Users Guide

Configuring IT Assistant to Monitor Your Systems 35
Configuring SNMP for System Manageability
Before configuring SNMP for system manageability, let us look at the two scenarios we will use to
illustrate IT Assistant in this section:
Two systems administrators—let us call them Jane and Tom—are responsible for managing two separate
network environments. Jane represents the small-to-medium size business (50 servers, plus over
200 client systems), while Tom represents a much larger enterprise (1,000 servers). Although Jane and
Tom both use IT Assistant to discover and manage their systems, the way they configure and use
IT Assistant will differ significantly. However, before highlighting the differences, let us look at some
basic steps both must perform.
Both Jane and Tom must configure the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) systems
management protocol to discover their systems and to receive traps (asynchronous, alert notifications)
that report the status of their components. On managed systems, the Server Administrator agent
generates SNMP traps in response to changes in the status of sensors and other monitored parameters on
a managed system. In order to correctly send these traps, the operating system’s SNMP service must be
configured with one or more trap destinations that correspond to the system where IT Assistant
is installed.
Details on Configuring the SNMP Service
For detailed information about SNMP configuration for the IT Assistant system and for all supported
managed system operating systems, see "Configuring Protocols to Send Information to IT Assistant."
Configuring SNMP on Systems You Want to Manage
In addition to having the SNMP service installed and running on the IT Assistant system, each managed
system’s operating system must have the SNMP service or daemon configured.
SNMP Best Practices
When configuring SNMP, adhere to the following requirements:
• Use a host name or a static IP address for the IT Assistant system.
• On all managed systems, configure the static IP address or host name as the SNMP trap destination. If
you use a host name as the SNMP trap destination (the IT Assistant system name), you must correctly
configure DNS on your network.
• Ensure that
Get and Set community names for SNMP are different.
• When assigning community names to managed systems, keep the total number of different
community names low. The fewer community names, the easier it will be to manage your network.