What Happened to Ping Agents?

[alitaz]

I am in the process of migrating from TNG 2.4 to TND 3.0. The first huge difference that I noticed is there is no ping agent for Win2k Servers (I haven't tried it on any others yet). Am I correct in assuming that the IP_interface is taking the place of the ping agent? If so, how do I change the polling interval? Right now from node view, it says 900 seconds, with several retries. Not good!! I've tried using the pollset browser on the DSM server to change the MIB2 agent, the Agent!, the "All", and several others, but nothing changes that interval. The only thing that worked temporarily was actually changing the value in node view, but after a reboot it defaults back to the original 900 seconds. Also, has anyone noticed that if you pull the network cable on a managed node all of the AW_Services fail and don't come back until network is restored and AW_Services is stopped/started. Is that by design?

 

[JonnoGT]

The ping agent has been replaced by the IP Agent, which doesn't have a WV icon. You can re-enable the ping agent if you like, but there isn't that much point.
The ping_22 files are in tnd\services\config\aws_nsm\dm\exclude directory. If you move these into the tnd\services\config\aws_nsm\dm\ it will re-enable the pld ping agent (do a resetdsm).

If you want to change the polling interval of the new IP agent then look in the tnd\services\config\aws_nsm\dm\ directory for this file: ip.atp
There will be a section near the top that looks like this:
int admin_status = 0;
int pollInterval = 900;
int pollTimeout = 5;
int pollRetries = 2;

You can change this interval and do a resetdsm.

I would advise that you ask CA support about this - I may not be 100% correct!

 

[rguzzo]

Definition Media Sensing and TNG.
"Media Sensing is a feature within Windows 2000 whereby TCP/IP is used to detect whether or not your network media is in a "link state". Whenever Windows detects a "down" state on the media (for servers with AFT enabled this would require both adapters to be down), it removes the bound protocols from the adapter until it is detected as "up" again. Once these protocols are removed - TNG agents go into a FAILED state (instead of STOPPED) and then must be started manually. By disabling this feature - the protocols are never removed and therefore the services remain in a RUNNING state. "

Here is some additional information on Media sensing from Microsoft's website that may be useful in regards to my note last week.

SUMMARY
Windows contains the "Media Sensing" feature. You may use this feature on a Windows-based computer using Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) to detect whether or not your network media is in a "link state". A "link state" is defined as the physical media connecting or inserting itself on the network. For example, assuming a 10bt or 100bt physical media, Ethernet network adapters and hubs typically have a "link" light to indicate the current connection status. This is the same condition in which Windows can detect a link. Whenever Windows detects a "down" state on the media, it removes the bound protocols from that adapter until it is detected as "up" again. There may be situations where you may not want your network adapter to detect this state, and you can configure this by editing the registry.

NOTE: 10b2 or coaxial (RG-58) Ethernet cable is not a connection-based media. Because of this, Windows does not attempt to detect a "connect" state if this type of cabling is used.

NOTE: There are some side effects of disabling the "Media Sensing" feature. For example, if you have a machine with two network adapters, and you have the "Media Sensing" feature enabled, if one network adapter does not work, it is unbound, and associated routes are removed so that all traffic goes through the other network adapter (assuming a default gateway is there). Also, if you are a roaming (portable) user, the "Media Sensing" feature is what provides the ability to connect to any network and have everything work, without restarting, release and renewing, and so on. After disabling Media Sense and restarting, Windows still shows the "Network Disconnected" icon on the TaskBar and the 'ipconfig' command still shows a "Media State .....: Cable Disconnected" message when the cable is disconnected. However, the Network Interface is bound to TCP/IP and you can verify this by looking at the route table --you can use the "route print" command-- which shows the interface IP address (you are also able to ping the
IP address assigned to the NIC).

 

[alitaz]

Thanks JT and rguzzo. JT your advice worked well. Thanks. rguzzo - unfortunately most of my servers are multi-homed so I will need to keep the Auto-sensing on. I guess I'll have to write a batch file to do an awservices start every 8 hours or so to keep the agents up and running. I was hoping to avoid having to do that in this version. Looking forward to Remote Monitoring in 3.1 (not GA yet). Hopefully we will not have to mess with agents after that. Thanks for the reponse.