IBM Tivoli Monitoring > Version 6.3 > User's Guides > System p Agent User's Guides > AIX Premium User's Guide IBM Tivoli Monitoring, Version 6.3
Overview of the agent
The IBM Tivoli Monitoring: AIX Premium Agent (product code PX) provides you with the capability to monitor AIX.
IBM Tivoli Monitoring is the base software for the AIX Premium agent. The AIX Premium agent monitors the availability, health, and performance of key AIX system resources.
- Components of the IBM Tivoli Monitoring environment
After you install and set up the AIX Premium agent, you have an environment that contains the client, server, and monitoring agent implementation for Tivoli Monitoring.
- User interface options
Installation of the base IBM Tivoli Monitoring software and other integrated applications provides various interfaces that you can use to work with your resources and data.
IBM Tivoli Monitoring
IBM Tivoli Monitoring provides a way to monitor the availability and performance of all the systems in the enterprise from one or several designated workstations. It also provides useful historical data that you can use to track trends and to troubleshoot system problems.
You can use IBM Tivoli Monitoring to achieve the following tasks:
- Monitor for alerts on the systems that you are managing by using predefined situations or custom situations.
- Establish your own performance thresholds.
- Trace the causes leading to an alert.
- Gather comprehensive data about system conditions.
- Use policies to take actions, schedule work, and automate manual tasks.
The Tivoli Enterprise Portal is the interface for IBM Tivoli Monitoring products. You can use the consolidated view of your environment as seen in the Tivoli Enterprise Portal to monitor and resolve performance issues throughout the enterprise.
See the IBM Tivoli Monitoring publications listed in Prerequisite publications for complete information about IBM Tivoli Monitoring and the Tivoli Enterprise Portal.
Functions of the monitoring agent
- AIX Availability, Health, and Performance Resource Monitoring
- Monitors the availability, health, and performance of key AIX system resources: LPAR configurations, CPU, memory, storage, network, printers, NIM, and Workload Partitions (WPARS).
System p monitoring agents
The four System p monitoring agents monitor the PowerVM environment.
Figure 1 shows the four System p monitoring agents in the PowerVM environment:
- AIX Premium agent
- CEC Base agent
- HMC Base agent
- VIOS Premium agent
Each agent operates independently of each other and together, they provide a complete PowerVM monitoring offering.
Figure 1. System p agents
- The AIX Premium agent runs on an AIX LPAR and provides monitoring of the AIX system for that LPAR. Each AIX LPAR to be monitored must run a dedicated AIX Premium agent. This agent is available on the installation package for the System p agents.
- The CEC Base agent runs on a single AIX or VIOS LPAR and provides Central Electronics Complex (CEC) frame-level monitoring of CPU and memory resources by aggregating information retrieved from the XMTOPAS daemon for each AIX/VIOS LPAR. LPARs not running AIX /VIOS or XMTOPAS cannot be monitored and therefore, impact the ability of the agent to provide accurate information. This agent uses a secure shell (SSH) connection to the hardware management console (HMC) to issue HMC commands for discovering the LPARs on the CEC. The agent does not rely on the AIX Premium agent data; however, this agent provides summaries of some of the same LPAR-specific information. For environments that are not managed using the HMC, this agent must be run on the VIOS for discovery to be accomplished using the Integrated Virtualization Manger (IVM). This agent is pre-installed with the VIOS operating system and is in the installation package for the System p agents.
- The HMC Base agent runs on a single AIX LPAR and provides monitoring of the health and performance of the HMC. This multi-instance agent uses a unique agent instance for monitoring each HMC. This agent sends HMC commands over an SSH connection to retrieve information from the HMC. The agent collects Power server, LPAR, and CPU Pool configuration data and monitors the CPU utilization of the Power servers, LPARs, and pools. The agent is available in the installation package for the System p agents.
- The VIOS Premium agent runs on the VIOS LPAR and provides monitoring the VIOS system, and the network and storage client mapping defined by the HMC. Each VIOS to be monitored must run a dedicated VIOS Premium agent. This agent uses an SSH connection to the HMC to issue HMC commands, and uses the VIOS command line for discovering network and storage mapping data. This agent is pre-installed with the VIOS system and is not included in the installation package for the System p agents.