMP agents, see Management and Monitoring Services.


Setting Up Monitoring

Because Management Agent for NetWare and ManageWise Agent for Windows NT are based on SNMP, all actions that are directed from network management consoles to a server involve SNMP SET and GET requests from the manager to the agent. Any management console requesting data from a managed server does so by issuing an SNMP GET request. An SNMP SET command is required to set server alarm thresholds or configuration parameters. Conducting these management operations from a remote management console, such as ConsoleOne, raises the issue of ensuring security. In particular, if unchecked, unauthorized users setting configuration parameters on a server could cause severe performance problems or even sabotage network operations.

For these reasons, you should secure communication between the management system and your SNMP agents. For further information on SNMP security, see Management and Monitoring Services.


Setting Up the Traffic Analysis Agent

The traffic analysis agent for NetWare is a distributed network analyzer that complements ZfS. While other ZfS agents collect data about specific network nodes, such as servers or hubs, the traffic analysis agent for NetWare observes the interaction among these nodes on a specific LAN segment. The agent is installed on a NetWare 4.x or NetWare 5.x server. To set up traffic analysis agent for NetWare, complete Starting the Traffic Analysis Agent for NetWare.

The traffic analysis agent for Windows NT/2000 uses SNMP to communicate with the management server. After installation, in order for the traffic analysis agent for Windows NT/2000 to operate, you must start the SNMP services. To start SNMP services, complete Starting the SNMP Service for the Traffic Analysis Agent for Windows NT/2000.

HINT:  After the agents are set up, you must restart the Windows NT/2000 server on which the agent resides.

The following sections contain additional information:


Starting the Traffic Analysis Agent for NetWare

The installation program for the traffic analysis agent for NetWare modifies the AUTOEXEC.NCF file so that the agent starts automatically. Therefore, you do not need any further configuration. If, however, you are upgrading from a previous version of the traffic analysis agent (referred to as the Lanalyzer agent), and did not uninstall the previous version, you must ensure that each server on which you upgraded the agent will run the new traffic analysis agent.

To ensure that the upgraded NetWare servers run the new traffic analysis agent:

  1. On each NetWare server on which you upgraded the ZfS Traffic Analysis Agent, open the AUTOEXEC.NCF file located in SYS:\SYSTEM.

  2. Comment out the following lines by placing a # character at the beginning of the line as follows:

    #Search add lanzdir  

    #LANZ.NCF

    The first statement defines the search path where lanzdir is the directory in which the older agent is installed. The second statement loads the older agent.

  3. Save the file and restart the server.

The new agent will load and run automatically.


Starting the SNMP Service for the Traffic Analysis Agent for Windows NT/2000

If you have configured Windows NT/2000 to start the SNMP service automatically, the agent installed on Windows NT/2000 starts with the SNMP service when you start Windows NT/2000.

If you have not configured Windows NT/2000 to start the SNMP service automatically, do either of the following:



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