A. Overview
-----------
The Oracle Enterprise Manager (OEM) Intelligent Agent is an autonomous
process running on remote nodes in the network. An agent resides on the
same node as the service it supports. However the agent can support more
than one service on a particular node. For example if two databases are
installed on one machine a single
agent can support both databases.
The agent is autonomous so they can perform administrative tasks, monitor
the system and correct problems, detect and react to events, all
independently, at any time, without requiring the OEM console be running,
or any active participation by the administrator. The agent queues any
job or event messages destined for an administrator and delivers them
when the administrator logs in to a console again. The OEM agent can run
without the database being up
and can shut down or start up the database.
The OEM agent is responsible for:
. Accepting jobs or events from the OEM Console or other third-party
applications
. Running jobs, collecting job results and output and queueing them for
the OEM console
. Canceling jobs
. Checking for events, and queueing
the event reports
. Handling Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) requests, if SNMP
is supported.
Using TCL scripts submitted as OEM jobs you can program an agent to perform
a task or to detect problems. By submitting a 'fixit' job along with an
event registration you can also program an agent to correct a problem
when it is detected.
Please consult to the OEM documentation and on-line help for further
details.
B. Installation
----------------
When installing the Oracle Intelligent
Agent on Windows NT you must have Administrator privileges (for
creating and deleting services).
C. Miscellaneous
----------------
AGENT BINARIES
Binaries for the Agent are stored
in $ORACLE_HOME\agentbin, including DLL's that you might not expect
to be there, as they exist elsewhere on the system. The reason
for this is that the agent must be able to reinstall those DLL's
for Oracle Software Manager (OSM), and if it were using the same
copies of the files as other Oracle software, the DLL's would
be locked and the Install would fail.
AGENT SERVICE DISCOVERY AND AUTOCONFIGURATION
The OEM Intelligent agent needs no manual configuration. At startup time
it checks for Oracle software installed on the machine and configures
itself by creating the files snmp_ro.ora and snmp_rw.ora under your
TNS_ADMIN directory (by default ORACLE_HOME/net80/admin). Do not edit
snmp_ro.ora.
Before starting the agent, make sure that all the databases you want to
monitor and administer by OEM are entered in the NT Registry. This happens automatically if you use the database that is created by the installer or if
you use the Oracle NT Instance Manager to create a new database. For more information on the exact location and format of the oratab file, please
consult your Installation and
Configuration Guide.
AGENT CONTROL FUNCTIONS
To start the agent: Start the OracleAgent service from the NT Control Panel
To stop the agent: Stop the OracleAgent service from the NT Control Panel
To check the agent's state: Look
at the NT Control Panel
To turn on tracing include the following in the snmp_rw.ora file
nmi.trace_level = ADMIN
USER AUTHENTICATION FOR OEM JOB
EXECUTION
The Agent authenticates the NT user name and password for all owners of jobs that it runs. This means that you must provide valid credentials in the Console, via the File Menu "Preferences" option for the node where the NT
Agent resides. The userid used as preferrred credentials needs to be granted
the "log in as batch jobs"
privilege.
If you submit a job and it fails with the error "Failed to authenticate user"
you may need to verify that the userid used as preferred credentials is
configured properly. To do this:
a) Bring up the "User Manager for Domains" from the Administrative Tools program group.
b) Select the user used or create a new user. Make sure the "User Must Change Password at the next logon" option is not selected. Do not call this user "SYSTEM" or "system".
c) Under Policies --> User Rights, click on "Show Advanced User Rights". Locate "Logon as a batch job" and select it. Add this right to the user above.
D. Restrictions and workarounds
-------------------------------
1. Fix to bug#611028, has introduced
a serious side effect where the 8.0.4.1.1 agent is unable to upgrade
from an 8.0.4 agent.
2. The OEM Intelligent maintains a connection to all databases that it
monitors. As a result, while the agent is up, these databases cannot be
shutdown in normal mode. Please stop the agent first, before issuing
the shutdown normal command
in server manager.
3. If more than one Network Listener is configured to service a database,
even if only one of them is up, the agent discovery process will pick
up the first one it finds and will print out a warning. If the wrong
listener is picked up, monitoring of this database will fail.
4. The EM Intelligent Agent version
8.0.4.1.1 for Windows NT does not include SNMP support.
5. When distributing software
from Oracle Software Manager v1.5.5 to servers running the EM
Intelligent Agent version 8.0.4.1.1, only one repository
user can perform software distribution.
6. If the NT System PATH contains
a mapped remote directory, no NT Services will start, including
the Oracle Intelligent Agent Service, OracleAgent.
Make sure
that your System PATH contains ONLY local drives.
7. We strongly recommend
that you maintain consistency between the Computer Name, the Local
DNS Name (Host Name) and the Domain Name Server Name (DNS Name
(Ref. Bug#599225). Not doing so may result in naming inconsistencies
and possibly lack of communication between the Console and Agent.
E. Bug Fixes in this Release
-----------------------------
1. Fix to bug#565669 and bug#605025,Unable
to register the CPU utilization event
2. Fix to bug#605026 Unable
to register the swapful event
3. Fix to bug#682757, Import/Export
tcl commands fail in NT with MOH.
4. Fix to bug#656803, TCL
scripts incorrectly converting character set.