Efficient Solutions

Increasing Font Size in Event list
1) Click start ->run
2) enter regedit and hit OK
3)Navigate to following destination
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Micromuse\OMNIbus\CurrentVersion\Desktop Settings\<username>\Preferences
<username> here is your user ID

4) Increase the font size of below field
DWORD value “el_font_height” – Allows the user to set their preferred font height
Values can be in the range of decimal 8 to 72

5) Restart your Netcool Omnibus Event Conductor and Open an Event list

1. Click “My Computer”
2. Open the Control Panel
3. Select Time Options
3a. Classic View: Open Reginal and Language Options.
3b. Category View: Date, Time, Language and Regional Options.
4. Click “Change the format of numbers, dates, and times”.
5. Select the “Regional Options” tab.
6. Next to the box that shows your selected language click “Customize”.
7. Click the “Time” tab.
8. In the “Time Format” box enter:
8a. Standard Format: “h:mm:ss:tt”
8b. Military Format: “HH:mm:ss”

Setting up SUN- Solaris SNMP SMA agent

http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/doc/817-3000/introduction-1?a=browse

Some more information if you would want to develop modules:

http://docs.sun.com/app/docs/doc/817-3155

Further reading [Simple and good]:

http://www.vivaunix.com/howtos/www/publish/html/Solaris%2010/SNMP.html

To find where the mib directory is

Some product/consulting companies charge upto 25K USD for integration of FM-FM/FM-PM products. One has to be careful of such offerings because not only they have a one time cost, but also they come with a continual license fee for the gateway. BAD!! So let me save you some money by generalizing this process by an example of integrating two highly used NMS solutions – Tivoli Netcool [from IBM] and NAGIOS [Open source offering]. Integration from Nagios to Netcool is simple [not sure why people pay tones of money for this] and can be done in couple different ways:

Overview

1. Asynchronous uni-directional data flow [from Nagios SBI to Netcool] : In this method of integration, Netcool shall receive events  as forwarded, but shall not acknowledge the event back in Nagios. This is useful when Nagios is not used by operators for RT monitoring.
2. Synchronous bi-directional data flow: An event in Nagios will flow to Netcool and will be confirmed back in Nagios as recieved by Netcool. On every update on the event [such as journal entry, acknowledgements] the event in Netcool, status shall be updated in Nagios.

Either options work based on the business/solution requirements. So without further ado:

Implementation:

1. Asynchronous uni-directional data flow [from Nagios SBI to Netcool]

To understand the implementation, I shall divide the steps as southbound implementation and northbound implementation. Southbound implementation refers to the changes/configuration on Nagios end, and Northbound implementation refers to updates in Netcool.

Southbound updates [On Nagios];

a) Create a script to send tcp socket messages or snmp traps or direct JDBC insert to NBI.

You can use snmptrap command for writing the script, if you are not a SNMP guy you can use a simple script to do socket message communication/JDBC inserts into Objectserver. Test this script.

sample snmp script:

Send trap

# Arguments:

# $1 = Management Station

# $2 = Community String

# $3 = host_name

# $4 = service_description (Description of the service)

# $5 = return_code (An integer that determines the state

# of the service check, 0=OK, 1=WARNING, 2=CRITICAL,

# 3=UNKNOWN).

# $6 = plugin_output (A text string that should be used

# as the plugin output for the service check)

#

# Sample

# /usr/bin/snmptrap -v 2c -c $2 $1 ” NAGIOS-NOTIFY-MIB::nSvcEvent nSvcHostname s “$3″ nSvcDesc s “$4″ nSvcStateID i $5 nSvcOutput s “$6″

b) Define a global event handler in Nagios: Global event handler will help execute the script on every state change on Nagios instance and will communicate, failure and seizure of the problem. How to configure GEH: http://nagios.sourceforge.net/docs/2_0/eventhandlers.html

Northbound updates [On Netcool]

If SNMP:

a) Download the Nagios MIB and compile with MIB2Rules

http://sourceforge.net/projects/nagiosplug/files/nagiosmib/

b) Update the rules file and include it  in mttrapd main ruleset

If socket:

a) Update the socket probe to parse message based on delimiters

b) Ensure all mandatory objectsesrver fields are accounted for

If JDBC:

a) Ensure all mandatory objectsesrver fields are accounted for

b) **CAUTION** Watch the objectserver profiler for IDUC consumption, as this is not so much of a conventional approach

DID YOU CATCH THE HEADFAKE?

Nagios an Netcool were just examples, you can integrate most FM-FM/FM-PM solutions using the aforementioned procedure, you just need to know the NBI data model, SBI data model, right triggers on the SBI system and right listner on NBI system. Made your life easy, din’t I? So start saving your company some money now!!

In the next post, I will talk about method 2 {bidirectional data flow}. Keep visiting!!

For those in the Service and Network management industry who are not aware of what is going to hit us in the next 5 years, I would like to give an overview of what LTE and SAE and then talk about the effects of these technology evolution on our ways of working. I am Software solutions expert and not a Network scientist and had to get in touch with a lot of folks, do a lot of research and dig a lot of books to find this data. Below are very high level abstract explanation of LTE and SAE networks and the purpose they serve.

LTE [Long term evolution] is the one of the proposed 4th generation radio access network technology and if all goes as planned the world will be wireless and with much higher data rate after a successful implementation. Recent tests on the field have been successful and all the  investments planned by US telecom market indicates that this is definitely going to be the future of access Networks. The main node of this network would be the eNodeB which would encompass the functional behavior of multiple nodes of our current network paradigm. The end goal architecturally is to have a flat architecture for 4G networks. End goal from user perspective is increased data rate and quality, along with reduced cost and access anytime/anywhere.

SAE [System Architecture Evolution] on the other hand will be the core for the 4G networks, is focused on a all IP, flat architecture, improved data rate and reduced CAPEX/OPEX expenditures. Evolved packet core [EPC] to which the eNodeB will connect, serves as the central functional unit of the core architecture.

Now, what does all of the above mean to Service and Network management  as it is known today to what it would become in the coming years of 4G networks. Will get to this in my next post. Stay tuned!

References:

http://www.radio-electronics.com/info/cellulartelecomms/lte-long-term-evolution/sae-system-architecture-evolution-network.php

“Self-configuring and self-optimizing network use cases and solutions: Release 9”; 3GPP TR 36.902; Sept, 2009

Those who know me also know that I have been a Nagios supporter for a while; but have had my share of complains about the solution. Since past few months, I have been hearing/trying out GroundWorks open source solution as it provides a better integrated value offering when compared to Nagios; so did a study that I would like to share with my readers.

Groundworks 5.3 community edition is hosted on enterprise class application server/database, this came as a big relief after using Nagios which had some scalability issues. JBOSS and Mysql have given a good foundation to GroundWorks and provide some really nice Web 2.0 features like AJAX driven views/role driven dashboards etc… Furthermore GWS also provides some really cool reporting features. Note that the reporting functionality is for both realtime and historical information.

Hardware requirements for GWS are pretty straightforward i.e. 4 Gigs of RAM, 3 GHz CPU speed, 160 Gigs of harddrive, etc.. Net net – Nothing earthshaking.

What was really interesting is that GWS had a lot of plug ins incorporated, intuitive UI driven hostgroup/host setup, servicegroup/service setup, dependency control and service metric reporting features. This was a BIG plus and provided value of the shelf… For the existing Nagios users, GWS provides an seamless port over of existing functionality. Whats more is that installation took only 30 minutes!! Well do not confuse installation with ready solution — PLEASE. I am only referring to base solution.

If all of the aforementioned was not enough, the GWS solution provides a feature to discover  devices based on ping sweep and tcp layer discovery option as well; Auto discovery for free — Neat!!

So to summarize, GWS community edition turned out to be a very useful time investment due to following reasons:

1) Easy to install 20 minutes of initial setup

2) UI driven hostgroup/host/servicegroup/service/commands/dependencies

3) Historical and Realtime reporting features

4) Auto Discovery via ICMP protocol

5) AJAX driven role based views/dashboards

6) MySql archive

7) Checks for SNMP alarms [passive]

8 ) Active service checks [loads of them]

I would be interested to hear the feedback from others who have used enterprises edition on GWS BSM features provided in enterprise version of the solution.