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Innovative uses of Files and Directories agent

ITM Agent for Files and Directories

Gaining Visibility Into Granular File and Directory Server Activity

Extends IBM Tivoli Monitoring with deep monitoring and alerts for file and directory related activities on critical enterprise servers.  Expands file and directory monitoring capabilities far beyond the standard ITM Operating System (OS) Agent's FILE_TREND, WATCH FILE, and FILE_CHANGE functionality.
 
Business Benefits
Less complexity, increased security, more uniform operations management with significant cost reduction via elimination of redundant infrastructure and multiple platform-specific tools.
 
Features
Blue Medora ITM Agent for Files and Directories provides in-depth monitoring of files and directories on both an individual and collective basis at the file-system level of Windows, Unix, and Linux servers. A simple directive file defines which files and directories to monitor via regular expressions.

  • Validated by IBM as Ready for IBM Tivoli
  • Leverages ITM's Tivoli Enterprise Portal (TEP) visualization capabilities including expert advice, customized workspaces, and historical data gathering
  • Integrates with Tivoli Data Warehouse (TDW) for historical data collection and analysis
  • Inspect only files and directories you want with directory recursion and regular expressions
  • Optionally enable computation of MD5 checksums for individual monitored files (New Feature) 
  • Initiate an alert when the MD5 checksum of a file changes (New Feature) 
  • Track timestamp information for the newest files in a regex-based fileset definition
  • Capable of sending application-specific events to Tivoli Enterprise Console (TEC) and Netcool OMNIbus for advanced correlation and automation

    Typical Uses of Files and Directories Agent
    • Which files have been modified recently in a specific directory?
    • What is the total size of files in a directory and subdirectories matching a regular expression? 
    • Which log files have exceeded a size threshold?
    • How many new files are in a set of directories?
    • Which log files have changed?
    • How has a file changed over time?
    • What is the magnitude of change (file size, number of files, etc) since last data collection or over time (when using Warehousing)?

    Innovative uses of the Blue Medora ITM agent for Files and Directories:
    • System Security – monitoring password, group, and network configuration files can quickly alert a system admin to a potentially compromised system
    • Backup Verification – was a new backup created? Was the backup file at least #Gb in size? Was it successfully transferred to a remote device?
    • Resource Allocation – have we reached a threshold for used disk space? Is the paging / swap file growing regularly indicating memory constraint?
    • Implement Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS)     https://www.pcisecuritystandards.org/security_standards/index.php
    From PCI DSS requirements (11.5): “Deploy file-integrity monitoring software to alert personnel to unauthorized modification of critical system files, configuration files, or content files; and configure the software to perform critical file comparisons at least weekly.”

    ITM Agent for Files and Directories Complete Attribute List (larger image)


    Blue Medora's ITM Agent for Files and Directories:

    • Takes advantage of ITM's Tivoli Enterprise Portal (TEP) visualization capabilities to include best practices, expert advice, customized workspaces, and historical data gathering
    • Integrates with Tivoli Data Warehouse (TDW) to provide ITDS-focused historical data collection and analysis
    • Provides the ability to send application-specific events to the Tivoli Enterprise Console (TEC) and Netcool OMNIbus for advanced correlation and automation

    Versions of IBM Tivoli Monitoring Supported
    • IBM Tivoli Monitoring v6.2.1
    • IBM Tivoli Monitoring v6.2.2

    Operating System Support
    • AIX 5.3 (64 bit)
    • AIX 6.1 (64 bit)
    • Solaris V9 (SPARC) (32/64 bit)
    • Solaris V10 (SPARC) (64 bit)
    • Solaris V10 (x86-64) on AMD Opteron
    • HP-UX 11.23 and 11.31 on Itanium2
    • Windows 2003 Server SE (32 bit) with Service Pack1 or higher
    • Windows 2003 Server EE (32 bit) with Service Pack 1 or higher
    • Windows 2003 Server (64 bit) with Service Pack 1 or higher
    • Windows 2003 Server EE (64 bit) 
    • Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition
    • Windows Server 2008 SE (32 bit)
    • Windows Server 2008 EE (32 bit)
    • Windows Server 2008 SE (64 bit)
    • Windows Server 2008 EE (64 bit)
    • Windows Server 2008 Data Center
    • Windows Server 2008 Data Center (64 bit)
    • Red Hat Enterprise and Desktop Linux 4 for Intel
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 for AMD64/EM64T
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 for pSeries
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.0 for z/Series 31-bit
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.0 for z/Series 64-bit
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 for AMD64/EM64T
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 for pSeries
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.0 for z/Series 31-bit
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.0 for z/Series 64-bit
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 for Intel
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 for zSeries 31-bit
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 for zSeries 64-bit
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 for pSeries
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 for Intel
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 for zSeries 31-bit
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 for zSeries 64-bit
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 for pSeries
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 for Intel
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 for zSeries 31-bit
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 for zSeries 64-bit
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 for pSeries

    Requirement for pre-existing IBM Tivoli Monitoring agent
    To install any Blue Medora ITM Agent you must have at least one pre-existing IBM published agent installed.  Blue Medora Agents do not include key IBM specific Java",  IBM GSkit, or the IBM Tivoli Monitoring runtime libraries. Installing an IBM-provided agent (normally the OS agent) installs these elements.