HP 407484-B21 - ProLiant Essentials Accelerated... Reference manual

Abstract.............................................................................................................................................. 2
Introduction to the Insight Management Agents architecture ...................................................................... 2
HP Insight Management agents ............................................................................................................. 4
Foundation agent............................................................................................................................. 4
Server agent.................................................................................................................................... 5
Storage agent.................................................................................................................................. 5
NIC agent....................................................................................................................................... 6
SNMP Services.................................................................................................................................... 7
Microsoft SNMP Agent Service.......................................................................................................... 7
Management Information Base .......................................................................................................... 7
Enhancing SNMP Security................................................................................................................. 7
Performing SNMP Sets...................................................................................................................... 8
Monitoring the server and delivering SNMP Traps ............................................................................... 8
Additional Insight Agents functionality.................................................................................................. 10
The HP Insight Event Notifier ........................................................................................................... 10
Process Monitoring......................................................................................................................... 11
The System Management Homepage framework ................................................................................... 13
System Management Homepage web server ..................................................................................... 13
System Management Homepage ..................................................................................................... 14
HTTPS, single sign-on, and secure task execution ............................................................................... 15
Replicate Agent Settings service....................................................................................................... 15
Considerations when installing and configuring the Insight Agents........................................................... 16
Updating Insight Management Agents .............................................................................................. 16
Understanding port use with Insight Management Agents and HP SIM ................................................. 16
Configuring the data collection interval............................................................................................. 16
Setting the server role ..................................................................................................................... 17
Additional support for Insight Management on HP ProLiant servers .......................................................... 18
HP Insight Management WBEM Providers......................................................................................... 18
Support for ProLiant 100-series servers ............................................................................................. 18
Conclusion........................................................................................................................................ 18
For more information.......................................................................................................................... 19
Call to action .................................................................................................................................... 19
HP Insight Management Agents architecture
for Windows servers
1st Edition

2
Abstract
This technology brief provides an overview of the HP Insight Management Agents for HP ProLiant
servers running the Windows®server operating system. It is intended to provide an architectural
overview of the entire set of client-side software components that are installed on ProLiant servers to
provide integrated manageability using the HP Systems Insight solution. It is assumed that the reader
is already familiar with HP Systems Insight Manager (HPSIM) in managed server environments.
Introduction to the Insight Management Agents architecture
HP Insight Management Agents provide a robust and unique solution for monitoring and managing
ProLiant servers through HP Systems Insight Manager. To provide this functionality, which extends
beyond that of simple SNMP-based management, the Insight Management Agents architecture
requires the installation of a set of software components on each managed server. Although they are
commonly referred to as the Insight Management Agents, it is instructive to think of these as three
different groups of software components, each performing a core function in the overall Insight
Manager architecture.
The first group consists of the Insight agents themselves. There are four different agents in the Insight
architecture for Windows–based servers. As a group they are responsible for collecting all of the
management information about the server. This information is eventually reported and displayed in
the Systems Insight Manager console and the System Management Homepage. This includes
information about the server’s health, key operating system statistics, and information about the server
hardware.
The Microsoft SNMP Agent Service is the second component of this architecture. This program
provides the basic set of SNMP services between the managed server and HP SIM.
The third and final component group on the managed server is the System Management Homepage
(SMH) framework. In addition to acting as a web server to deliver detailed information on the
managed server as part of the SIM console, it also implements the core functionality that makes
unique SIM features such as single sign-on and replicate agents settings possible.
Figure 1 shows an overview of the Insight Management Agents architecture and the basic
interoperation of the component groups. The sections that follow describe the roles of each of the
components in the Insight Management architecture and provide more details about the architecture
itself.

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Figure 1. HP Insight Management Agents architecture

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HP Insight Management agents
The four HP Insight Management agents are the core of the architecture on managed servers. As a
group, they are responsible for collecting all of the management information about the server and its
software environment. As the information is collected, it is stored in the Windows Registry. Using
SNMP protocol, Insight processes such as HP SIM server and the System Management Homepage (or
other SNMP-based management tools) access this information and then display it to the user. Some of
the Insight agents perform additional tasks within the Insight architecture, and these will be explained
in the detailed discussion of each agent.
Foundation agent
The Foundation agent collects high-level system information about the managed server. As shown in
Table 1, most of the information that the foundation agents collects comes from the Windows OS
itself. This information is then stored in the Windows Registry as Management Information Base (MIB)
information.
Table 1. System information collected by the Foundation agent
Information collected Source
High-level server information
(Host name, System role, OS installed)
Windows OS
System Performance
(OS statistics, CPU and memory utilization)
Windows OS
File System information
(Logical Drives, Drive utilization)
Windows OS
HP software installed Windows Registry
Clustering information Windows OS
In addition to collecting high-level system information, the Foundation Agent has additional roles. It is
responsible for the low-level execution of all SNMP Sets within the Insight architecture. This is covered
in greater detail in the section on SNMP Services. It also provides the HP Insight Event Notifier
functionality.

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Server agent
The Server agent collects the basic server information, including the server’s key subsystems
configurations and health information. Table 2 lists the categories of information that the Server agent
collects and the sources from which this information is obtained.
Table 2.Server information collected by the Server agent
Information collected Source
Server hardware information
(Product ID, serial #, board revisions)
SM BIOS
CPU configuration SM BIOS
Memory installed SM BIOS and System Management driver
PCI devices and system slots SM BIOS, Windows OS
Sensor information
(fans, temperature, power supplies and redundancy)
System Management driver
Critical events (hardware errors) HP Integrated Management Log (IML)
Management processor information iLO 2
BladeSystem enclosure information ROM BIOS1
Storage agent
The Storage agent collects and delivers the core storage-related information, including information on
storage controllers and their logical and physical drives. The storage agent supports HP SmartArray
controllers as well as Fiber Channel Host Bus Adapters (HBAs) and SAS HBAs. It also provides basic
information on storage box enclosures. The Storage agent obtains most of this information directly
from the disk controller firmware, although some of it is obtained directly from the drives (Table 3).
Table 3.Storage information collected by the Storage agent
Information collected Source
Storage controller information
(firmware revision, battery status)
Controller firmware
Logical drive information
(fault tolerance, rebuild status)
Controller firmware
Physical Drive information
(size, speed, location, performance data, pre-failure)
Controller firmware
Drive firmware
Storage box infrastructure
(fans, power supplies, temperature)
Enclosure Services interface via controller
firmware
1Some displayed enclosure information is collected by HP SIM directly from the enclosure Onboard Administrator and does not involve the Server
Agent

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The Storage agent and Insight Management Agents are designed to collect and report information on
storage that is viewed as belonging to the single host server. Multi-host storage on the network, such
as SANs, is not reported through the Insight Management Agents. It is managed using WBEM-based
Storage Management Initiative Specification (SMI-S) Storage Providers. Additional information on HP
support for SMI-S is available at http://www.compaq.com/storage/smis.html.
NIC agent
The NIC agent collects and stores information about the network controllers installed in the managed
server. Some of the information is collected through the NIC miniport driver. Other information is
actually collected by the Windows OS and stored in MIB-II in the registry. Table 4 lists the categories
and sources of information collected and displayed for the network controllers.
Table 4.Networking information collected by the NIC Agent
Information collected Source
Adapter Information (firmware, speed, location, MAC) MIB-II, Windows OS, NIC miniport
driver
Interface information (Interface name, IPv4 address) MIB-II, Windows OS
Ethernet statistics NIC miniport driver, Windows OS
NIC teaming configuration Teaming intermediate driver

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SNMP Services
The SNMP Services enable the flow of basic management information between the managed server
and HP SIM. These components process SNMP Gets and Sets, as well as the SNMP Traps used in
alerting.
Microsoft SNMP Agent Service
The Microsoft SNMP Agent Service provides the core set of SNMP services used by the Insight
Management system on the managed server. The following services are included:
Fulfillment of SNMP Gets to deliver information from the HP MIB to authorized requesting services.
In the Insight architecture, MIB information is typically requested from the SIM server or from a
process associated with the SMH framework.
Processing of SNMP Sets, which are used to change SNMP configuration information as well as
alert thresholds for server management information.
The Microsoft SNMP Agent Service provides a standard SNMP interface to external processes.
However, its internal structure is very specific, using its own set of application program interfaces
(API’s). The HP Insight Agents are specifically designed to work with the Microsoft SNMP Agent
Service and will not interoperate with other SNMP stacks.
Management Information Base
The Management Information Base defines all of the information collected about the managed system.
In the HP Insight Architecture, the four Insight Agents collect the MIB information and store it in an
extension to the Windows Registry. When MIB information is requested, the Microsoft SNMP Agent
Service uses the Insight Agents to retrieve information from the Windows Registry before delivering it
to the requesting process, typically the HP SIM server or the System Management Homepage.
Enhancing SNMP Security
The SNMP protocol provides basic security and access authorization through the use of community
strings. However, standard SNMP protocol does not encrypt the community strings or the
management information that it sends or receives. This leaves the information vulnerable to being
intercepted (snooped) over the network. The HP Insight Management framework provides a more
secure management environment by establishing a separate certificate-based SSL communication
channel between the SIM server and the managed server. This channel is actually a part of the SMH
framework, and it used by the Insight Management framework as the transport mechanism for all
secure information. Other, less sensitive information is still sent to the HP SIM server over standard
SNMP from the Microsoft SNMP Agent Service.
To further enhance security, at installation, the Insight Management Agents architecture configures the
Microsoft SNMP Agent Service to restrict SNMP writes to the local host only. This prevents any
external agent from being able to execute writes to the managed server. The HP SIM server is still
able to implement SNMP Sets since its commands are sent over the encrypted link and are actually
executed locally.

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Performing SNMP Sets
SNMP Sets are used to define the alerting thresholds for management information or to set SNMP
configuration information. Because these operations are considered sensitive, the Insight Management
architecture does not send SNMP Sets over the open SNMP connection between SIM and the
managed server. Instead, they are sent over the secure https channel link that SIM establishes with the
System Management Homepage framework. These Set requests are then sent to the Microsoft SNMP
Agent Service which passes them to the appropriate HP SNMP Extension Agent and then to an Insight
Management Agent. In the HP Insight Management Agents architecture, all SNMP Sets are passed to
and executed locally by the Foundation Agent as part of its extended functionality.
Monitoring the server and delivering SNMP Traps
One function of a management system is to deliver alerts whenever the values for key system
parameters exceed or fall below the threshold values that have been set for them, or whenever
important system events occur. For example, a system administrator may want to be alerted whenever
disk utilization exceeds 85%. The Insight Management Agents architecture uses SNMP Trap
notifications to deliver these alerts to the SIM server, where they are processed and then displayed for
the system administrator on the SIM console.
Several different components of the Insight Management architecture, including parts of each of the
four Insight Agents, monitor the MIB and process the information to determine when to issue alerts.
Remote Alerter Threads. Each Insight Management agent has a remote alerter thread that is
responsible for monitoring its portion of the HP MIB in the Windows Registry for Registry change
events. When the thread detects a change that requires an alert, such as a threshold being
exceeded, it writes an event to the Windows Event Log with a pre-defined Event ID.
The HP Trap Thread. This extension to the Microsoft SNMP Agent Service scans the Windows Event
Log for alert events that have been written to it by the Remote Alerter Threads. It also detects other
key events in the log that should generate an alert.
The Microsoft SNMP Agent Service. Based on the events selected by the HP Trap Thread, the
SNMP Agent Service generates the actual SNMP Traps that are sent to the SIM server for display
on the management console.
The Insight Manager alerting architecture is shown in Figure 2. This is a slightly more detailed view of
one section of the overall Insight Agents architecture shown in Figure 1.

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Figure 2. Architecture of HP Insight Manager alerting

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Additional Insight Agents functionality
The HP Insight Agents architecture provides additional functionality that is unique to the HP SIM
solution environment.
The HP Insight Event Notifier
The HP Insight Event Notifier service provides a mechanism for the Insight Management Agents
architecture to send e-mail notifications to specified recipients when alert events occur on the
managed server. The Insight Event Notifier service is typically used as an alternative alerting
mechanism when managing a small server installation (typically, fewer than ten servers) that does not
require the full set of capabilities available through HP Systems Insight Manager. Figure 2 shows
where the Event Notifier service fits within the of Insight Manager alert architecture.
Although it is installed as part of the Insight Management architecture on managed servers, the Insight
Event Notifier is disabled by default. An administrator can enable this service locally on a managed
server through the Computer Management administrative tool.
Once the service is enabled, an administrator can use the Event Notifier Configuration Wizard to
configure the outbound Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) server for sending the e-mail alerts as
well as the list of notification recipients for the Event Notifier service. The configuration wizard is part
of the HP Management Agents program group on the managed server (Figure 3).
Figure 3. Running Event Notifier configuration.

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Process Monitoring
The HP Insight Management Agents architecture can also monitor and alert on any active processes
running on a managed server and send alerts as necessary. This functionality is part of the
Foundation Agent. It can be configured using the HP Management Agents configuration utility
accessible from the Control Panel of any managed server with the Insight Management Agents
architecture installed (Figure 4).
Figure 4 . Running the HP Management Agents configuration utility
Figure 5 shows the Process Monitor tab for the Management Agents configuration utility. Using the
Process Monitor function, an administrator can configure the Insight Management architecture to send
alerts to HP SIM on the Start, the Stop, or the Start and Stop of any active process on the server. The
default setting for monitoring each process is ‘None’, in which case no alerts will be sent when the
process is started or stopped.

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Figure 5. Setting process monitoring in the Management Agents configuration utility

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The System Management Homepage framework
The System Management Homepage framework plays several roles in the Insight Management Agents
architecture. It retrieves and displays the detailed management information for a managed server
through the System Management Homepage. The framework also provides a set of services that are
integral to delivering many of the special features that are part of the overall Systems Insight
Management solution. These include a web server and its various web applications, as well as the
Secure Task Execution and Configure Agent Settings services. Figure 6 shows a detailed view of the
SMH framework, which is part of the overall Insight Management Agents architecture shown in Figure
1.
Figure 6. The System Management Homepage framework
System Management Homepage web server
At the heart of the SMH framework is an Apache-based web server and an infrastructure for
supporting a set of plug-in web applications developed by HP. These web applications retrieve the
detailed information on the managed server from the MIB, put it into a meaningful format, and create
the HTML pages that comprise the System Management Homepage. The system administrator can
then use a web browser to view these pages that are delivered from the SMH web server of each
managed system.
The SMH web server also provides the execution platform for additional web-based applications that
are part of the overall Insight Management system. These include the web-based implementations of
HP Diagnostics and the HP Array Configuration Utility, as well as applications such as the HP Version
Control Agent. Although it is Apache-based, the SMH web server is a locked-down, non-extensible
version of the Apache server that is not accessible for general purpose use by other applications
running on the server.

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System Management Homepage
The System Management Homepage itself is a set of active web pages that aggregate a system’s
management information for display as part of the overall HP Systems Insight Manager solution. As
shown in Figure 7, the management console displays general descriptive information about the
managed server, and presents information that was gathered by the HP SIM server over the standard
SNMP connection. Often, when administrators drill-down from HP SIM to view the detailed
information for the managed server, they are in fact viewing the System Management Homepage for
that server. The SMH is displayed in a separate browser window by the SMH web server at the
request of HP SIM. In this instance, the SMH for the managed server was invoked when the
administrator clicked on the Health Status choice from the SIM console. The SMH for a server can
also be accessed directly at Port 2381 of the server’s IP address and requires OS password
authentication. If the Insight Agents have been configured properly, either at installation or
subsequently using the Configure and Repair Agents capability in HP SIM, the user is automatically
logged into the SMH when accessing it through HP SIM. This is part of the HP SIM single sign-on
functionality.
Figure 7. SIM management console and SMH for the server hpdcl4ds02

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HTTPS, single sign-on, and secure task execution
An additional role of the SMH framework is to provide a secure communications environment for the
Insight Management Agents architecture. SNMP does not provide secure, encrypted communications
between the managed server and the remote requesting process. To address this, the SMH framework
implements HTTPS, a separate, SSL-based, secure communications link and protocol between each
managed server and the SIM server. While SIM continues to use the standard SNMP service to
retrieve basic MIB information, all sensitive traffic (including threshold Sets, configuration data, and
other commands) is sent over this secure link using HTTPS.
A configurable trust relationship also provides certificate-based authentication between the managed
servers and the SIM server. This authentication eliminates the need for a user to manually log-in to
each managed server and forms the basis for the Insight Manager single sign-on functionality.
Without the SMH framework, SIM single sign-on would not be possible. The trust model also allows
SIM to perform automated tasks on managed servers without storing the credentials of the user who
sets up the task. This is known as Secure Task Execution.
Replicate Agent Settings service
The SMH framework implements the remote configuration capabilities of the Insight Management
Agents architecture using the Configure Agent Settings functionality, which is part of the Replicate
Agent Settings service. To accomplish this, the service establishes a protocol that allows HP SIM to
query the SMH framework for the configuration settings of various components of the client-side
Insight architecture. This includes the Insight agent settings, general SNMP settings, the SMH security
settings, and others. Changes to configuration settings can then be passed back and forth between
the SIM server and the SMH framework over the SSL link. When the Replicate Agent Settings service
receives the new parameters, it changes the configuration settings on the managed server.
The Replicate Agents Settings capability in HP SIM is built using this core service of the SMH
framework. In HP SIM, an administrator can use the Replicate Agents Settings functionality to
duplicate the agent settings of one reference server across an entire group of managed servers.
Without the SMH framework and the Replicate Agents Settings service installed on the managed
servers, the Replicate Agents Settings functionality in HP SIM cannot work.

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Considerations when installing and configuring the Insight
Agents
Updating Insight Management Agents
In addition to the latest device drivers and utilities for HP ProLiant servers, the ProLiant Support Packs
contain updated Insight Management Agents. ProLiant Support Packs are developed and tested
concurrently with HP SmartStart releases. They provide a tested and trouble-free method for keeping
the Insight Agents on managed servers up to date.
Understanding port use with Insight Management Agents and HP SIM
The various software components that comprise the HP SIM environment use several different system
ports for communications. Table 5 lists the different ports used and the software components that use
them.
Table 5.HP SIM Port usage
System Port(s) Usage
161, 162 SNMP traffic between Microsoft SNMP Agent
Service and HP SIM server
2381 Secure https link between SIM server and SMH
Framework
2301 Used by SIM to identify managed servers in the
network
50000 Serving web pages from HP SIM to the
management console browser
When using HP SIM as a management solution, it is important to keep these port addresses open
within the internal networks. Internal firewalls that block these ports can cause parts of HP SIM to
function improperly.
Configuring the data collection interval
The Insight Management Agents operate by collecting information on the managed server at regular
intervals. This is commonly referred to as polling. The Insight Agents Architecture allows an
administrator to configure how frequently the agents collect data from the managed server. The data
collection interval can be set from as short as every five seconds to once every hour.
Using a short data collection interval allows the agents to provide more frequently updated
information on the server, which may prove useful for closely monitored systems. However, a shorter
data collection interval consumes more system resources and could affect system performance at some
level. The recommended setting for the data collection interval is two minutes, which is also the default
value. Administrators can configure the data collection interval under the SNMP Settings tab of the
Management Agents configuration utility, from the SMH, or from HP SIM.

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Setting the server role
System Administrators can use the Insight Management Agents architecture to define server Roles for
any servers being managed using HP SIM. The Server Role is a user-defined string of up to 256
characters. It is typically used to identify a server’s function in the network or even its physical
location. Administrators can set the Server Role in several ways:
using Configure and Repair Agents in HP SIM
from the SMH of the managed server
from the Management Agents configuration utility
Administrators can use the server role field as one of the search criteria in the HP SIM Advanced
Search function. This allows them to find groups of servers based on their Server Role and to create
SIM Collections from these groups. Figure 8 shows an Advanced Search screen using Server Role as
a search criterion.
Figure 8. Advanced Search in HP SIM using Server Role as a criterion

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Additional support for Insight Management on HP ProLiant
servers
Support for management of HP ProLiant servers using HP SIM continues to expand in response to the
need for more systems management in increasingly complex environments.
HP Insight Management WBEM Providers
The HP Insight Management Web-Based Enterprise Management (WBEM) Providers offer an
alternative to the SNMP-based Insight Agents for collecting and delivering managed system
information to HP SIM. WBEM is a defined standard for a set of management and Internet
technologies intended to unify management of distributed computing environments. The Distributed
Management Task Force (DMTF) developed and maintains the WBEM standard. It is intended as a
next-generation management standard.
The HP WBEM Providers are based on Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), Microsoft’s
implementation of the WBEM standard. WBEM Providers deliver the management information they
collect to the WMI service, part of the Windows operating system. The WMI service acts as the client-
side interface to HP SIM in the same way that that the Microsoft SNMP Service does in the Insight
Agents architecture. The WBEM Providers client-side architecture also incorporates the System
Management Homepage framework.
Systems using WBEM Providers and those running Insight Agents can co-exist within the HP SIM. HP
SIM will discover and transparently manage servers running either type of client-side management
architecture.
Support for ProLiant 100-series servers
Beginning with G6 servers and HP SIM 5.3, HP ProLiant 100 - series servers are supported in HP SIM
using the HP Insight Management Agents. Previously, ProLiant 100 - series servers supported only the
Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI) for system management. IPMI did not integrate with
HP SIM. HP Systems Insight Manager 5.3 provides full integration with ProLiant 100-series G6
servers, including discovery and association with the Lights Out 100 management processors on the
servers. HP SIM and the Insight Management Agents are not supported on any earlier generations of
the ProLiant 100-series servers. More information on HP Insight Management Agents and their support
on ProLiant 100-series servers is available at www.hp.com/go/100series/agents.
Conclusion
The HP Insight Management Agents for Windows servers continue to offer a robust solution for
monitoring and managing HP ProLiant servers. They provide SNMP-based system management that
integrates into the HP SIM solution framework and provides greater security than traditional SNMP
management solutions. Although HP introduced WBEM-based Providers as an alternative client-side
management solution, the Insight Management Agents architecture continues to be supported on HP
ProLiant servers. Beginning with G6 servers, this support now includes the HP ProLiant 100 - series
servers.

For more information
For additional information, refer to the resources listed below.
Resource description Web address
HP Systems Insight Manager www.hp.com/go/hpsim
Information on HP System Management
Homepage
http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/servers/management/
agents/index.html
HP Insight Management Agents for HP
ProLiant 100- series servers
www.hp.com/go/100series/agents
HP Insight Management WBEM Providers http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/servers/management/
wbem/index.html
ProLiant Support Packs http://h18013.www1.hp.com/products/servers/management/
psp/benefits.html
Call to action
Send comments about this paper to [email protected].
© 2009 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained
herein is subject to change without notice. The only warranties for HP products and
services are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such
products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an
additional warranty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or
omissions contained herein.
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