Blade Servers are now an integral part of infrastructure in a datacenter. The demand for space and power are ever on the increase and the choice to switch to an
alternative technology that ropes in all these benefits is but natural. Space, power, cost, reduced cabling, and easy manageability are the key factors that drive the datacenters to switch to Blade Servers. Its a server chassis that holds multiple server blades with each 'blade' being a server by itself. The resources are centralized and the non-core computing services required to manage the blade servers such as managing the power, temperature, connectivity etc, are pushed to the blade chassis/enclosure.
The overall health and performance of the BladeServers is ensured by monitoring the Blade health, chassis temperature, and the power module besides the other system hardware resources. The temperature and blower are the components that have frequent issues. The important variables that reflect the proper health and functioning of IBM BladeCenter H Series devices including these components are:
OpManager monitors all these critical resources using SNMP. The relevant SNMP OIDs are implemented in The BLADE MIB and BLADESPPALT MIB. Visit this page for the particulars on the OIDs for which monitors are configured, and how these resources determine the health of performance of a Blade server.
....I needed a quick, and preferably easy one to set up.....It grabs a bunch of the normal statistics but where I found it most useful was the alarms and notifications.... I am liking it way better than WebCacti!
In most cases, what Jeff has explained holds good. It is not feasible for admins to spare a huge amount of time to build what they want, especially when they have limited resources.
With the demand to provide 100% availability for the internet service,
every organization goes for multiple Internet services. However due to
cost constraints the speed and the bandwidth may vary between service
providers. It is obvious, in terms of backup link because you don’t want
your users to browse any social or unproductive web sites when your
main service link is down.Similar to NetFlow, Cisco IP SLAs is also a part of Cisco IOS. Cisco IP SLAs uses active monitoring techniques to let you know how the link is performing! To know about the Cisco IP SLAs features that are supported in the IOS versions click here…
More at http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps6602/products_ios_protocol_group_home.html
2010 Global Product Excellence Award Winners

. This release is expected in a couple of weeks, a promise we plan to keep this year
WMIDiag.vbs is a VBScript script designed to help you ascertain the current state of the WMI service on a computer. The download package includes the utility itself, a ReadMe file that discusses how the tool works (and how to best use it), and sample spreadsheets that provide information about the default WMI configuration on various versions of the Microsoft Windows operating system.
WMI Tools include:WMI CIM Studio: view and edit classes, properties, qualifiers, and instances in a CIM repository; run selected methods; generate and compile MOF files.WMI Object Browser: view objects, edit property values and qualifiers, and run methods.
The device templates in OpManager contain predefined rules based on which a device is categorized and relevant monitors are associated soon after discovery. The ability to define custom templates for new device types or modify an existing template to accommodate yet another device type in the same template provides great flexibility to administrators.
That said, as an administrator, you will be able to make the best out of this feature if used to its full potential. For instance, some might end up defining a template for every variant of a device type instead of creating one template that can encompass all the variants.
Ideally, defining device templates before you initiate discovery helps in proper classification. Over 650 device templates are available out of the box. If SNMP is enabled on the monitored devices, and if proper credentials are configured in OpManager, most devices fall into the correct category. Modify an existing template or create a new one based on need.
1. When should I modify/update an existing template?
Assume you have purchased a new Cisco 805 router and you would like to monitor it using OpManager. OpManager already has a device template for Cisco 800 series routers with few sysOIDs in these series updated in the template. All you need to do is edit this template to include the sysOID of Cisco 805 router if it is not present already.
2. When should I create new templates?
Scenario 1
Let us now assume you have purchased a Cisco 11000 Series Content Services Switch. OpManager does not have a template yet (this is as of Build no.8721!). Just go ahead and create a new template.
Scenario 2
Assume you have a whole new set of Environment Sensors that are manageable (that supports SNMP). These devices cannot be classified under any of the default categories like servers, routers, switches etc, and deserve a separate category. The managing parameters too differ for this new device type. An ideal situation where you will define a new category view (Eg: Sensors) and define a fresh device template. You can have different models of sensors from the same vendor in a template or even combine Sensors from multiple vendors in the same template.
The steps you'd follow here would be as follows:
Even before you proceed to
add or modify a template to accomodate a new device type, make sure the
device is SNMP enabled and it responds to query from OpManager. Invoke
the MibBrowser utility bundled with OpManager to check for response. Let
me show you how to check for SNMP response.
1. From OpManager/bin, double-click to execute MibBrowser.bat.
2. In the MibBrowser GUI, enter the device name, the SNMP port, and the read community string (default is PUBLIC).
3. RFC1213 mib is loaded by default. Expand the mib to
org->dod->internet->mgmt->mib2 ->system and select
sysObjectID from this table.
4. From the toolbar above, click on the Get SNMP Variable icon (7th icon from the left) to see the response in the text area to your right.
Trust you will find the details shared in this post useful. Feel free to raise your doubts if any. Will be glad to assist you!
Regards
Vidya
OpManager Team
