Hardware Alerts...

Question

I'm very confused with one thing...  How do you set up the IT Assistant, so when you have a hard drive failure - ITA sends an email out saying the drive was/is failed............  In ITA, I can only find a way to send notifications / emails, for general Alerts, not for Hardware Alerts....  this IMHO is very stupid, but I'm sure it's something I myself am not doing correct...   Any light on this matter would be great, if I can figure this part out I can probably figure out the rest of the issues I'm having with not being able to send out an email/notification for a hardware failure....

Murr · Answer

What version of ITA are you running?   You should be able to configure alerts from ITA - from the menu, click on Alerts - and select actions. Right click on Alert Actions , and click on New Alert Action   Walk through the 4 step wizard, and specify physical disk failure, and set it to email you.   Murr

bamskel · Answer

I'm using ITA Version 8.0.0

When creating a new Alert Action, it asks me which "Filter" I want to choose, or to create a new one... I've created filters for ANYTHING that occurrs in "Physical Disk" and have set it to my group of servers I want to watch.... Here's what I have set up as my Filter and Alert...

Filter:

******************************
Name: Test Group Hard Disk Failure
Severity: Unknown, Normal, Warning, Critical
Associated Alert Categories: Physical Disk
Associated Device Groups: Test Group

*******************************

Alert:

*******************************

Alert Action Name: Hard Drive Failure Notification
Type: E-mail
Description: Test group, notification of forseen Hard Drive Failures
To: myemail@mydomain.com
From: OpenManage@mydomain.com
Subject: Device:$n $ip; Severity:$sev
Message: Device:$n $ip, Service Tag:$st, Asset Tag:$at, Date:$d, Time:$t, Severity:$sev, Message:$m
Associated Filters: Test Group Hard Disk Failure, Physical Disk Warning/Critical
********************************

Yet I have physically unplugged a hard drive from the servers within this group, I see the Hardware Alert come up in the Hardware Log, but nothing appears in the Alert Log, and therefore I get no Alert Action and no notification that my Hard Drive has gone bad...

mtw00 · Answer

The exact same thing is happening with me. I get entries in the hardware log but nothing in the alert log. If someone figures this one out please post your solution here. I've see 2 or 3 other posts describing the same problem but none with a solution.

OMNavigator · Answer

Hey,   The hardware alert should also cause an SNMP trap to be sent out. Have you configured the SNMP community names correctly? Also, could you check whether you have included the IT Assistant system as an SNMP Trap Destination (settings to be performed on the managed system)?   You can make sure your SNMP settings are correct, if the trap is visible in Alert Logs screen of ITA (Alert->Logs). If you can see the alert there, but still do not get the desired email notification, either the alert action is configured incorrectly, or, it is associated with an incorrect filter.   By any chance, you haven't configured ITA to ignore the trap by creating an Ignore/Exclude Filter... right?

kirigoe · Answer

While on the subject of hardware alerts, it's not a requirement to have OpenManage Server Administrator on the machines that send out the traps right? Just the default Windows SNMP service?

mtw00 · Answer

@OMNavigator wrote:

You can make sure your SNMP settings are correct, if the trap is visible in Alert Logs screen of ITA (Alert->Logs). If you can see the alert there, but still do not get the desired email notification, either the alert action is configured incorrectly, or, it is associated with an incorrect filter.

I have verified that SNMP traps are being sent to the ITA server. I ran ethereal, saw the packets arrive and made sure the SNMP community string was correct. One item I am having trouble finding is where to configure the SNMP community string on the ITA server to match what my managed nodes are sending.

mtw00 · Answer

bamskel,

These configuration screens are accessed through windows thus:

Start -> Administrative Tools -> Services -> Right click SNMP Service, select Properties

Within the Properties windows you should see the Traps and Security tabs.

HTH,

-mtw

Message Edited by mtw00 on 09-26-2006 05:40 PM

mtw00 · Answer

MDMike, Take a look at this thread, I just got my alert logs working today: Message Edited by mtw00 on 09-26-2006 05:06 PM

MDMike · Answer

Thanks.  I am set to READ/WRITE, and I have the option set to accept SNMP packets from any host.  Do I need to specify each server that I am monitoring?

MDMike · Answer

I am experiencing the same frustrations.  My configurations have been verified (over and over) with Dell tech Support.  I have uninstalled and reinstalled numerous times, verified SNMP, etc.  I tried ITA on 2 different Windows 2003 SP1 servers, with the exact same results:  event seen in Hardware Logs, but never got to Alert Logs.   Just this afternoon, I went ahead and installed ITA on my WinXP SP2 workstation.  It actually worked as it was supposed to.  Exact same config as the servers.  I still cannot get it to work on the servers, so I continue to struggle.

bamskel · Answer

Yep that was exactly what I have been looking for!!!  Excuse my idiocy, it was so easy.....!  Thanks much, will let y'all know if it comes through now :-)

mtw00 · Answer

Allowing SNMP packets from any host will work too.

I re-read my original message and it might not be entirely clear. I'll attempt to write something that makes more sense.

Let's say system 'abbot' is a Server Admin managed node. In the SNMP configuration screen, under the Traps tab I have defined a community named 'HelloWorld' and it's configured to send traps to 10.0.0.5, my IT Asst. server.

On the IT Asst. server 'costello', in the SNMP configuration screen, under the Security tab I have a defined the community name 'HelloWorld' with READ/WRITE rights. That community is configured to accept SNMP packets from any host.

To summarize, the community names on 'abbot' and 'costello' match. The community name on costello is set to READ/WRITE and allows SNMP packets from any host.

Hope this helps....

bamskel · Answer

Your note helps some mtw00, the problem I am having is locating the SNMP configuration screens that you're talking about...  Are these configurations set inside ITA/OMSA or inside Windows... because I don't see these configuration settings anywhere inside ITA/OMSA...

MDMike · Answer

Thanks for your help.  In my case, I don't believe it is a configuration issue.  For more testing, I installed ITA on a test server - fresh install of Win2003 SP1.  It works just fine.  I think I must have something installed on the other servers causing conflict.  Not sure what it may be yet - AntiVirus, MOM, etc causing the issues.

cr1950 · Answer

Your other servers may be blocking the ports that ITA uses.  The built-in help in ITA is quite extensive and also searchable.  Click the help button from any screen in ITA to acces it.  Search for ports.  You can also change the ports used if you don't want to open up common ports.

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Hardware Alerts...

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