Server with BMC-Board as one node

Started by Dani@M3T, January 15, 2014, 08:13:23 PM

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Dani@M3T

We would like to monitor physical Windows servers with management boards (we use HP servers, there it's called iLO, they have a dedicated network port). The ilo network interface should be a second interface to the server node in netxms (we don't want 2 nodes, 1 for the server and a second for the iLO). That's manually possible. But then I have the problem that the server has a native windows netxms agent and snmp agent installed. The iLo has SNMP for themself (there it would be possible to passthrue the SNMP to the server OS. But now I can't configure the netxms server to poll the netxms-agent on the server network interface and SNMP on the iLO interface (for some hardware monitoring for example).

What would be the best configuration solution for such situations in netxms? The same situation exists in 'network services', where you also can't configure a specific node interface for a network interface.

Every input and suggestions are very appreciated

Dani@M3T

No one has a good idea? I think most of todays servers have there management board.
Would a 'cluster' be a possible solution? A cluster with the server as one node and the managment board (HP iLO) as a second node.

Alex Kirhenshtein

Currently there are no out of the box solution for that. We plan to make new new object class - "Management Board", but it's yet to be implemented.
As partial workaround, you can create second node for iLO, unbind it from "Infrastructure Services" (it will be visible only in "Entire Network", and then create iLO-related DCIs on the server node, using a proxy. Sample configuration is attached.

To make this work (proxy), you need either add server node to the list of trusted on iLO, or disable trust check completely.
To add it, open iLO properties, select "Trusted Nodes", click "Add" and select Server node.
To disable it completely, open Server Configuration and set parameter "CheckTrustedNodes" to 0.
Some info about "Trusted Nodes": http://wiki.netxms.org/wiki/SG:Security_Issues

Dani@M3T

thanks. Yes this workaround could be a solution. I just tested that. One disadvantage of this solution is, that I can't use templates for the iLO related DCIs. In the DCIs of the template is a field 'proxy node'. But I can't set this fix for all servers with iLO.
A follow up question:
Which interface NetXMS uses for SNMP-, ICMP- and Agent-Poll if the node has more than one interface? So far I can see I can't select an interface for SNMP-Poll and a separate for Agent-Poll or even on DCI level.

Dani@M3T

Has anybody an answer for my last question about the interfaces used for polling? Thanks.

Victor Kirhenshtein

NetXMS server uses IP address resolved from host name (or IP address) specified as "primary host name" in node properties. You can see it in overview page as "Primary IP".

Best regards,
Victor