Foglight for VMware 6.1.0 - User Guide (Lite version)

The Agents view shows a list of existing agent instances and a set of agent management buttons at the top of the list. The following buttons are available:

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Add: Starts a workflow for creating new agent instances. For more information, see Configuring monitoring agents for data collection.

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Refresh: Refreshes the list of agent instances and their states.

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Activate: Activates one or more selected agent instances. Activating an agent instance starts the agent process on the machine on which the agent is installed.

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Deactivate: Deactivates one or more selected agent instances. Deactivating an agent stops the agent process on the machine on which the agent is installed.

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Start Data Collection: Starts the data collection for one or more selected agent instances. Starting an agent’s data collection causes the agent to begin monitoring a Virtual Center, and to send the collected metrics back to the Management Server.

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Stop Data Collection: Stops the data collection for one or more selected agent instances. Stopping an agent’s data collection causes the agent to stop monitoring the Virtual Center.

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Edit Properties: Starts a workflow for editing the properties of one or more selected agent instances. Each agent comes with a set of properties that it uses to configure its correct running state. For more information, see Setting the Configuration properties.

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Remove: Deletes the selected agent instance.

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Update Agent: Updates the agent package to the latest version.

To perform an agent management command, select the one or more check boxes in the left-most column and click the appropriate button. For example, to start an agent’s data collection, select the check box in the agent row and click Start Data Collection.

The table in the Agents area lists the existing VMware Performance Agent instances. For more details about the data appearing in this table, see Agents view .

Accessing the VMware Agent Administration Dashboard

To access the VMware Agent Administration dashboard:

Ensure that the navigation panel is open.

To open the navigation panel, click the right-facing arrow

on the left.

On the navigation panel, under Dashboards, choose VMware > VMware Agent Administration.

The VMware Agent Administration dashboard appears in the display area.

Figure 10. VMware Agent Administration dashboard

Configuring monitoring agents for data collection

Foglight® for VMware uses the VMware Performance Agent to collect information from monitored environments. Creating a VMware Performance Agent instance creates the agent process on the Agent Manager host. Activating the VMware Performance Agent starts that agent process while starting an agent instance’s data collection enables the agent to start collecting data from the monitored vCenter® and to send it to Foglight for VMware.

When the VMware Performance Agent package is successfully deployed, create one or more agent instances, activate them, and start their data collection. To perform these steps in a single operation for one or more monitored hosts, use the Agents view on the Administration tab.

Each VMware Performance Agent monitors a single Virtual Center. When you create a VMware Performance Agent instance and the Agent Setup wizard determines that the Virtual Center was not previously monitored by this Foglight instance, it starts importing historical data into Foglight. This data is not immediately available as it takes some time to collect it. This process can import data collected over 30 days or less, depending on the amount of data available in the Virtual Center. This allows you to explore VMware metrics as soon as the data is imported, instead for waiting for the agent to collect some data from the Virtual Center. The Metric History column in the Agents table indicates the progress of the historical data import. Historical data is intended for charting, trending, and general presentation purposes. It does not cause any alarms to fire.

To import vCenter historical data, the minimum recommended vCenter Statistics Levels must be at least 2 in the samples that are collected for one month for the agent to populate 30 days of historic collections. The following table lists the minimum Statistics Levels for all collection frequencies. For more information about vCenter Statistics levels, see your VMware® documentation.

Table 2. Statistics Levels for all collection frequencies
Collection Interval	Collection Frequency	Statistics Level
1 Day	5 Minutes	1
1 Week	30 Minutes	1
1 Month	2 Hours	2
1 Year	1 Day	1


	IMPORTANT: Before creating your first VMware Performance agent, you must configure a Virtual Center user with sufficient privileges. For more information, see “Enabling VMware Performance Agents to Collect Data from a Virtual Center” in the Foglight for VMware Installation Guide.


	NOTE: In FIPS-compliant mode, you need to import the CA certificate or the self-signed certificate to the KeyStore of FglAM. For more information, see Managing certificates.

To create, activate VMware Performance Agent instances, and start their data collection:

On the navigation panel, under Dashboards, choose VMware > VMware Agent Administration.

Figure 11. VMware Agent Administration dashboard

Launch the Agent Setup Wizard. In the Agents area, click Add.

The Agent Setup Wizard appears with the Select an Agent Host page open.

Select the host machine running the Agent Manager that you want to manage the VMware Performance Agent you are about to create, and click Next.

The Agent Setup Wizard refreshes, showing the Select Virtual Center page.

Specify the Virtual Center that you want to monitor.

In the Virtual Center box, type the fully qualified name of the host on which the Virtual Center is running.

In the Port box, type the port number of the host running the Virtual Center that will be used by the VMware Performance Agent to connect to the Virtual Center.

If you want to enable the VMware Performance Agent to collect the Foglight Storage data, select the Enable Storage Collection check box. Foglight Storage can help you optimize the VMware environment by monitoring virtual storage and its underlying physical storage components. For more information about this product, see the Managing Foglight Manager Storage User and Reference Guide.

If you want to import historical data, select the Enable Historical Metric Data check box. This data is not immediately available as it takes some time to collect it. This process can import data collected over 30 days or less, depending on the amount of data available in the Virtual Center. Selecting this option allows you to explore VMware metrics as soon as the data is imported, instead for waiting for the agent to collect some data from the Virtual Center.

Click Next.

The Agent Setup Wizard refreshes, showing the Credential Verification page.

Specify user credentials the VMware Performance Agent needs to log into tho Virtual Center host. Select one of the following options:


	IMPORTANT: The Virtual Center user account must have sufficient privileges. For more information, see “Enabling VMware Performance Agents to Collect Data from a Virtual Center” in the Foglight for VMware User and Reference Guide.

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Add vCenter(s) to a new credential: Select this option if you want to create a new credential for the selected vCenter. Click Next and continue to Step 7.

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Add vCenter(s) to an existing credential: Select this option if you want to use an existing credential for the selected vCenter. This option is suitable if an existing credential has the information needed to access the vCenter. Click Next and continue to Step 8.

For complete information about Foglight credentials, see the Administration and Configuration Help.

Creating a new credential only.

Specify the following information:

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Credential Name: Type a name that uniquely identifies the credential.

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User: Type the vCenter user name.

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Password: Type the vCenter password.

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Confirm Password: Type the vCenter password.

Select a lockbox in which you want to keep the credential. A lockbox can be used to group credentials for access and/or security. In smaller Foglight installations, you can use the default System lockbox.

Click Next.

The Summary page appears.

Click Finish.

The Agent Setup Wizard closes, and the Agents area refreshes, showing a newly created VMware Performance agent instance.

Using an existing credential only.

Select an existing credential that you want to use to access the vCenter.

Click Next.

The Summary page appears.

Click Finish.

The Agent Setup Wizard closes, and the Agents area refreshes, showing a newly created VMware Performance agent instance.

Managing certificates

Syntax Conventions

In order to successfully make use of the Foglight commands in your monitoring environment, review the syntax conventions before getting started. The syntax conventions are as follows:

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Generic examples follow the UNIX path structure that uses forward slashes '/' to separate directories.

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Platform-specific examples follow standard platform conventions. For example, UNIX-specific examples use forward slashes ‘/’ as directory delimiters, while Windows examples use backslashes ‘\’.

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<foglight_home> is a placeholder that represents the path to the Foglight Management Server installation.

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<foglight_agent_mgr_home> is a placeholder that represents the path to the Foglight Agent Manager installation. This can be the location of the Foglight Agent Manager installation on a monitored host, or the home directory of the Foglight Agent Manager that comes embedded with the Foglight Management Server. For example:

Path to the Foglight Agent Manager installation on a monitored host (Windows):

C:\Quest\Foglight_Agent_Manager

Path to the embedded Foglight Agent Manager installation (Windows):

C:\Quest\Foglight\fglam

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Unless otherwise specified, Foglight commands are case-sensitive.

Managing certificates for FglAM

Foglight Evolve agents use Foglight Agent Manager (FglAM) to manage certificates for SSL encryption connection.

Prerequisite

All the certificate-related command line options require that FglAM be up and running.

Add a certificate

bin/fglam --add-certificate "user alias 1"=/path/to/certificate/file

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Validate the certificate and ensure the following:

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It is not expired.

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It is an X.509 format.

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FglAM requires the Base64 format. To verify if the certificate file is encoded with Base64, open the certificate with a notepad and the certificate should be similar to the following example:
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
XXXXXXXX=
-----END CERTIFICATE-----


	NOTE: If the certificate is not Base64 format, use openssl command to convert the certificate file into a Base64 file. Use either of the following commands depending on the source form: openssl x509 -inform DER -in xxx.cer -out xxx.crt or openssl x509 -inform PEM -in xxx.cer -out xxx.crt