User guide

Option Description

Pass-through Authentication

Pass-through authentication enables Windows computers in different domains or in non-

Windows network environments to communicate with one another by using identical user

accounts and passwords on each computer.

This solution is ideal when you only need to monitor a few servers outside of your

primary domain and you do not have the resources available to install another

Monitoring Service in the secondary domain.

Site Configuration

Sites represent a logical grouping of Computers, Connections, SMTP Servers,

and Monitoring Services within your SQL Sentry environment. With the Site Configuration

option, you will install a SQL Sentry Monitoring Service in each domain/location where you

have servers that you wish to monitor.

Each Monitoring Service will only poll the servers in their own domain. The Monitoring

Service located outside of your primary domain will use either Pass-through authentication

or SQL Server authentication to communicate with the SQL Sentry Database server.

This solution is ideal if you have a need to monitor a large number of servers outside

of your primary domain, or have a need to monitor servers which are geographically

separated from your main installation.

This solution also requires that you have the required resources available in the

secondary location to install a Monitoring Service.

9.3.1 Pass-through Authentication

Pass-through authentication enables Windows computers in different domains or in non-Windows

network environments to communicate with one another by using identical user accounts and

passwords on each computer.

For example, if user “JoeDBA” with password “SQLrocks!” is created on SERVER1 and SERVER2,

JoeDBA will be able to connect and authenticate directly from SERVER1 to SERVER2, and vice versa,

without using domain-level authentication.

It is the job of the SQL Sentry Monitoring Service to collect data from monitored targets, then store

the data in the SQL Sentry Database for analysis with the SQL Sentry Client. In the above scenario,

SERVER1 may be the computer where the SQL Sentry Monitoring Service is running, and SERVER2

either the monitored computer, or the computer where the SQL Sentry Database resides.

Note: Additional configuration may be required on machines running Windows Vista and higher

with the introduction of User Access Control (UAC). When a remote connection is made using

pass-through authentication the machine is unable to resolve elevated permissions under UAC,

and for WMI and registry purposes the account is treated as a regular (non-admin) user, even if

SQL Sentry Quick Start 31