no.5 autumn 2006 omnibus or tec? what you need to know · customisation one of the key benefits...

No.5 Autumn 2006

With the acquisition of Micromuseearlier in the year, IBM have greatlyenhanced their Systems Managementportfolio with the NetCool suite ofproducts. One such product is Omnibus.

Omnibus has been exceptionally

successful in companies that require a

very high throughput of events, such as

Telecommunications companies. Of the 25

largest telecomms companies, Omnibus is

used in the Network Operation Centres

(NOC) of 24 of them.

However, as IBM already had the Tivoli

Enterprise Console (TEC), there are now

two products that, at least superficially, do

the same thing. This article is intended for

TEC users to provide a summary of the

functionality, capabilities, benefits and

downsides of Omnibus.

Core Component ComparisonTo place the two products into

perspective, the table below outlines the

core and sub components that make up

Omnibus and relates, where possible, the

equivalent TEC components. The article

then gives a brief overview of each

Omnibus component and how they differ

in the two products.

Object Server

Database

The key product within the NetCool suite

of products is Omnibus and the core

component of that is the Object Server.

Key to the Object Server’s event

management capabilities is its internal

memory-resident database; allowing it to

process an extremely high throughput of

events without the degradation in

performance due to the constraints of disk

I/O. This speed of throughput is the main

reason why it has been so successful

within Telecommunications companies.

The Object Server is responsible for event

management and automation by

manipulating event data through a series

of SQL triggers or stored procedures using

a sub set of ANSI SQL known as Object

Server SQL. This is key to the ability of the

Object server for data definition,

manipulation and administration.

Automation

The methods in which the two products

handle automations are completely

different with respect to the technologies

they use. TEC processes events serially by

storing the event in the reception log first,

evaluating it and processing it using a

prolog rules engine, before finally storing it

in the event table of the RDBMS. In

Omnibus, the validation of event data

against the Object Server’s event schema

occurs during the initialisation of the probe

or event list. This is shown clearly in the

Customisation section when we add a new

News in a Minute

Composite ApplicationManagement

We Have Moved

Using Odyssey to Deliver withITM 6

IBM Tivoli Monitoring as aBusiness Services Viewer

How can buying new softwarereduce your licensing costs?

Building data flows with IBMTivoli Directory Integrator

Using ITM6x Firewall GatewayFeature

Inside

7

6/7

5

8/9

10-12

13

14/15

16

continued on p2

Omnibus or TEC? What you need to know...by Paul Campbell

Function Omnibus Tivoli Enterprise ConsoleEvent Management Object Server TEC Event ServerDatabase Internal Memory-Resident External DatabaseAutomation SQL, SQL Triggers and Procedures Proprietary Prolog rules engineDistributed Event No Equivalent TEC Gateway and State Correlation Management Engine (SCE)Adapters Probes TEC AdaptersEvent Consoles Event List TEC Console or WAS TEC ConsoleEvent Visualisation WebTop Third Party or CustomisedEvent Enrichment Impact Third Party or CustomisedScalability, Uni- and Bi-directional Gateways. CustomAvailability and Fail and Fail back capabilities IntegrationCommunications IDUC over TCP/IP Framework (RIM Object)Licensing Flex License Server required for Trust Model

validation of component and subcomponents

Configuration Conductor and Config Manager GUI TEC Console or command lineUtilities or command line

Message Broker No.5 Autumn 2006

2

field to the Object Server later in the

article. This removes the need for defining

TEC Classes and event attributes through

BAROC files and also the need for a

validation process.

The actual processing and evaluation of

events in Omnibus is handled by SQL

Triggers or SQL procedures executed from

triggers. Like TEC rules, triggers fire on

conditions being met within the Object

Server. There are 3 types of these:

There are a number of generic triggers

that are defined and activated during the

creation of the Object Server schema.

These triggers handle common event

management processes like de-

duplication, event correlation and

housekeeping. A good example of the

differences is with de-duplication. In the

TEC, the dup_detect facet, defined in a

BAROC file against a particular event

attribute and class, is used to determine

whether two events are the same in

conjunction with a rule predicate like

first_duplicate. However, any subsequent

changes to the BAROC file require the

rulebase to be recompiled, reloaded and

the Event Server restarted. In Omnibus,

duplication is more dynamic and flexible.

Duplication of events is defined by a

unique Identifier attribute and is often

defined at the probe level by

concatenating several other attributes to

form an Identifier key. The Object Server

then uses this unique field to compare

events and match those with the same

value. This allows for similar events to be

dropped. The following shows how the

Identifier field is defined within the

simulation probe:

@Identifier = $Node + $Agent +$Severity + $Group

Both triggers and TEC rules do a very good

job in providing automation and event

management. However, it’s worth noting

that Omnibus can be extended by utilising

other products within the NetCool suite

such as WebTop and Impact. These

products complement Omnibus by

providing event visualisation and further

event enrichment through integration with

external data sources and adding further

context to the original Omnibus event.

High Availability

Tivoli provides a means to configure TEC

Gateways to forward events to a

secondary TEC Server if the primary TEC

server becomes unavailable. However,

there are no means to automatically fail-

over the TEC Consoles so they point to the

correct server if one of the servers goes

down. Often this,

and the fail back

process,

becomes a

manual task and

introduces even

more headaches

when ticketing

systems are

involved.

Omnibus

provides a

mechanism out

of the box for

failing over and

automatically

(without user

intervention)

failing back

probes, gateways and desktops between a

primary and backup Object Server.

To configure fail-over between two Object

Servers you must first configure a ‘Virtual’

Object Server and it is this that you point

your probes/events list to. The screenshot

above details the fail-over configuration

using the nco_xigen tool. As you can see,

a VIRTUAL Object Server has been defined

on host orbomnibus with a TCP port 4100.

This actually points to the PRIMARY

Object Server as both TCP ports match.

The backup server, represented as Backup

1, resides on the host, orbomnibus-bk

Database Database driven condition thatmatches the condition definedwithin the trigger

Temporal Execution based on a timerexpiring

Signal System or User defined conditionwhen a signal is raised


3

with a defined TCP port of 4101 which

actually points to the BACKUP_A Object

Server.

Further configurations are required for fail

back. For instance, at the probe layer, you

need to specify network timeout and poll

values so the probe will attempt to detect

when the primary server has become

available again and the backup Object

Server needs to be defined as a

BackupObjectServer through its

properties file.

Once this is in place and you shutdown

the primary server, the event list detects a

server failure and prompts a logon to the

backup server via the virtual Object

Server.

It’s usually a good idea to ensure userids

and passwords are synced between the

two Object Servers for a failover to occur

smoothly. Once the correct credentials are

set, the event list is refreshed from the

backup server. The probe would fail over

automatically.

When the primary Object Server becomes

available again, the event list detects this

and prompts you to reconnect to the

primary server.

The status section on the bottom right of

the event list lets you know which Object

Server you are currently connected to.

Customisation

One of the key benefits Omnibus has over

the TEC Console is the ability to easily

customise the event server database by

adding or modifying new databases,

tables and columns and being able to

incorporate these new additions within

the running events list. This was

something that was not easily achieved

within a TEC Console and something that

could definitely not take place without

restarting the server.

The example above adds a regional field

to the ObjectServer and console and

demonstrates how easily this can be

accomplished using the standard tools

available through the Object Server.

Adding a field to the Object Server’s event

table (alerts.status) can be accomplished

either through the command line or the

GUI. The screen shot below shows the

adding of the new field using the nco_conf

tool. This tool is the heart of the Object

Server and can be used to configure and

manage every aspect of the Object

Server(s).

Once the new field has been added a

restart of the Object Server isn’t

necessary. However, all event lists or

consoles that are open need to be

refreshed. This is quite easily

accomplished by performing a ‘resync’

from the event list GUI. Once this has

been done the new field can be added as

a column to the event list.

continued on p4


And we can then see that the event list

will now include the new ‘Region Slot’.

Desktop

The desktop component is made up of the

Conductor, the Event List and Tools. The

Conductor, as the name suggests, is the

top level GUI from where other GUI's are

launched or conducted, one of which is

the Event List.

The Event list is the equivalent to a

standard TEC console. Much as in a TEC

Console, it is made up of one or more

Monitor Boxes that represent subsets of

events based on filters. This view provides

an executive summary of the events being

represented by the filter. For example,

filters can be set up to represent all events

that are in maintenance mode or all

critical events that have occurred in the

last 10 minutes. From each Monitor Box

you are able to drill down and list the

events defined within a sub-event list

filter. From within the sub-event list, tools

(such as ping or ssh or internal SQL

commands) can be run against selected

events using the context of that event to

pass details to the tools.

Probes

Omnibus Probes are key components of

the Omnibus product and are responsible

for obtaining key information by either

receiving the information from another

source or analysing a local source and

passing on the event information to the

Object Server. Probes can be compared to

4

TEC adapters in regards to functionality.

However, Omnibus Probes come in many

shapes and forms being both generic and

vendor-specific. For example, similar to

the TEC Adapters, there are the generic

probes for log scraping, syslogd

monitoring, and SNMP Traps but there are

also Universal probes that are more

closely related to the functionality that

exists within the Tivoli Monitoring 6.1

Universal Agent. For example, the Exec

Probe, Generic ODBC Probe, STDIN Probe

and TCP/IP Socket Probe are all available.

There are also specific probes that have

been designed and developed by the

vendor to integrate their own Enterprise

Management Systems into Omnibus or to

interface directly with a particular

Application or Hardware device.

One of key benefits to the probe over the

TEC adapter is the ability to parse events

for duplication or enrich key events at the

probe’s source before passing the event to

the Object Server. In the Tivoli world,

events sent from Adapters can be filtered

or discarded at the source but any parsing

of events means that events have to pass

though the State Correlation Engine or

end up at the TEC’s rulebase before any

manipulation of the event could take

place. However, at the probe level, event

enrichment is possible through the

probe's local rules file; a lightweight,

shell-type scripting language with inbuilt

functions capable of string and arithmetic

manipulation, regular expressions and

conditional logic. For example, where the

region field was added earlier, we might

have created a probe rule as shown

below:

if(regmatch($Node,".*_a$|.*_b$")){@Region = "South West"

}else if(regmatch($Node,".*_c$|.*_d$")){

@Region = "North West"}else if(regmatch($Node,".*_e$|.*_f$")){

@Region = "South East"}else if(regmatch($Node,".*_g$|.*_h$")){

@Region = "South West"}else{

@Region = "Unknown"}

Like TEC Adapters, a probe also has the

ability to cache or store events locally if

the connection to the Object Server has

been lost and re-send the stored events as

soon as the connection has been re-

established. However, more importantly, a

probe can be configured to automatically

fail over to a backup Object Server based

on timeouts being met.

For those of you interested in utilising the

TME TECAD probe for integrating ITM 6.1,

Tivoli Enterprise Console and Netview

events into Omnibus then please take a

look a the following tip on our Web Site:

http://www.orb-data.com/index.php?pageId=791

Omnibus Gateways

To Integrate the Tivoli Enterprise Console

with problem management systems or

asset management databases often

requires the need for complex rule writing

or a method of extracting the events table

using a 3rd party tool; be it Perl, SQL,

5


procedures or triggers. Ensuring the

extracted data is in the correct format can

often be time consuming and can lead to

inconsistencies if changes occur to the

event data down the line.

To aid in the integration of the Object

Server, Omnibus provides a series of

Gateways that extract data out of the

Object Server and into some form of

destination. The form varies by gateway

type and varies again like the probes from

generic gateways i.e ODBC, SNMP or Flat

file to vendor specific gateways like Oracle

Databases, Peregrine, Remedy to Tivoli

related gateways.

More importantly, gateways can provide

failover and resilience capabilities to the

Object Server by synchronising event data

in a bi-directional flow between two

Object Servers. This is known as a Bi-

Directional gateway. A Uni-Directional

gateway is available as a mechanism for

building a hierarchical architecture of

Object Servers by moving specific events

to specific Object Servers for presentation

to specific customers or organisations.

Licensing

If you’re excited by what you’ve read and

it’s whetted your appetite for what

Omnibus has to offer with regards to

functionality, reliability and performance

then I think at this point it’s worth

mentioning licensing!

All NetCool products require a unique

license per product and, for the most part,

per component (each probe, each

gateway, each desktop). Each license is

loaded into a central licensing server

where they are checked in and checked

out each time the product or component is

activated. Some of the products produce a

heartbeat to ensure the actual license or

the numbers of licenses are available or

the license hasn’t expired so the product

can remain operational. In addition, these

licenses are tied to specific hostids which

mean each time you install you will need

to apply for a new license. Luckily IBM has

stated that the license mechanism will

eventually fit into their current Trust

model and the license server function will

be scrapped.

Technical Workshops

In the New Year we will be running

technical workshops in our offices in

Burnham to enable customers to get a

good understanding of the capabilities of

the new products.

If you would like to register interest inattending these events please send yourdetails to [email protected].

IBM’s Acquisitions bolsterthe Tivoli line IBM has bought several companies in thepast year, and it has begun integratingtheir technologies with its Tivoli suite.Alongside the availability tools from itspurchase of MicroMuse, it hasincorporated discovery tools fromCollation into the Tivoli Change andConfiguration Management database. Thedatabase will show IT executives whethera specific business service is available,while another user interface will showadministrators whether specific hardwarecomponents are failing.

In addition, the company also intends tounveil a roadmap for adding productsfrom its purchase of MRO Software; adeal that is expected to close "verysoon", said Al Zollar, the generalmanager of IBM's Tivoli division. MROSoftware's Maximo application isdesigned to manage equipment such aspower plants.

Google plans solar-powered HQ Google plans a solar-powered electricitysystem at its Silicon Valley headquartersthat will rank as the largest US solar-powered corporate office complex.Google said it is set to begin building a

rooftop solar-powered generation systemat its California headquarters capable ofgenerating 1.6 megawatts of electricity;or enough to power 1,000 Californiahomes. "We are going to be producingroughly 30 percent of the power that weuse." said David Radcliffe, vice presidentof real estate.

Government IT projects 'running 17years late' According to a list compiled by the LiberalDemocrats, IT projects are running a totalof 17 years and three months late.Delayed projects include the Child TrustFund (six months late) and the PensionSchemes project (one year behindschedule). Other delays are affecting theimplementation of BS7799 compliancefor information security in theGovernment's Actuary department whichis over three years behind schedule, andeContact Exploitation which is expectedto be five months late.

Theresa Villiers, Conservative shadowchief secretary to the Treasury,commented: "These latest figuresdemonstrate just how Gordon Brown hasmanaged to spend so much and achieveso little. If he can't run an IT project,how's he going to run the country?"

News in a MinuteThe Virtual Keyboard is here We can’t go this time with mentioningthe I-Tech Virtual Laser Keyboard (VKB)that uses both infrared and lasertechnology to generate an invisible fieldand project a full-size virtual QWERTYkeyboard on any surface. You can usethe VKB with both PCs and compatiblemobile devices, Smartphone and PDA.Direction technology based on opticalrecognition enables the user to tap theimages of the keys, complete withrealistic tapping sounds, which feedsinto the compatible PDA, Smartphone,laptop or PC.

All we need now is a projected screenand we will be able to have a full-sizecomputer in the space of a Mars bar.The I-Tech Virtual Laser Keyboard isavailable now at http://www.virtual-laser-keyboard.com.

6


Composite Application Managementby Dave Webb

Changes to SystemManagementBusinesses are finding that the natureof system management is changingsignificantly.

In the past, applications were usually

contained on a single server and

“management” consisted of little more

than availability monitoring. Now,

applications have their business logic and

data spread over a number of different

systems, which may be Web servers,

Database servers, J2EE application

servers, integration middleware or even

mainframe and other legacy systems.

Whilst availability monitoring is still

useful, the availability of all the individual

components is no guarantee of a healthy

application.

To complicate matters further,

organisations have much greater

expectations of System Management. As

many of these new applications are

developed in-house, the role of Systems

Management extends from problem

detection to troubleshooting, problem

solving and helping development teams

by providing information from production

systems. Additionally, information has to

be provided elsewhere for things such as

Service Level compliance reports, which

often require data about application

response times rather than information

about the availability of individual

components.

Accurate Monitoring The most significant challenge is to

provide accurate monitoring of an

application that consists of many different

components. By considering what

“accurate monitoring” means, the solution

to the problem becomes obvious. Any

monitoring should reflect the end-user

experience of this application, and the

simplest way to do this is to replicate end

user activity.

As most of these composite applications

are web-based, this at first appears to be

a simple task; as monitoring the

availability of a web page is reasonably

straightforward. However, it usually

requires a transaction involving several

web pages including tasks such as

“logging in” to involve all the components

in an application. This being the case, any

monitoring solution needs the ability to

replicate such complex behaviour.

Application InstrumentationWhen such monitoring finds an

application down or, just as seriously and

just as likely, finds a significant

performance problem, the next step is to

identify the cause. The traditional

approach would be to consult the relevant

specialists, for example the DBAs. The

problem with this is that, whilst the root

cause of a poorly-performing application

may reside in the database, if this is due

to a poorly written query then the

database itself will appear healthy to the

DBA. Even if a monitor were tracking

transaction times within the database, an

average over all the transactions in the

database may still appear acceptable.

The solution then must be to track each

individual transaction, capturing

information about those that appear

problematic. Until recently, the only way

to do this would be to instrument the

various elements of the application by

modifying the source code and placing API

calls to enable such transaction tracking.

This overhead is manageable for new

applications being developed, but altering

legacy applications is almost certainly

unacceptable and for third party

applications such changes are impossible.

Now though, most applications have a

J2EE application server at their centre.

This has the benefit of providing a central

hub where the transaction monitoring can

be performed and uses an architecture

that simplifies the required application

instrumentation. As Java applications are

compiled into byte-code rather then native

binaries it is possible to automatically

instrument them; either by processing this

byte-code prior to installation on the

Application Server or, preferably,

dynamically adding the instrumentation

within the Application Server as the

application is run.

Since one of the major benefits of J2EE is

the APIs it provides, such as JDBC or the

Java Message Service (JMS), a transaction

monitor can identify calls to these APIs

and so identify the separate components

of the transaction; such as individual SQL

queries.

IBM Tivoli CompositeApplication MonitoringIBM’s solution to these problems is the

IBM Tivoli Composite Application

Management (ITCAM) suite of products.

The ITCAM family of products provide

genuine integration, with each able to

connect to the others in context, allowing

problem identification and diagnosis to

take place quickly, easily utilising all of

the management information available.


7

The information from all products is

available in a single view in the Tivoli

Enterprise Portal, which can also be used

to launch the ITCAM products in context.

ITCAM for WebSphere provides real-time

problem detection, analysis and repair for

applications running on WebSphere

Application Server and provides

transaction correlation spanning J2EE,

RDBMS, CICS and IMS. It provides

operations and developers with

comprehensive, deep-dive analysis to

identify the root cause effecting

application slowdown.

ITCAM for Response Time Tracking (RTT)

is an end-to-end transaction management

solution which monitors end user

response time and analyses transaction

performance using both robotic and real-

time techniques. It allows easy

identification of performance bottlenecks

in applications spanning J2EE application

servers, databases and mainframe

systems.

ITCAM for Service Oriented Architectures

(SOA) monitors, manages and controls the

Web services layer of IT architectures and

allows users to drill down to the

application or resource layer for quick

identification of the source of performance

bottlenecks or application failures. ITCAM

for SOA gives both clear status views and

enterprise-wide end-to-end views of web

services and provides reports on service

level fulfilment.

An ExampleThe diagram below shows an example

composite application and how it relates

to the ITCAM family of products. The

diagram is a rough approximation and

should not be used to infer functionality.

For example, whilst no component of

ITCAM for WebSphere resides on a

database server it can still analyse

database transaction times by tracking

calls to the JDBC API.

Please send an email [email protected] if youwould like to take advantage of ourweb-site evaluation service, whichincludes free of charge, non-intrusivemonitoring of your external site.

We Have MovedAs part of Orb Data's expansion plans, the

company has relocated to The Chapel, in

the grounds of historic Grenville Court in

Burnham, Buckinghamshire; a move which

provides the company with four times the

office space available at our previous

premises.

Included in this space are dedicated

training facilities allowing Orb Data to

offer training courses and seminars from

its own offices.

"This is an exciting time in the life of Orb

Data and acquiring our new premises in

Burnham will aid our

growth over the coming

years." said Nigel Brown

Managing Director,

"The Chapel provides

an elegant and stylish

setting for our staff to

work and customers to

enjoy."

Our new address is:

The Chapel

Grenville Court

Britwell Road

Burnham

Bucks

SL1 8DF

United Kingdom

Tel : +44 (0) 1628 550450

Fax : +44 (0) 1628 550451

8


Using Odyssey to Deliver with ITM 6by Ben Fawcett

ChallengesIBM Tivoli Monitoring version 6.1 hasbeen with us for over a year now.Many new and old Tivoli customershave taken the plunge to transfer tothe new technology and try to makethe promises of simplified monitoringa reality.

There have been a number of teething

problems with the migration and

upscaling from the Omegamon product to

the ITM offering. We have seen 3 fix packs

so far and these have included a mix of

bug fixes, limitation improvements and a

number of new features making their way

into the product. Some have been under

demand from customers whilst others are

welcome enhancements to address

usability.

So how do you make ITM 6 work for you?

This article looks at how the latest release

of Odyssey 3.1 provides a number of

features to deliver the best from any ITM 6

implementation.

Scalable DeploymentOur experiences with ITM 6.1

deployments, particularly in large-scale

environments, have shown time and again

the value of an underlying management

infrastructure.

For many of our customers, who have a

history with IBM Tivoli products, this

means leveraging the existing Tivoli

Framework implementation to manage

each phase of the ITM 6.1 solution

delivery. This includes scoping, pre-

requisite checking, preparation, roll out

and configuration during the

implementation. It also includes managing

the ongoing maintenance, improvement

and extension of the service.

To successfully scale your ITM 6.1

deployment requires that each of the

implementation phases is well defined,

consistent and repeatable. To successfully

deliver the service requires clean

interfaces, a robust infrastructure and

clear integration with other systems

management services.

Integrated EnvironmentsOdyssey 3.1 already harnesses the Tivoli

infrastructure to provide clean, usable and

scalable interfaces to support and deliver

Tivoli services to Operators. Odyssey

builds on this strength by providing a

unifying link between ITM 6.1 Agents and

their Tivoli Endpoints. This immediately

provides a consolidated view of the new

availability world alongside other Tivoli

services, and an outstanding level of reach

for ITM 6.1 agent management and

configuration.

Agent ManagementUsing the power of the Odyssey Wizard

processing engine and with actions and

status checks bundled out of the

box, taking control of your ITM 6

estate has never been easier.

The ITM 6 Agent Wizard allows

management of ITM 6 Agent

resources. Odyssey is able to

interact with the agents and their

host system in a number of ways. It

can query their status, perform

configuration operations, execute

commands against the underlying

system, retrieve monitoring metrics

that have been collected by the

agent and publish reports of the

monitored data.

Using Odyssey it is possible to

perform actions like :

• Agent status healthcheck

• Agent configuration

• Monitored data snapshot and analysis

• Automated ITM 6 reporting

• Agent audit

• Agent roll-out

Remote AccessOdyssey already provides one-click launch

of remote command windows on your

Tivoli Endpoints. This has been extended

to include ITM 6 Agent systems. This

vastly simplifies the troubleshooting and

analysis process and greatly reduces the

administrative overhead for operators.

Right click on an Agent or ITM 6 System

and you also have direct access to log and

configuration files.


9

Scheduled Publishing ofITM 6 ReportsOdyssey is able to present your ITM 6 data

alongside other information from your

Tivoli environment. Side by side views of

monitoring metrics, inventory data, TEC

events, software distributions and more.

You can even display live logfiles from the

agent system and open a remote

command window automatically when you

browse to the workspace.

Any views that you create within the

Odyssey ITM 6 Operations Console can be

published as HTML reports available

through Odyssey's built in web portal.

Reporting is scheduled and controlled

through the Odyssey ITM 6 Wizard,

providing great flexibility on how and

when data is published.

For further information about Odysseyvisit http:/www.orb-data.com/odyssey orsend an email to [email protected].

Rent Odyssey Now!To complement our standard licensingagreement, Orb Data is now makingOdyssey available to customers on amonthly rental basis. In an uncertainlandscape of technological change, butwith ongoing service demands, you cannow immediately reduce costs withoutthe need to justify a formal capitalexpenditure. For more information pleasecontact [email protected].


10

cannot be opened or saved in a graphic

editor. In the example at the bottom left of

the page we are using a pre-supplied .IVL

file called united_kingdom_ireland and a

default style sheet called default.css that

generates the items displayed on the

map; server images in this case. More of

these later.

A second example, and one that we are

finding more popular amongst the

customers we are visiting, is a

representation of services as logical units.

Typically this would be a Business Service

View which could represent services that

are made up of many applications and

physical servers. For example, a Bank may

want an object to display the service for

Internet Banking. In other words “Can our

customers use Internet banking or not?”

In the example at the top of the page, we

have used an image called orb-data.jpg as

the background. This could be any image

but would typically be quite simple so as

to not interfere with the service views.

As said previously, the style of the view is

defined using Cascading Styles sheets or

Most users of Tivoli Monitoring toolshave become accustomed to viewingsimplistic event lists rather than thegraphical event statuses availablewith some other vendor’s SystemsManagement tools. However, with theintroduction of IBM Tivoli Monitoring(ITM) 6.1 customers can now displaylogical views that, with a little work,can be used to display key BusinessServices.

This is something that most customers

have wanted but have often been loathe

to make the investment needed to buy

IBM’s TBSM or Managed Object's Formula

products because the functionality

delivered by these two applications is way

above that required. However, in many

installations we have been involved with,

we have found that a simple service status

view is all that is needed.

Logical ViewsThere are two types of views that can be

used:

1. Logical Units displayed on a map

2. Logical Items displayed on an

Image/Blank screen

For example, if you have a branch network

or regional sites, you might want to

display these on a map. ITM 6.1 uses a

geo-referenced map which is a special

type of graphic that has built-in

knowledge of latitude and longitude and

can be zoomed into and out of quickly.

The Portal uses proprietary .IVL files that

IBM Tivoli Monitoring as a BusinessServices Viewer by Simon Barnes


11

.css files. These external style sheets

enable you to change the appearance and

layout of all pages by editing one single

CSS document. The style sheet used here

(OrbData_Top_Level.css) defines two

objects; firstly the rectangular box and

secondly the small circular icon in the

corner. This is a monitor to show that the

infrastructure that creates these views is

working (i.e. TEP Server, TEMS, and TEC).

Once these views have been defined,

there are two simple steps (see above) to

make them reflect the situations and

systems you want:

Step 1: From the logical item properties

window assign the system or managed

system lists associated with the service

you want to monitor.

Step 2: From the logical item situations

choose the specific situations you have

chosen to reflect the service’s status and

associate it with the logical item.

Linking to a Sub-ViewEach view that you create can also be

linked to sub-views so that you can click

on a service and be shown a view of the

sub-services. For example, Internet

Banking might be linked to a view

showing the infrastructure that makes up

this service and this could be displayed on

the desktops of the support team that

deals with this service.

This is performed by right clicking on the

item in the Graphic View, selecting “Link

to -> Link Wizard” and following the

wizard instructions.

Is it really that simple?Well not quite. If you are only using ITM

6.1 and you want every event to be

reflected in the view, then these simple

displays will be enough. However, there

are two circumstances where more work

will be needed:

1. Legacy Events – Events that are

delivered through the Tivoli Enterprise

Console (TEC) (or any 3rd party tool) such

as NetView will not update the TEP and

will therefore not be displayed as part of

the Logical views.

2. Service Logic – Not all events will cause

a service to be unavailable and therefore

merely assigning a situation (an event) to

a logical item will not give a clear picture

as to whether that service is up or down.

Legacy TEC EventsITM 6.1 logical views provide no route for

incoming TEC events to impact icons,

views and situations in the TEP. As events

from items such as NetView and adapters

must feed the infrastructure-base service

views, a mechanism is required to convert

them to ITM 6.1 Situations and thus drive

the icon changes. An icon in the TEP is

changed by the following process:

1. A Situation status changes, e.g. a

Situation is raised

2. The icon is checked to see if the

ManagedSystem linked to the Situation is

assigned to it

3. The icon is checked to see if this

Situation is associated with it

4. The Situation status is reflected in the

icon

Only 2 criteria of a situation determine

which icons it can affect – Managed

System and Situation Name.

To extract TEC events into an ITM 6.1

Managed System Attribute Group, we have

defined a mechanism using an ODBC data

provider Universal Agent to extract data.

This is represented in the TEP as an

Attribute Group of a Managed System as

defined by the Universal Agent metafile.

This creates a single Managed System

with all the data in it. We then create

multiple situations (at least one per icon)

to drive multiple icons.

continued on p12


12

Using Logic to change iconsThere are cases where, although an alert

has fired, you might not want a service to

be marked as down. For example, if are

monitoring if the Web Servers service is

up (green) or down (red) we probably

don’t want a 100% CPU alert to be shown

as causing the Web Servers service to be

down? You want to know it is happening

but it does not cause the service to be

down. ITM 6.x allows for this to be

achieved without using TEC rules by using

Situation Comparisons and Correlate

Situations Across Managed Systems.

Situation ComparisonsA Situation Comparison is a specific type

of situation that compares the results of

other situations that have been

distributed to one or more systems. All of

the situations that are compared must be

distributed to all systems.

For example, we could create a situation

called WebServers that would check if any

of MS_Offline, UDB_Status_Warning, and

NT_Paging_File_Critical is true. In other

words it is an OR comparison.

Whereas in this example, the situation will

fire if MS_Offline, UDB_Status_Warning,

and NT_Paging_File_Critical all fire

together. In other words it is an AND

comparison.

These situation comparisons will need to

have intervals set and then be distributed

to be active. If you try and compare a

situation that has not been distributed to

all the systems that the Situation

Comparison is sent to then these will be

distributed automatically.

Correlate Situations AcrossManaged ServersCorrelate situations across Managed

Servers will compare a single situation

across multiple systems. For example, if

we wanted to create a situation that will

check whether the WebServers situation

has fired on more than one system, we

would use Correlate situations across

Managed Systems. This is particularly

useful when you are using load balanced

servers or when a single server failure

does not cause the service to be down.

To do this we must assign a system

against the logical item we are using (e.g.

Web Servers) and then create the

situation against the logical item. In this

case, associating a previously created

situation will not work.

Like the idea?In summary, ITM 6.1 does offer a new

facility that, with a little work, can provide

a feature that has been missing from the

core IBM availability options to this point.

If you would like to discover more aboutthis facility or take advantage of OrbData’s experience in this area to createyou the views that you want, then contactus at 01628 550465 or by email [email protected].

If you would like to see ITM 6.1using service views then give usa call and we will try to arrangea visit to one of our customers.

Ring +44(0) 1628 550450

or send an email [email protected]


13

It’s a strange question but can buyingmore software really save you money onyour overall software costs? Well, yes;provided that your next softwarepurchase is Tivoli License ComplianceManager (ITLCM).

Many organisations, particularly those

with large and complex software estates,

struggle to identify and retain accurate

license usage records resulting in poor

procurement practice such as site-

licensing or maximum-concurrency

licensing. And the multitude of software

licensing policies employed by vendors

can make software tracking and license

compliance difficult to enforce.

This is why the University of Liverpool

(www.liv.ac.uk) approached us for help.

The University has 20,000 students

accessing hundreds of applications across

a diverse range of locations and hardware

platforms and believed that they could

reduce their licensing costs if only they

had usage data available prior to contract

negotiations. Having operated an

extensive proof of concept on-site, the

University recently purchased ITLCM and

is looking forward to reducing the costs of

both maintenance renewals and future

software purchases.

Steve Aldridge, Systems Manager at the

University explains. "License management

is another area of IT which is very

challenging in the Higher Education

environment. ITLCM, as a point solution

within the strategic Tivoli Enterprise

Systems Management brand, offers a

comprehensive approach that can deal

with the complexities we face. Once again,

Tivoli has given us the flexibility and ease

of deployment that we need."

With advanced software inventory, usage

monitoring and reporting capabilities,

businesses can identify exactly what

software licenses are installed, which are

being used and which are actually

required. This information also assists in

proving compliance during business

audits conducted by vendors, the

Federation Against Software Theft (FAST)

or other regulatory bodies.

So what can License Managerdo for you?Take the example of a company that

needs to upgrade a piece of existing

software. If the software is licensed by

concurrent users they would have to pay

for the number of systems that it has

been installed upon. This is because the

IT department would not be able to

control how many licenses were

concurrently in use and therefore they

would be unable to prove that the

number of used licenses is less than the

number deployed. After purchasing ITLCM

they can run reports that show the

maximum number of users at any one

time and, more importantly, prove this to

the vendor.

Gartner (www.gartner.com) states that

“companies can expect to achieve 30%

cost savings in the first year and 5-10%

annually with an effective Software Asset

Management program”.

This translates to an ROI typically

available in less than 12 months.

How can buying new software reduceyour licensing costs? by Marie Broxholme

Advantages and Benefits of ITLCMWeb-based architecture – ITLCM is based on IBM WebSphere giving complete, securelicense management through a simple Web-browser interface; regardless of location.ITLCM also provides users with role-based, decentralised, thin-client administration toolsfor optimum flexibility.

Software Lifecycle Management – You can link software installation and license use toproduct entitlements and contracts. This enables easy reconciliation of how muchsoftware is deployed and how much is actually used; making for better-informed licenseprocurement activities.

Self Updating Agent – There is no need to go from desktop to desktop manually updatingeach user’s license instructions or agents. Intelligent self-update agents are updatedautomatically when newer agent versions or updated licensing information becomeavailable.

Extensive License Model Support – Able to manage several types of software licensingmodels including CPU-based, user-based, machine-based, concurrent-use, multi-use,sub-capacity use and more. Tracks software deployment and use according to the specificlicensing model subscribed; key to effective license management.

Where do these savingscome from?

35% Removal of Unnecessary Software

22% Invoice Reconciliation

11% Avoid Compliance Penalties

11% Productivity Improvement

6% Tax Savings

5% Optimised CPU Upgrades

4% Better Vendor Negotiation

3% Avoid Redundant Product Evaluation

3% Avoid Unnecessary Purchases

If you are interested in finding out howIBM Tivoli License Manager can help yourbusiness, please visit our web-site atwww.orb-data.com, or email us [email protected].


14

Building data flows with IBM TivoliDirectory Integrator by Colin Miles

Despite its name, IBM Tivoli DirectoryIntegrator (ITDI) has uses far beyondthe synchronisation of data betweendirectories.

In fact, ITDI is an extremely useful and

flexible tool that helps in the rapid

development of data flows between pretty

much any repository of data – be these

files, directories, databases or

applications. Where traditionally there

would be a requirement for custom coding

to develop the required interfaces

between systems, ITDI helps the user to

build the communication and data

transformation paths quickly by using a

graphical editor to assemble pre-built

components and then define the

processing logic that binds the process

together.

How does ITDI work?

ITDI simplifies and accelerates the process

of building integrated data flows by

defining and linking together the required

components into an end-to-end process

definition termed an Assembly Line.

Development of ITDI Assembly Lines is

carried out using the Config Editor (an

Integrated Development Environment).

The Config Editor provides a graphical

interface for bringing together all the

required components and quickly

modelling the required throughput and

transformations of data. Creating and

deploying an Assembly Line with ITDI

typically involves completion of the

following tasks:

• Identify all the systems and properties

involved in the data flow and deploy

connectors to import or export data in

the required format.

• If required, parse and transform the data

into the required format(s) and define

the link criteria for associating data

between systems.

• Detail processing logic by exploiting

numerous hook points and provide

coding at desired points in the Assembly

Line execution (via simple JavaScript).

• Make provision for the events that define

when and how data flows should be

initiated, or detail updates that are to

occur in a batch mode.

• Test and debug the Assembly Line

interactively.

• Package the Assembly Line into a

standalone component (i.e. daemon or

service) – allowing the configuration to

be shared and reused across the

infrastructure.

• Allow for the remote administration and

monitoring of Assembly Lines from any

location.

ITDI connectors

A key part of the value of ITDI is that it

delivers a standard set of connectors that

define the required transport mechanisms

and structure for communicating with a

range of common data repositories. These

connectors allow interfaces to common

repositories to be deployed “out of the

box” by simply allocating the appropriate

connector to your configuration.

For applications or systems not covered by

any of the standard connectors or

functions provided, ITDI allows for

extensibility via a fully featured Java API.

This allows communication with just about

any system or repository to be

implemented as well as catering for the

development of bespoke functions to be

executed in conjunction with the Assembly

Line.


15

ITDI example usage

Whilst the potential applications for ITDI

are vast, some examples may include the

following:

• Ensuring data consistency by detecting

changes to authoritative sources of data

in one location (i.e. additions,

modification or deletions) and

propagating this information to all other

relevant systems.

Example ITDI connectors

• Active Directory

• Exchange

• FTP

• File system

• JDBC

• JMS

• JNDI

• LDAP

• Domino/ Lotus Notes

• RDBMS changelog (Oracle / DB2)

• DSMLv2

• XML

Issue 2• Managing Distribution Operations

• Linking ESM functions to businessvalue

• ITIL and best practice – learningfrom others mistakes

• News in a Minute

• Security – Why wait to comply?

• Increasing the reliability of yourTivoli Environment?

• Technical Corner: Using Tracing inResource Models

Issue 3• Creating an Inventory Schedule in

30 minutes


• Is a Configuration ManagementDatabase important to yourorganisation?

• Role mining: a quick route to RoleBased Access Control

• IBM Tivoli Education – News

• Tips for writing Resource Modelsusing VBA Script

Issue 4• An Introduction to Federated

Identity Management


• The Odyssey SOAP Interface forITM 6.1

• Accelerating ITIL Best PracticeAdoption

• Managed Objects - Overview

• Improving IT Service Delivery inLocal Government

• Viewing Resource Models in TivoliEnterprise Portal

Issue 1• Companies Spend to Solve the

Identity Conundrum

• ‘Just in Case’ Computing


• Data, data everywhere - Orb DataReporting Application

• Hotfix Deployment Comes of Age

• Technical Corner: Rules Based onTime

Did you miss a previous issue?

• Enabling the migration of data from

legacy systems.

• Automatic transformation of data files

from one format to another.

• Extending the scope of existing systems

by allowing the rapid deployment of new

interfaces.

• Integrating geographically remote

systems via web services.

• Enabling password synchronisation

between multiple systems.

ITDI and Identity Management

One of the key areas of usage for ITDI is in

the field of Identity Management. This is

partly because organisations traditionally

find that data relating to their employees,

partners and suppliers is often distributed

around the infrastructure with significant

scope for inaccuracies and inconsistencies

to result. By deploying the appropriate

ITDI Assembly Lines data can be combined

and synchronised across all repositories in

real time – thereby improving data quality

and easing the administrative burden.

ITDI also forms an integral part of the IBM

Tivoli Identity Management portfolio –

where it can be used in the deployment of

HR based identity feeds and the

development of custom adapters to legacy

systems for the automation of user

administration tasks.

For more information on IBM TivoliDirectory Integrator refer to the linkssuggested below, or contact Colin Miles,who will be happy to discuss potentialscenarios in your environment.Tel: 01628 550475Email: [email protected]

Further Reading

ITDI Getting started guide:http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/tivihelp/v2r1/topic/com.ibm.IBMDI.doc_6.1/gettingstarted.pdf

ITDI Users Group:http://www.tdi-users.org

ITDI News Group:news://news.software.ibm.com/ibm.software.network.directory-integrator

Don’t worry, you can download them here: http://www.orb-data.com/messagebroker

16

IBM Tivoli Monitoring v6.x and (atleast) Fixpack 2 introduces a featurethat allows safe traversal of multiplefirewalls.

This is an XML based solution for

configuring Tivoli Enterprise Monitoring

Agents (TEMAs) to act as proxy TEMS, up

relays or down relay components.

The configuration is performed through

XML files that reside locally on a TEMA. To

start using this feature, modify the TEMA’s

local configuration file and add the

location of the gateway.xml file in the

format KDE_GATEWAY=filename. This xml

file contains all the configuration details

for the agent.

In our example this was

Sample Firewall Environment

In the sample firewall environment above,

we have 3 firewall zones; white, green and

amber. However, this can be extended to

work over multiple hops and, so far, has

been tested up to 12.

In this configuration the connections are

always initiated from the most secure side

outwards. Therefore the initiation is

always initiated from white to green and

then from green to amber.

TEMA orbdatawhite1

In the white zone there is a Remote TEMS

called orbdatawhite1. This system also

has a TEMA which acts as a client proxy

and a down relay through the firewall into

the green zone. All the TEMAs in the white

zone will point to a TEMS as normal

<tep:gatewayxmlns:tep="http://xml.schemas.ibm.com/tivoli/tep/kde/" name="orbdatawhite1" >

<zone name="white"><interface name="clientproxy" ipversion="4" role="proxy">

<bind localport="poolhub" service="tems">

<connection remoteport="1918">10.1.1.10</connection>

</bind> <bind localport="poolwhp" service="whp">


</bind><interface name="downrelay_green1"ipversion="4"role="connect"> <bind localport="10021">10.1.1.10


</bind> </interface> </interface>

</zone> <portpool name="poolhub">20000-20099</portpool> <portpool name="poolwhp">20100-20199</portpool> </tep:gateway>

Using ITM6x Firewall Gateway Feature by Jason Forsyth

Unix : $CANDLEHOME/config/ux.ini$CANDLEHOME/config/ux.config

Windows : %CANDLEHOME%\tmaitm6\KNTENV

Linux : $CANDLEHOME/config/lz.ini$CANDLEHOME/config/lz.config

ux.ini:KDE_GATEWAY=/usr/tivoli/IBM/ITM/FIREWALL/gateway.xml

ux.config:KDE_GATEWAY=’usr/Tivoli/IBM/ITM/FIREWALL/gateway.xml’

TEMA orbdatagreen1In the green zone there is a TEMA called

orbdatagreen1. This system acts as an

uprelay to the white zone, a downrelay

into the amber zone as well as a TEMS

server proxy. All the TEMAs in the green

zone will be configured to talk to the

server proxy on orbdatagreen1. These

TEMAs will appear in the TEP as normal.

TEMA orbdataamber1In the amber zone there is a TEMA called

orbdataamber1. This system acts as an

uprelay to the green zone and a TEMS

server proxy. All the TEMAs in the amber

zone will be configured to talk to the

server proxy on orbdataamber1. These

TEMAs will appear in the TEP as normal.

For a fuller explanation of this feature see

http://www.orb-data.com/ITM61firewalls

<tep:gatewayxmlns:tep="http://xml.schemas.ibm.com/tivoli/tep/kde/" name="orbdatagreen1">

<zone name="green"><interface name="uprelay_white1"ipversion="4" role="listen">

<bind localport="10021">11.1.1.10<connection remoteport="10021">10.1.1.10</connection>

</bind><interface name="downrelay_amber1" ipversion="4" role="connect">

<bind localport="10022"> 11.1.1.10<connection remoteport="10022">12.1.1.10</connection>

</bind></interface><interface name="serverproxy" ipversion="4" role="proxy">

<bind localport="1918" service="tems"/><bind localport="6014" service="whp"/>

</interface></interface>

</zone></tep:gateway>

<tep:gatewayxmlns:tep="http://xml.schemas.ibm.com/tivoli/tep/kde/"name="orbdataamber1">

<zone name="amber"><interface name="uprelay_green1" ipversion="4" role="listen">

<bind localport="10022">12.1.1.10<connection remoteport="10022">11.1.1.10</connection>

</bind><interface name="serverproxy" ipversion="4" role="proxy">

<bind localport="1918" service="tems"/><bind localport="6014" service="whp"/>

</interface></interface>

</zone></tep:gateway>

Published by Orb Data Limited, The Chapel, Grenville Court, Britwell Road, Burnham, Bucks, SL1 8DF Telephone: +44 (0) 1628 550450IBM and Tivoli are trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.


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