An unreasonable request...

... it is, as well, it really is - especially in a large Enterprise that has grown rather organically.

What I'd really like [big grin] is the network to be segmented for my convenience - Windows servers on one segment, UNIX on another, network kit on another and so on. It'd be so much easier for setting probe ranges and making sure jobs like Host Connection by SSH don't try and connect to Windows machines. My error logs would decrease in size dramatically!

Of course it'd be a complete pain in the nether regions for the people actually managing the network and the things that go on inside it, but that's .. well, that's someone else innit ;-) ?

So today I am working on checking over ranges to see where I have Windows kit being scanned by SSH jobs and so on and so forth. It'll be an ongoing job but best to get it started (again - I've been here before) - and this time I'll document the way I do it so that someone else can do it next time. Probably.

Foiled, but in a positive way

Curses. And yet not. The Company's ESX servers are seen by uCMDB but both as Linux servers and as the VMware physical devices they are. Trouble is, that is as two separate CIs with the physical attributes related to one CI - along with the installed software and so one, but the virtual pool and it's connections are associated with the other CI. I shall have to Spend some more of the time I don't have a lot of getting into the depths of why.

Nevertheless, it's jolly good to see that they are properly discovered :)

And so it begins ...

"Are you using Content Pack 10?" asks the support agent "because I think this issue that we haven't been able to resolve for some months will be resolved by CP10."

CP10 needs CUP7, which needs an oracle upgrade that I'm simply not going to get the resources to do.

I can see this getting somewhat tiring (even if it will sometimes be fair and justified) :(

ESX servers

And so they are discovered, which is nice. For a long time they weren't.

Not a lot of details though. I don't know what's usual for discovered ESX servers, so I shall do some rooting through comms logs. I do a lot of that.

uCMDB Browser (again)

Version 1.0 works a treat - except I need to get Tomcat running as a service on the app server. Every time I log off, uCMDB browser dies... So I've taken to just closing RDC, keeping my session running. Must look into sorting it out soon - time, always it's time...

I still think the browser's a major enhancement to usability - not for me but for people like sys admins, incident managers, change admin staff - easy to use & easy to run. No messing about with Java, no learning to use the client. Brilliant.

Example - I am pushing data from uCMDB into Atrium. The Atrium admin can use the uCMDB Browser to look at CIs in uCMDB, check they've come over properly in the push or look up records (e.g. a server) to request new related CIs be included in the integration. They never need a login to uCMDB (I use the guest login for everyone) and they don't need to know how to use the client.

Another example of browser usage - OpSec can browse the data and notice that an account which should have been closed some times ago is still on some machines. They get that closed down and that's one security issue resolved thanks to uCMDB browser. Brilliant :)