Database agents do appear in Global View dashboard console but agent monitors and alarms are fired (4308990)

An agent that is not seen in Globalview Databases Dashboard is an agent that is not working, for some reason.
Agent Status shows that the Agent is activated and marked in green, but behind the scenes the agent is not functioning.

A database agent must have monitored successfully at least once to be visible in the databases dashboard. If an agent no longer appears in the dashboard by the agent is shown as acting in the Agent Status panel then the most common reason for an agent not to function as expected is topology duplication.

In this scenario, the agent may have been created more than once.
For example, the user has created the agent by using Database Installer, then deleted the agent from Agent Status and created it again by using the Agent Status Properties (ASP).
If not properly deleted from the topology, the agent will maintain two topologies:

1. One that is not updated anymore
2. Second topology that is updated
   Global View will address the first instance it finds, meaning the old and non/updated topology.
   The old topology is not active, and because of that the agent will not be shown in Global View.

Note that The Topologies are created in the FMS process and agent is running on the FglAM process. That explains why the agent is marked in green in Agent Status, while there is a failure on the FMS side.

Another reason for the agent to be shown as active in Agent Status and not shown in Databases Dashboard can be related to NTLM2, Microsoft security protocol.

Symptoms

• Agents are shown as Active in Agent Status but do not appear in Databases Dashboard
• From a review of the agent log in the Agent Status the agent appears to monitoring successfully
• Topology tree for an agent shows more than a single instance in it
• Agent has been created more than once
• Used ASP Agent Status in order to create an agent

Best practices would be to create the agents from the database agent installer only.
The Installer will run validation checkup before allowing agent creation which may prevent agents duplications.

If an agent is green in Agent Status and is not shown in Databases Dashboard , suspect topology duplication.

1. From Agent Status identify the agent which is missing from Database Dashboard
2. open Configuration | Data | Management Server | All Data | DBSS_Data_Model | SQL-Server Data Model | Clusters | Agent name | Instances

If there is more than a single Agent under Instances, it means that the agent is working but the data is pushed to the wrong tree.
And if there is no data, the agent will not exist in the Databases Dashboard.

Next step would be to delete the topology for the agent in the proper way:

1. Open Databases | Support Dashboard | Database technical Support
2. Switch between the DB types tabs (Oracle or SQL Server accordingly)
3. Click on Clear Agent data
4. Highlight the agent which is missing from Database Dashboard and has topology duplication
5. Click on the Delete button
6. Click on Clear Agent Model Data
7. Highlight the agent which is missing from Database Dashboard and has topology duplication
8. Click on the Delete button
9. Check Topology and see duplication is now gone
10. Check Databases Dashboard and see if the agent is now there. no need to de-activate/activate the agent from Agent Status