Foglight: Getting Started Guide

Foglight
Getting Started Guide
5.5.0
2009 Quest Software, Inc. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

This guide contains proprietary information protected by copyright. The software described in this guide is furnished under a software license or nondisclosure agreement. This software may be used or copied only in accordance with the terms of the applicable agreement. No part of this guide may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording for any purpose other than the purchaser's personal use without the written permission of Quest Software, Inc. If you have any questions regarding your potential use of this material, contact: Quest Software World Headquarters LEGAL Dept 5 Polaris Way Aliso Viejo, CA 92656 www.quest.com email: legal@quest.com Refer to our Web site for regional and international office information.
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Disclaimer
The information in this document is provided in connection with Quest products. No license, express or implied, by estoppel or otherwise, to any intellectual property right is granted by this document or in connection with the sale of Quest products. EXCEPT AS SET FORTH IN QUEST'S TERMS AND CONDITIONS AS SPECIFIED IN THE LICENSE AGREEMENT FOR THIS PRODUCT, QUEST ASSUMES NO LIABILITY WHATSOEVER AND DISCLAIMS ANY EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY WARRANTY RELATING TO ITS PRODUCTS INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, OR NON-INFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL QUEST BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE, SPECIAL OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF PROFITS, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION OR LOSS OF INFORMATION) ARISING OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THIS DOCUMENT, EVEN IF QUEST HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. Quest makes no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this document and reserves the right to make changes to specifications and product descriptions at any time without notice. Quest does not make any commitment to update the information contained in this document.
License Credits and Third Party Information

To view license credit information, click the License Credits link on the Welcome to Foglight online help page.
Getting Started Guide July 2009 Version 5.5.0
Table of Contents
Introduction to this Guide ...................................................................................................................................7
About Foglight .................................................................................................................................................................. 8 About this Guide............................................................................................................................................................... 8 Foglight Documentation Suite .......................................................................................................................................... 9 Core Documentation Set ....................................................................................................................................... 10 Cartridge Documentation Sets .............................................................................................................................. 17 Feedback on the Documentation........................................................................................................................... 17 Text Conventions ........................................................................................................................................................... 18 About Quest Software, Inc. ............................................................................................................................................ 18 Contacting Quest Software.................................................................................................................................... 19 Contacting Quest Support ..................................................................................................................................... 19
Introducing Foglight ..........................................................................................................................................21

Welcome to Foglight....................................................................................................................................................... 22 What is Foglight?................................................................................................................................................... 22 How Foglight Organizes and Presents Data ......................................................................................................... 22 How Foglight Helps ............................................................................................................................................... 22 Key Concepts and Terms............................................................................................................................................... 23 How Foglight Works ....................................................................................................................................................... 26 Foglight Components ..................................................................................................................................................... 33 Foglight Management Server ................................................................................................................................ 33 Foglight Browser Interface..................................................................................................................................... 33 Foglight Command-line Interface .......................................................................................................................... 34 Foglight Middleware .............................................................................................................................................. 34 Cartridges .............................................................................................................................................................. 35 Agents ................................................................................................................................................................... 36
Foglight Getting Started Guide
First Steps.......................................................................................................................................................... 39
Getting Started with SupportLink .................................................................................................................................... 40 Downloading Foglight ..................................................................................................................................................... 40 Next Steps ...................................................................................................................................................................... 41
Installation and Setup Overview ...................................................................................................................... 43

Getting Started with the Installation and Setup Process................................................................................................. 44 References to the Installation and Setup Guide Set .............................................................................................. 44 Before You Get Started.......................................................................................................................................... 44 Part 1: Installing or Upgrading the Foglight Management Server................................................................................... 45 Part 2: Initializing the Database, Starting the Foglight Management Server, and Logging In ........................................ 46 Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges....................................................................................................................... 47 Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Agent Manager....................................................................... 49 Part 5: Deploying and Creating Agents .......................................................................................................................... 51 Next Steps ...................................................................................................................................................................... 53
Starting Points in Foglight ............................................................................................................................... 55

Before You Get Started .................................................................................................................................................. 56 Working in a Current or a Diagnostic Time Range ................................................................................................ 56 Operators Welcome Page.............................................................................................................................................. 58 Administrators Welcome Page....................................................................................................................................... 60 Service Operations Console ........................................................................................................................................... 62 Hosts Dashboard ............................................................................................................................................................ 64 Next Steps ...................................................................................................................................................................... 66
Appendix: Foglight Client Reference .............................................................................................................. 67

Introducing Foglight ........................................................................................................................................................ 68 Key Concepts and Terms ...................................................................................................................................... 68 Foglight Components............................................................................................................................................. 68 Foglight Client ........................................................................................................................................................ 68 Installation and Setup Overview ..................................................................................................................................... 69 Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges.............................................................................................................. 69 Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Client ............................................................................. 70 Part 5: Deploying and Creating Agents.................................................................................................................. 72 Next Steps ...................................................................................................................................................................... 73
Table of Contents
Index....................................................................................................................................................................75
Introduction to this Guide

This chapter provides information about what is contained in the Getting Started Guide. It also provides information about the Foglight documentation suite and Quest Software. This chapter contains the following sections: About Foglight ...............................................................................................................................8 About this Guide............................................................................................................................8 Foglight Documentation Suite .......................................................................................................9 Text Conventions .........................................................................................................................18 About Quest Software, Inc...........................................................................................................18
About Foglight
Foglight is an application management solution that reduces or eliminates service disruptions to unify IT and the business. Unlike other solutions, it provides a correlated, 360 degree view of your applications from end user to database and from service levels to infrastructureto source the root cause of every incident impacting your business and fix them quickly. Foglight correlates data from multiple perspectives into a single version of the truth to provide deep insight into the service relationships that exist between end users, the business and infrastructure components. Its unique adaptive technology rapidly adjusts to change for improved application performance and service levels, reduced operational cost and risk, and enhanced visibility for all stakeholders.
About this Guide

The Getting Started Guide introduces you to Foglight concepts and components and provides overviews of certain Foglight dashboards. It provides a high-level overview of the installation and setup procedures and suggests starting points in the Foglight browser interface. In addition, it provides instructions for getting started with SupportLink and downloading Foglight. This guide is intended as an overview for any user getting started with Foglight. Users who are new to Foglight can use this guide as an introduction to the topics and procedures described above. New users may want to consult this guide prior to following the procedures described in the Installation and Setup Guide, the Administration and Configuration Guide, and the Foglight User Guide. More experienced users can use this guide as a high-level outline of these topics and procedures or as a supplement to the Installation and Setup Guide, the Administration and Configuration Guide, and the Foglight User Guide. The Getting Started Guide is organized as follows: Chapter 1, Introducing FoglightIntroduces Foglight by discussing how Foglight works, defining key concepts and terms, and describing Foglight components. Chapter 2, First StepsIncludes instructions on establishing a SupportLink account, logging in to SupportLink, and downloading Foglight 5 documentation and software packages from SupportLink. Follow these instructions if you want to use SupportLink, Quest Supports web self-service, to download Foglight 5.5.0.
Introduction to this Guide Foglight Documentation Suite
Chapter 3, Installation and Setup OverviewProvides an overview of the Foglight installation and setup process and acts as a preface or supplement to the Administration and Configuration Guide and the appropriate part of the Installation and Setup Guide set. This chapter summarizes the main steps involved in installing and configuring Foglight. As well, this chapter directs you to the appropriate instructions in the Administration and Configuration Guide and in the Installation and Setup Guide set. Chapter 4, Starting Points in FoglightIntroduces several dashboards that are starting points in the Foglight browser interface. This chapter also includes examples of next steps that you can take. In addition, this chapter provides getting started tips on common elements in the browser interface and features that can affect how you see data in the monitoring dashboards. Foglight offers a wide range of functionality through its customizable dashboards. Consult this chapter to learn about some of the starting points, next steps, and workflows that are available to users with different roles and needs. Appendix A, Foglight Client ReferenceContains material drawn from the chapters Introducing Foglight, Installation and Setup Overview, and Starting Points in Foglight for users who continue to use the Foglight Client.
Foglight Documentation Suite

The Foglight documentation suite is made up of the core documentation set, plus the documentation set for each Foglight cartridge that you deploy. Documentation is provided in a combination of online help, PDF and HTML formats.
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Online Help: You can open the online help by selecting the Help tab from Foglights action panel.
PDF: The complete Foglight documentation set is available in Adobe PDF from SupportLink. The PDF documentation can also be found in the Documentation folder on the Foglight DVD. The following subset is available from the computer Foglight is installed on: Administration and Configuration Guide, User Guide, Command-Line Reference Guide, Web Component Guide and the Web Component Tutorial. In addition, the cartridges ship with PDF guides. To view the installed PDF guides, in Windows go to Start > Programs > Quest Software > Foglight 5.5.0 > Documentation. The default location of the documentation after installation is <foglight_home>/docs. Adobe Reader is required. HTML: Release Notes are provided in HTML format. Videos: Tutorial videos are not provided with the product, but are available on SupportLink. They provide an easy and accessible way to learn about key features and help you get started with Foglight.
Core Documentation Set

The core documentation set consists of the following documents: Release Notes (HTML) Middleware Release Notes (HTML) Getting Started Guide (PDF) Whats New Guide (PDF)
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System Requirements and Platform Support Guide (PDF) Upgrade Guides (PDF) Installation and Setup Guide set (all in PDF format) Administration and Configuration Guide (PDF and online help) Foglight User Guide (PDF and online help) Command-Line Reference Guide (PDF and online help) Transition Guide (PDF) Web Component Guide (PDF and online help) Web Component Tutorial (PDF and online help) Web Component Reference (online help)
Core Documentation Set in Detail

The Foglight core documentation set includes Release Notes, guides, and other documents for the Foglight Management Server and the group of Foglight components that are installed with it: Foglight middleware (the Foglight Agent Manager or the Foglight Client), the browser interface, the command-line interface, and Quest Web Components. The following sections provide additional information about the guides, documents, and videos included in the core documentation set. Release Notes The Foglight Release Notes and Middleware Release Notes documents (HTML) list: Known and resolved issues. Workarounds for known issues. Installation troubleshooting information. Late-breaking news about issues occurring just as the product ships. Consult these documents first, because they may contain modifications to information or procedures described in other Foglight guides. Getting Started Guide (this document) The Getting Started Guide (PDF) introduces you to Foglight concepts and components and provides overviews of certain dashboards. It contains a high-level outline of the
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installation and setup procedures and suggests starting points in the Foglight browser interface. In addition, it provides instructions for getting started with SupportLink and downloading Foglight. You can consult this guide prior to following the procedures described in the Installation and Setup Guide set, the Administration and Configuration Guide, and the Foglight User Guide, or use it as a supplement to these guides. Whats New Guide The Whats New Guide (PDF) outlines new features and enhancements in a release of Foglight. System Requirements and Platform Support Guide The System Requirements and Platform Support Guide (PDF) contains information about: Hardware requirements for 32- and 64-bit installations of the Foglight Management Server and the database. Platform requirements for the Foglight Management Server. Platform requirements for the Foglight Agent Manager. Platform requirements for the Foglight Client. Requirements for the Java Runtime Engine (JRE). Operating system requirements for the Cartridge for Operating Systems. Supported web browsers. Supported external databases. Supported report viewer. Review this guide prior to installing the Foglight Management Server. Installation and Setup Guide Set The Installation and Setup Guide set (PDF) includes: Installation prerequisites, recommendations, and guidelines. Instructions for installing, configuring, and running the Foglight Management Server.
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Information about installing, configuring, and running the Foglight Agent Manager. Information about database configuration, tuning, and management. Information about installing cartridges and agents. An appendix with instructions for installing, configuring, and running the Foglight Client. Foglight Upgrade Field Guide The Foglight Upgrade Field Guide (PDF) provides instructions on how to upgrade the Foglight Management Server, the Foglight Agent Manager (FglAM), the Foglight Client (SPID) to the latest version. In addition, this guide discusses best practices for upgrading and provides information about the version compatibility of the Foglight Agent Manager, the Foglight Client, and the Cartridge for Operating Systems with version 5.5.0 of the Foglight Management Server. This guide is intended for any user who wants to upgrade one or more components in their current installation of Foglight to the latest version. The Foglight Upgrade Field Guide is available from SupportLink. Cartridge Upgrade Field Guide The Cartridge Upgrade Field Guide (PDF) provides instructions on how to upgrade Foglight cartridges to the latest version. This guide is intended for any user who wants to upgrade their Foglight cartridges. The Cartridge Upgrade Field Guide is available from SupportLink. Administration and Configuration Guide The Administration and Configuration Guide (PDF and online help) is intended to assist Foglight System Administrators to configure and manage Foglight. This guide provides: Conceptual information about Foglight administration components. Configuration instructions. Instructions on how to use the dashboards in the Administration module to perform administrative tasks such as managing agents, users, security, data, rules, registry variables, schedules, and cartridges. Information about building script agents.
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Information about retrieving data with queries and scripts. Information about deploying and creating Foglight agents using the commandline interface. Information about the query language used in Foglight and instructions for using this language to set the scope for rules and derived metrics, create rule conditions and expressions, reference expressions in messages, and create derived metric expressions. A list and descriptions of the built-in, core Foglight rules that monitor the health of your application server environment. Instructions for performing certain agent management tasks from the command line, such as deploying agents, creating agent instances, and retrieving agent logs. A list and descriptions of default port assignments in Foglight. In addition, the Administration and Configuration Guide includes the following information in an appendix: Foglight Client Reference: This appendix shows examples of dashboards and command-line output in an environment that uses the Foglight Client. Foglight User Guide The Foglight User Guide (PDF and online help) includes configuration instructions, conceptual information, and instructions on how to use the browser interface. This guide provides: An introduction to the key screen elements in Foglight, the navigation tools used in the Foglight browser interface, and roles. Information about customizing Foglight according to User Preferences and setting home pages and themes. Descriptions of how to work with Foglight dashboards and common elements found on most dashboards. Information about working with services, alarms, reports, data, and data sources. Information about monitoring agents, hosts, and the Foglight Management Server. This guide is intended for any user who wants to configure Foglight using the browser interface.
Introduction to this Guide Foglight Documentation Suite Command-Line Reference Guide The Command-Line Reference Guide (PDF and online help) helps you use Foglight commands to interface with different components of your monitoring environment without using the browser interface.
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This guide contains information about syntax conventions, lists the Foglight commands, and contains getting started instructions that show you how to configure your environment. It also contains information about the commands for performing tasks such as: Managing the Foglight Management Server, the Foglight Agent Manager, agents, cartridges, and licences. Upgrading the database or managing encryption keys. Working with entities such as metrics, monitoring policies, and schedules. In addition, it contains an appendix with information about the commands related to using the Foglight Client. This guide is intended for Foglight System Administrators who want to use Foglight commands. Transition Guide The Transition Guide (PDF) includes information that allows you to quickly transition to Foglight 5 from a Foglight 4 perspective. Use it to find your Foglight 4 components in Foglight 5, understand typical workflows, and perform some of the basic administrative tasks. This guide also contains an appendix with examples of dashboards and command-line output for environments that use the Foglight Client for agent communication and management. This guide is intended for Foglight 4 users who are getting started with Foglight 5. Web Component Tutorial Use the Web Component Tutorial (PDF and online help) as a first step in learning how to create custom views using the Web Component Framework technology in Foglight 5. It provides procedures that you can follow to construct simple views. This tutorial serves as a starting place for learning how to use the Web Component Reference, which contains a list of all the components in the Web Component Framework and a description of their properties.
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This guide is intended for any user who wants to custom-build Foglight views for use in the browser interface. Web Component Guide The Web Component Guide (PDF and online help) builds on the Web Component Tutorial and provides information about the mechanisms of page creation using the Web Component Framework technology. It describes how pieces of information can be passed to related views and how information can be extracted from the underlying data sources for presentation in a view. It is intended to be used with the Web Component Reference to assist you in creating new views. Web Component Reference The Web Component Reference (online help) contains a list of all the view components in Foglight 5 and a description of their properties.
Foglight Video Tutorials

Foglight video tutorials are available from SupportLink. Whats New in Foglight 5.5.0 The video Whats New in Foglight 5.5.0 provides a high-level overview of the changes in Foglight 5.5.0 and the impact of theses changes on using Foglight. Working with Reports The video Working with Reports provides instructions on how to work with reports in the browser interface using the updated Reports dashboard and other report-related browser interface changes. Introduction to Foglight The video Introduction to Foglight provides a quick tour of the Foglight interface, including instructions on how to customize it. Creating Custom Dashboards The video Creating Custom Dashboards provides information on how to create your own dashboards.
Introduction to this Guide Foglight Documentation Suite Managing Agents The video Managing Agents introduces you to the Agent-related dashboards in the Administration module and instructs you on how to perform agent management. Working with Alarms The video Working with Alarms provides information on how to locate alarms in the browser interface, filter alarms, and identify related hosts, related agents, and alarm sources. Working with Hosts The video Working with Hosts introduces you to the Hosts dashboard.
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Cartridge Documentation Sets

When you deploy a cartridge, the documentation set for it is installed. The online help for the cartridge is integrated automatically with the core Foglight help. When you open the help, the name of the cartridge is displayed in a top level entry within the table of contents. Most cartridges include additional PDF guides, which may be one or more of the following: a Getting Started Guide, an Installation Guide, a User Guide, and a Reference Guide. Cartridges also generally include their own Release Notes.
Feedback on the Documentation

We are interested in receiving feedback from you about our documentation. For example, did you notice any errors in the documentation? Were any features undocumented? Do you have any suggestions on how we can improve the documentation? All comments are welcome. Please submit your feedback to the following email address: am.docfeedback@quest.com Please do not submit Technical Support requests to this email address.
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Text Conventions
The following table summarizes how text styles are used in this guide: Convention
Code
Description Monospace text represents code, code objects, and commandline input. This includes: Java language source code and examples of file contents Classes, objects, methods, properties, constants, and events HTML documents, tags, and attributes Monospace-plus-italic text represents variable code or command-line objects that are replaced by an actual value or parameter. Bold text is used for interface options that you select (such as menu items) as well as keyboard commands. Italic text is used to highlight the following items: Pathnames, file names, and programs The names of other documents referenced in this guide
Variables
Interface
Files, components, and documents
About Quest Software, Inc.

Quest Software, Inc., a leading enterprise systems management vendor, delivers innovative products that help organizations get more performance and productivity from their applications, databases, Windows infrastructure and virtual environments. Through a deep expertise in IT operations and a continued focus on what works best, Quest helps more than 100,000 customers worldwide meet higher expectations for enterprise IT. Quest provides customers with client management as well as server and desktop virtualization solutions through its subsidiaries, ScriptLogic and Vizioncore. Quest Software can be found in offices around the globe and at www.quest.com.
Introduction to this Guide About Quest Software, Inc.
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Contacting Quest Software

Email Mail info@quest.com Quest Software, Inc. World Headquarters 5 Polaris Way Aliso Viejo, CA 92656 USA www.quest.com
Web site
Refer to our web site for regional and international office information.
Contacting Quest Support

Quest Support is available to customers who have a trial version of a Quest product or who have purchased a commercial version and have a valid maintenance contract. Quest Support provides around the clock coverage with SupportLink, our web self-service. Visit SupportLink at: http://support.quest.com. From SupportLink, you can do the following: Quickly find thousands of solutions (Knowledgebase articles/documents). Download patches and upgrades. Seek help from a Support engineer. Log and update your case, and check its status. View the Global Support Guide for a detailed explanation of support programs, online services, contact information, and policy and procedures. The guide is available at: http://support.quest.com/pdfs/Global Support Guide.pdf.
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Introducing Foglight
This chapter discusses how Foglight works, defines key concepts and terms, and describes Foglight components. This chapter contains the following sections: Welcome to Foglight....................................................................................................................22 Key Concepts and Terms ............................................................................................................23 How Foglight Works ....................................................................................................................26 Foglight Components ..................................................................................................................33
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Welcome to Foglight
What is Foglight?
Foglight is an application management solution that reduces or eliminates service disruptions to unify IT and the business. Unlike other solutions, it provides a correlated, 360 degree view of your applications from end user to database and from service levels to infrastructureto source the root cause of every incident impacting your business and fix them quickly. Foglight correlates data from multiple perspectives into a single version of the truth to provide deep insight into the service relationships that exist between end users, the business and infrastructure components. Its unique adaptive technology rapidly adjusts to change for improved application performance and service levels, reduced operational cost and risk, and enhanced visibility for all stakeholders.
How Foglight Organizes and Presents Data

One of the key features of Foglight is its ability to dynamically create unique data structures based on any data from any source. Rather than store data based on how it is collected by agents, Foglight can organize data based on your perception of the data. In many cases, Foglight is able to draw pictures of your monitored infrastructure that match what you would draw. This includes high-level abstractions like applications and services. All this is accomplished using a dynamic data transformation capability.
How Foglight Helps

Foglight helps application and information technology managers understand user service levels, notify stakeholders when those service levels are violated, and assign problem resolution tasks.
Introducing Foglight Key Concepts and Terms
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Key Concepts and Terms

Term Monitored environment Definition The hosts, server instances, databases, and other systems in your environment that are monitored by Foglight. The data collected from your environment is used in the Foglight Management Server, where it populates model instances, drives rules, and can be rendered in views. A representation ofand a way of understandingthe logical and physical relationship between items in your monitored environment. At run-time, Foglight dynamically builds topology model instances based on data about your system that it collects. Topology models provide the context for the metrics that Foglight collects. The organizing principle used by Foglight for data about your monitored environment. At run-time, Foglight transforms monitoring data into model instances. A model instance is a set of objects and relationships designed to represent a monitored resource and its parts. Each model instance is a representation of that model type. For example, the HostModel type is a collection of Host objects; each host object is one representation of the HostModel type. Foglight model instances hold collected data and transform it into nodes, adding configuration data to each node as properties, and attaching metric data to appropriate nodes as metrics. There are different types of models, including models defined in Foglight cartridges and models that you build, such as services. A specific technology or part of your environment that you are interested in monitoring and for which Foglight collects data and builds model instances. Foglight presents an overview of all domains in the Domains dashboard. See Domains on page 28 for more information.
Topology
Model
Domain
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Term Monitoring Data
Definition Data that is collected from your monitored environment and transformed into a standard format for use by the Foglight Management Server. Monitoring data includes both metrics and topology object properties. Monitoring data that describes a topology object, for example, a host name. An observation taken over time, for example, a Metric, StringObservation, or TopNList. In Foglight, every observation is linked to a specific part of the topology model, for example, CPU utilization on a particular monitored host. A simple value observation measured over time, for example, a count, rate, or percentage. A way of organizing objects in your monitored environment. Foglight automatically creates most of the object groups that you need to monitor your environment. Domains are examples of a type of object group that Foglight creates. Most users do not need to create object groups. Only advanced Foglight administrators should create object groups. See Object Groups on page 32 for more information. In Foglight, a service is defined as any grouping of meaningful or interesting things in your monitored environment, for example, a business process or an application. The monitoring dashboards in Foglight are organized around the theme of services. Foglight allows you to create and edit services. See Services on page 30 for more information. In Foglight, service levels are availability measurements on services. See Service levels, alarms, and state on page 31 for more information.
Topology Object Property Observation
Metric Object Group
Service
Service Levels
Introducing Foglight Key Concepts and Terms
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Term Service Level Agreement (SLA) Tier
Definition An agreement between information technology managers and end-users on the availability of system and application resources. Tiers help you structure services in a way that represents your monitored environment. By default, Foglight organizes data into tiers such as User, Web, Application, and Database. Using object groups, you can extend the set of tiers used by Foglight. See the Foglight User Guide. The central component of Foglight. The Management Server receives information from agents, stores and processes data, and makes it available in the browser interface. See Foglight Management Server on page 33 for more information. A Foglight middleware component that manages agents installed on monitored hosts. See Foglight Middleware on page 34 for more information. A unit that is added to the Foglight Management Server. Cartridges contain components that extend the functionality of Foglight, such as agents, rules, and views. See Cartridges on page 35 for more information. A Foglight component that monitors a specific part of your environment, such as an operating system, application, or server. Agents collect data from your monitored environment and send it to the Management Server. See Agents on page 36 for more information. A piece of business logic that links a condition with a result. Foglight evaluates rule conditions against monitoring data. If a condition evaluates to true, the results that are configured for that condition occur, for example, an alarm is fired and an email is sent.
Foglight Management Server Foglight Agent Manager Cartridge
Agent
Rule
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Term Registry Variable
Definition A variable stored in the Foglight registry that can be used in rule conditions, actions, and expressions. The value of a Foglight registry variable can be configured to change over time.
How Foglight Works

Traditional monitoring systems collect metrics from agents and present them to you. The context for these metrics (for example, host from which data is collected or the name of the database) is gathered at the same time as the metrics and is associated with them. This is an expensive way to store information: context tends to remain static over time, but there are often multiple metrics for a single context. In addition, when you store context this way, it makes it difficult to determine when the context changes which in itself may be something you are interested in monitoring. Traditional systems also do not allow you to correlate metrics from different nodes in a system, or to derive cluster data from individual server data. Foglight 5 monitoring uses a different approach. Foglight builds model instances from collected data. A model instance is a set of objects and relationships designed to represent a monitored resource and its parts. Each model instance is a representation of that model type. For example, the HostModel type is a collection of Host objects; each host object is one representation of the HostModel type. Foglight models provide context for the metrics collected from your monitored environment. The model instances are dynamic and can change and expand automatically as the resources you are monitoring change. This approach allows you to correlate data from different nodes and to derive cluster data. Foglight model instances are similar to organizational charts whose nodes contain properties: metrics and alarms are attached to the nodes, and a node can be connected to one or more other nodes. Creating a Foglight model establishes a hierarchical relationship among the nodes that represents information about the collected data. Nodes can represent physical elements of the system, such as CPU or memory, or logical elements such as EJBs (Enterprise Java Beans) or JSPs (Java Server Pages). A simple host model instance is illustrated in the diagram below:
Introducing Foglight How Foglight Works
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Figure 1 This diagram illustrates a model instance created using monitoring data for a particular domain (for example, an infrastructure domain such as Windows), and which is a representation of a model type. In this model instance, a host is represented by a node. It has three child nodes, which represent the CPU, memory, and disk of the host. The CPU and disk nodes also have child nodes that represent the individual processors and file systems, respectively. The monitoring data that populates this model instance is a mix of configuration data (host name, OS, patch level, CPU brand, clock speed, amount of memory) and metrics (CPU usage, allocated memory). Each piece of data is stored only once, but no context is lost. You can know the host name from the CPU or memory nodes, even though the host name is not stored along with the CPU or memory information. Metric data is also stored as part of the context. For example, if there are two hosts, the CPU usage for Host A would be stored with the Host A instance. What is truly innovative about Foglight is that these models can be built for any domain at any time. A model instance can be built at the click of a button in the browser interface (using the service builder), or as a result of new data arriving in the Foglight Management Server. Foglight models have been built for multiple domains, including Java, .NET, database, and custom applications (Siebel, PeopleSoft, Oracle E-Business).
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More importantly, models can be built that represent anything in your monitored environmentyour organizational structure, the physical layout of your server room, or the geographical distribution of your data centers. Once built, the artifacts that are part of a model are packaged into a cartridge (a .car file) and installed on the Foglight Management Server.
Domains
A domain is a specific technology or part of your environment that you are interested in monitoring and for which Foglight collects data and builds model instances. As described above, Foglight models have been built for multiple domains. Foglight collects data for different categories of domains: custom applications, packaged applications, databases, end-user, and infrastructure. For example, you can choose to collect end-user data as well as data for an application domain such as WebLogic, a database domain such as Oracle DB, and for an infrastructure domain such as Windows. The domains and subdomains for which Foglight collects data are listed below: Domain Custom Applications Subdomain .NET JBoss Oracle AS WebLogic WebSphere
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Domain Databases
Subdomain DB2 Oracle PA for Oracle PA for SQL Server SQL Server SQL Server 2005 Sybase
End User
End User FTR FxM
Infrastructure
AIX HP-UX Linux Solaris VMWare Windows
Packaged Applications
Oracle eBusiness PeopleSoft SAP Siebel
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The Domains dashboard presents an overview of all domains for which Foglight collects data. It summarizes the state of all monitored domains and allows you to drill down on a specific domain and investigate problems related to it. See the Foglight User Guide for more information about monitoring domains. There are Foglight cartridges available for different domains. See Cartridges on page 35 for a list of cartridges.
Services
In the context of Foglight, a service is any component or group of components that you want to monitor. The services you create reflect the components in your monitored environment that are meaningful or interesting to you. Examples of services include: An application, including its Web servers, application servers, and databases A collection of related systems, such as all Windows machines in your monitored environment A business process, such as retail banking Using the Service Operations Console, you can focus on monitoring a specific group of services by subscribing to those services and viewing their dependencies. In addition, this dashboard allows you to select tiers that are relevant to you and display service breakdowns based on these tiers. See Service Operations Console on page 62 for more information about this dashboard. See the Foglight User Guide for more information about working with services. Creating and editing services Foglight allows you to create service categories. A category is a top-level service that contains a hierarchy of services. Each service can include any component in your monitored environment, including other services. A service can have relationships to other services, and is dependent on the services that are added to it. The state of a service is impacted by the services it contains. See Service levels, alarms, and state on page 31 for information about how state is rolled up in Foglight. When you create a service, you classify it as a global service or a local service. A global service can be used in multiple places. A local service belongs only to the parent service to which it was added. A corresponding service level is automatically created for each service you define. You can also use Alarm Filters to decide what alarms are relevant to a given service and can impact the availability of that service. See Services and availability on page 31 for more information.
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You can make changes to existing services, such as renaming a service while preserving the history for that service. Using a rule-based group, you can define a set of components that are automatically included in a service when certain data arrives. Rulebased groups allow you to dynamically manage the components in a service. See the Foglight User Guide for more information about creating and editing. Service levels, alarms, and state In Foglight, service levels are availability measurements on services. Default service levels measure availability based on the state of individual nodes in a model instance. A Foglight rule evaluates a series of conditions designed to create an alarm if a performance probleman exception conditionhas occurred. The alarm has one of three severity levels: Warning, Critical, or Fatal. Rules are associated with nodes in the model. When one of the conditions of a rule evaluates to true, an alarm is attached to the node in the model instance with which the rule is associated. A state is set for each node in a model instance. If there have been no exception conditions, the nodes state is set to the default state Normal. However, if an alarm is attached to a node, then the state of the node is set to the severity level of the alarm (Warning, Critical, or Fatal). In general, the state of a node reflects the most severe alarm attached to that node. In addition to having an individual state, each node also has an aggregate state. By default, the aggregate state of a node represents the state of itself and all its children. Though there are some exceptions, in general, Foglight calculates a nodes aggregate state by evaluating the state of each of its child nodes and setting the aggregate state to be equal to the most severe child node state. In this way, state is propagated up the model instance. Services and availability The availability of a service is, by default, established based on a rollup of all the alarms fired for the monitored components added to that service. However, there can be cases in which you do not want this type of alarm rollup to be performed. Often, only a subset of the alarms fired for a monitored component are relevant to a given service. For example, an alarm fired by a rule called CPU Trending (which monitors the CPU usage over the last 12 months) may be relevant to your Management Planning service, but not to your Billing Application service. In this case, you would not want Fatal alarms fired by this rule for a component of the Billing Application service to signal a service outage.
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Foglight allows you to specify the alarms that are relevant to a given service by means of Alarm Filters. See Filtering Alarms in the Foglight User Guide for more information. Alarm impact and history Although all alarms indicate a problem in your monitored environment, some alarms may be of higher priority to you, depending on the services that they affect. When investigating an alarm, you can see whether that alarm has a negative impact on the service levels of specific services. Performing impact analysis on an alarm can help you determine the priority of fixing the problem that is detected by the alarm. Certain alarms occur repeatedly over time in your monitored environment. Foglight allows you to see the history of an alarm to find out when that alarm fired previously for a specific monitored component. For example, if a fatal CPU utilization alarm fires for a host called Host1, you can drill down on that alarm to a view that shows historic occurrences of that alarm on Host1. The alarm history displays information about past occurrences, such as the severity when it occurred, whether it was cleared, and any notes that were added to it. This view helps you identify patterns in the occurrences of alarms for specific components. See Alarms Details in the Foglight User Guide for more information.
Object Groups
An object group is a way of organizing components that are part of your monitored environment. Foglight automatically creates most of the object groups that you need to monitor your environment. Domains are examples of object groups that Foglight creates. The tiers that you add to services in Foglight are based on object groups. Although both object groups and services contain and organize components in your monitored environment, there are differences between them. For example, unlike services, object groups do not have service levels or dependent services. See the Foglight User Guide for more information about the differences between services and object groups. Most users do not need to create object groups, and only advanced Foglight administrators should create them. See the Foglight User Guide for information about working with object groups.
Introducing Foglight Foglight Components
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Foglight Components
Foglight Management Server
The Foglight Management Server is the central component of Foglight. The Management Server receives information from agents and makes it available in the browser interface. The Foglight database stores all system, application, and performance data. Over time, it becomes an invaluable source of historical information for planning future system capacity requirements and for doing point-in-time analysis. The information in the database can also be made available for use in external systems. The Management Server performs continuous internal monitoring on itself and other Foglight components, as well as on the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) and the database.
Foglight Browser Interface

Foglight has a browser interface that displays data collected by Foglight from your monitored environment. It allows you to view this data in various formats and levels of detail. You can also use this interface to perform administrative tasks such as managing agents, users, security, data, rules, and cartridges. The browser interface also includes the Administration home page, which allows you to navigate to all Administration dashboards and presents a summary of information about Foglight from an administrative perspective. The browser interface consists of three areas: A navigation panel that: Lists all of the dashboards that are available for viewing in the display area by the current user. Provides access to the Administration home page and to the pages where you perform administrative tasks. A display area in which you can view and create dashboards and reports. An action panel that: Lists the various actions that you can perform on the dashboard that is currently displayed.
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Contains views and data that can be added to a dashboard or report that you are creating. Provides access to the online help.
Note The action panel is referred to as the page panel in the Web Component Framework documentation, for example in the Web Component Reference.
See the Foglight User Guide and the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information.
Customizable Dashboards
Foglight also includes the Web Component Framework, which allows you to create and populate your own custom interface views on top of the dynamic data schemas generated by the Foglight Management Server. See the Web Component Guide and the Web Component Tutorial for more information.
Foglight Command-line Interface

Foglight provides commands that allow you to manage and work with Foglight components without having to use the browser interface. These commands allow you to perform tasks such as managing the Foglight Management Server, the Foglight Agent Manager, agents, cartridges, and licences, as well as work with entities such as metrics, monitoring policies, and schedules. For example, this interface allows you to automate component-management tasks using scripts or to use regular expressions to select multiple entities. See the Command-Line Reference Guide for more information.
Foglight Middleware
Most Foglight 5 agents require a middleware component to manage their life cycles and centralize communications with the Foglight Management Server. The System Requirements and Platform Support Guide provides information about supported platforms for Foglight middleware. This release of Foglight contains first and second generation middleware components. The Foglight Client (also known as SPID) is the original technology for managing agents and was released with Foglight 5.0. The Foglight Agent Manager (also known as FglAM) is the next generation technology for managing agents. Over time, it will replace the Foglight Client as the primary middleware component.
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You can run the Foglight Agent Manager only, the Foglight Client only, or a combination of the Foglight Client and the Foglight Agent Manager in the same installation. The sections below contain the recommendations made by Quest regarding Foglight middleware. New Foglight installations Whenever possible, all new Foglight installations should use the Foglight Agent Manager. However, several agents are not supported by the Foglight Agent Manager. If you plan to deploy these agents in your environment, Quest makes the following recommendation: run the Foglight Agent Manager on as many hosts as possible and run the Foglight Client only on hosts to which you deploy agents that are not supported by the Foglight Agent Manager. Existing Foglight installations If you have an existing Foglight installation where the Foglight Client is running, continue to use the Foglight Client unless you are advised to upgrade to the Foglight Agent Manager by Quest Professional Services or Quest Support. If you have an existing installation where the Foglight Agent Manager is running, continue to use the Foglight Agent Manager. If you have an existing installation in which you are deploying middleware and agents to new monitored hosts, you can use either the Foglight Client or the Foglight Agent Manager. Quest encourages you to start using the Foglight Agent Manager, but both options are supported. With the exception of Appendix: Foglight Client Reference, the instructions in this guide refer to the Foglight Agent Manager.
Cartridges
Cartridges extend the functionality of Foglight and are installed on the Foglight Management Server. A cartridge contains one or more components, such as agents for deployment, communication capabilities, and modifications to the way that data is transformed or handled, as well as rules, reports, and views. The following Foglight 5 cartridges are available: Foglight Cartridge for DB2 LUW Foglight Cartridge for Foglight Transaction Player
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Foglight Cartridge for FxM Foglight Cartridge for FxV Foglight Cartridge for Integration Foglight Cartridge for Java EE Foglight Cartridge for .NET Foglight Cartridge for Operating Systems Foglight Cartridge for Oracle DB Foglight Cartridge for Oracle E-Business Foglight Cartridge for PeopleSoft Foglight Cartridge for Performance Analysis Oracle Foglight Cartridge for Performance Analysis SQLServer Foglight Cartridge for SAP NetWeaver Foglight Cartridge for Siebel Foglight Cartridge for SQL2005 Foglight Cartridge for SQLServer Foglight Cartridge for Sybase Foglight Cartridge for VMWare When a cartridge is installed and enabled, all of its components become part of the Management Server. Adding cartridges to the Foglight Management Server allows you to monitor additional operating systems, processes, databases, applications, and servers in your environment. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information about managing cartridges. See the cartridge documentation for information about each cartridge.
Agents
Agents are deployed on machines in your monitored environment and send data to the Foglight Management Server. Agents can monitor the availability and performance of many aspects of your environment, including network services, operating systems, databases, virtual hosts, log files, file systems, disk space and utilization, top processes, custom applications, application servers, and Web servers.
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There are several types of agents. One or more instances of each type of agent managed by the Foglight Agent Manager can be deployed per host. For example, there is an agent that collects metrics from the operating system of the host machine. There are also agents that are embedded into systems or the software that they monitor. For example, the Java EE Agent, which collects service request traces, runs embedded in Java EE application servers. Foglight also includes internal agents that monitor Foglight components and services. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information about managing and configuring agents. See the documentation for the cartridge in which the agent was included for details about each agent.
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First Steps
This chapter includes instructions on establishing a SupportLink account, logging in to SupportLink, and downloading Foglight 5 documentation and software packages from SupportLink. Follow these instructions if you want to use SupportLink, Quest Supports web self-service, to download Foglight 5.5.0. This chapter contains the following sections: Getting Started with SupportLink.................................................................................................40 Downloading Foglight ..................................................................................................................40 Next Steps...................................................................................................................................41
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Getting Started with SupportLink

You can download Foglight 5.5.0 from SupportLink, Quest Supports web self-service. In order to download Foglight, you must have a SupportLink account. To establish a SupportLink account:
1 Visit SupportLink at: http://support.quest.com. 2 Under SupportLink Login in the left-hand sidebar, click Register. 3 Register for access with SupportLink: a Select the appropriate registration type at the top of the page. b Fill in the required fields for that registration type as well as any optional
fields you want to complete.

c When you have completed the form, click Register or Send Email (as
applicable). If you have any questions, contact supportadmin@quest.com or speak with a Support Administrator at one of the support numbers listed on the Contact Support page (Support > Getting Started > Contact Support from the menu bar). To log on to SupportLink:
1 Visit SupportLink at: http://support.quest.com. 2 Under SupportLink Login in the left-hand sidebar, enter the email address
associated with your SupportLink account and your SupportLink password.

3 Click Login.
If you have forgotten your password, click Forgot Password in the SupportLink Login left-hand sidebar to obtain your password. If you have any other questions concerning your SupportLink account, contact supportadmin@quest.com. See the Getting Started page (Support > Getting Started from the menu bar) for information about registration and logging in as well as PDFs about SupportLink and Quest Support.
Downloading Foglight
Once you have created a SupportLink account, you can download Foglight 5.5.0 and Foglight 5.5.0 documentation from SupportLink.
First Steps Next Steps
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To download Foglight software or documentation packages from SupportLink:

1 Create a SupportLink account and log on to SupportLink. See To establish a
SupportLink account: on page 40 and To log on to SupportLink: on page 40 for instructions.

2 Under SupportLink Login in the left-hand sidebar, click Downloads & Updates.
The Downloads & Updates page appears.

3 In the Select a product > Product field, type Foglight 5. 4 Select the Foglight 5 option that appears and click Go. 5 Under Downloads & Updates Results > Products > Foglight 5, click the link
for version 5.5.0.

6 Click the link for the item that you want to download.
A file download dialog appears.

7 Click Save to proceed with the download.
To download Foglight documentation from SupportLink:

1 Create a SupportLink account and log on to SupportLink. See To establish a
SupportLink account: on page 40 and To log on to SupportLink: on page 40 for instructions.

2 Under SupportLink Login in the left-hand sidebar, click Documentation.
The Documentation page appears.

3 In the Select a product > Product field, type Foglight 5. 4 Select the Foglight 5 option that appears and click Go. 5 Under Documentation Results > Products > Foglight 5, click the link for
version 5.5.0.
6 Click the link for the document that you want to download.
A file download dialog appears.

7 Click Save to proceed with the download.
Next Steps
Once you have downloaded Foglight 5.5.0 software and documentation, you can get started with the Foglight installation and setup process. See Installation and Setup
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Overview for summaries of the main steps involved in installing and configuring Foglight.
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Installation and Setup Overview
This chapter contains the following sections: Getting Started with the Installation and Setup Process .............................................................44 Part 1: Installing or Upgrading the Foglight Management Server................................................45 Part 2: Initializing the Database, Starting the Foglight Management Server, and Logging In .....46 Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges ...................................................................................47 Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Agent Manager....................................49 Part 5: Deploying and Creating Agents .......................................................................................51 Next Steps...................................................................................................................................53
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Getting Started with the Installation and Setup Process

This chapter provides an overview of the Foglight installation and setup process. It summarizes the main steps involved in installing (or upgrading) and configuring Foglight and contains directions to the appropriate instructions in the Administration and Configuration Guide and in the Installation and Setup Guide set. This chapter is intended as a preface or supplement to these guides.
References to the Installation and Setup Guide Set

The Foglight documentation suite comprises a multi-guide Installation and Setup Guide set. The database- and platform-specific guides included in this set are listed in Core Documentation Set in Detail on page 11. Throughout this guide, instructions direct you to the Installation and Setup Guide where the same type of chapter or section exists in all guides in the set. In these cases, refer to the Installation and Setup Guide for the database and platform you are running. Where a chapter or section exists only in a subset of the guides, those guides are referred to specifically, either by name or type.
Before You Get Started

Before you install or upgrade Foglight, review the components you plan to install (or upgrade) and ensure that you have the necessary information, such as port numbers and server names or the target installation locations. In addition, before you begin, you need to: Determine if you are going to set up and run the Foglight Management Server in High Availability (HA) mode or as a standalone server. Decide whether to use an embedded or external database. The System Requirements and Platform Support Guide contains information you should review prior to installation, such as: Supported platforms and Web browsers. Installation recommendations. Hardware requirements for the Foglight Management Server and database. JRE requirements.
Installation and Setup Overview Part 1: Installing or Upgrading the Foglight Management Server
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The Installation and Setup Guide also contains a brief overview of hardware requirements and installation recommendations. Prior to installing Foglight, review the System Requirements and Platform Support Guide as well as Before Installing Foglight and Preparing to Install in the Installation and Setup Guide.
Part 1: Installing or Upgrading the Foglight Management Server

The Foglight 5.5.0 installer allows you either to install a new instance of the Foglight Management Server or upgrade an existing installation of the Management Server.
1 Before you begin: Review the sections of the System Requirements and Platform
Support Guide and the Installation and Setup Guide described in Before You Get Started on page 44.
2 Install or upgrade the Foglight Management Server:
If you are performing a new installation: Run the installer by following the appropriate set of instructions in Installing Foglight in the Installation and Setup Guide. An instance of the Foglight Agent Manager is automatically installed with the Foglight Management Server and runs on the Management Server machine. See Embedded Foglight Agent Manager in the Installation and Setup Guide for more information. If you are upgrading an existing installation: Consult the Foglight Upgrade Field Guide for detailed upgrade instructions.
3 Configure the Foglight Management Server and database:
Configuring the Foglight Management Server: Once you install the Management Server, you may need to configure it, change its settings, or perform other additional setup steps. In addition, if you want to set up Foglight Management Server Federation, postinstallation changes to configuration files are necessary.
Note Foglight Federation is an advanced feature, which requires separate dedicated Foglight Management Servers. Contact Quest PSO for implementation guidance. See the Foglight Federation Field Guide for a description of this feature.
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For more information, see Foglight Settings in the Installation and Setup Guide for the platform and database you are running. Configuring the database: Depending on the type of database you are running, you may need to configure it or change its settings. For example: If you are using an external database and chose the installer option to manually set up the database later, see Manual Database Configuration in the Installation and Setup Guide for your platform and external database. If you are using an external MySQL database, see External MySQL Database Access for Remote Users in the Installation and Setup Guide for using an external MySQL database on your platform. If you are using an external MySQL database and want to set up an encrypted database connection, see Setting Up an Encrypted Database Connection with SSL in the Installation and Setup Guide for using an external MySQL database on your platform. For more information, see Foglight Settings in the Installation and Setup Guide for the platform and database you are running. Consult the Installation Troubleshooting section in the Foglight Release Notes if you encounter problems when performing the steps listed above.
Part 2: Initializing the Database, Starting the Foglight Management Server, and Logging In
The steps outlined in this section assume that you have already installed the Foglight Management Server. If you have not, refer to Part 1: Installing or Upgrading the Foglight Management Server for more information before proceeding.
1 Before you begin: If you are running a MySQL database (either embedded or
external) and want to migrate data to it from an existing MySQL database, follow the instructions in Migrating Data from an Existing Database in the Installation and Setup Guide for your platform and type of MySQL database (embedded or external).
2 Initialize the Database:
If you are using an external database, the database must be initialized successfully before you can run Foglight. If you are using the embedded database, the initialization is performed when you start the Foglight Management Server.
Installation and Setup Overview Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges
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3 Start the Foglight Management Server: The Foglight Management Server can
be run in stand-alone mode, in High Availability (HA) mode (if you are using an external database), or as a Windows service. See Starting and Stopping the Foglight Management Server in the Installation and Setup Guide for information about starting and stopping the Management Server. For information about running the Management Server as a Windows service, see Starting the Foglight Management Server as a Windows Service in the version of Installation and Setup Guide Installing on Windows for the database you are using. For information about running the Management Server in HA mode, see High Availability Mode and Starting and Stopping the Server in High Availability Mode in the version of the Installation and Setup Guide for the external database and platform you are using. See Running the Foglight Management Server in the Command-Line Reference Guide for the full set of options available for starting the Management Server from the command line in either stand-alone or HA mode.
4 Configure the embedded Foglight Agent Manager: If you need to configure
the embedded Foglight Agent Manager, you can do so by running the Foglight Agent Manager configuration interface from the embedded Foglight Agent Manager installation directory. See Configuring the Embedded Foglight Agent Manager in the Installation and Setup Guide for more information.
5 Log in to Foglight: See Logging in to Foglight in the Foglight User Guide for
more information.
Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges

In addition to cartridges that contain components for monitoring additional parts of your environment, Foglight also comes with a cartridge that contains the Foglight Agent Manager installers for all supported platforms. The cartridge is called FglAM-all5_5_0.car. In addition, FglAM-<platform>-5_5_0.car files that contain platformspecific Foglight Agent Manager installers. These cartridges are available in the \Server\FoglightClient-FglAM-5_5_0 folder on your install media. Once the cartridge for the Foglight Agent Manager is installed, you can download or retrieve the installer for your platform and install the Foglight Agent Manager on
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remote hosts as described below in Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Agent Manager.
Note As described in Part 1: Installing or Upgrading the Foglight Management Server, an instance of the Foglight Agent Manager is automatically installed with new installations of the Foglight Management Server. This embedded Foglight Agent Manager instance runs on the Management Server machine. You can deploy agents to the embedded Foglight Agent Manager if you want to monitor the machine on which the Management Server runs. In addition, the Foglight Agent Manager Adapter cartridge is installed with the Management Server. If you already have Foglight Agent Manager instances running on remote hosts and you do not want to download Foglight Agent Manager installers to additional remote hosts, you do not need to install the Foglight Agent Manager cartridge. The existing Foglight Agent Manager instances can connect to the Management Server.
You can install and manage cartridges using either the command-line interface or the browser interface. In addition, you can download agent installers using the browser interface. The instructions below assume that you are using the browser interface. See Managing Cartridges in the Command-Line Reference Guide for information about performing cartridge-management tasks from the command line.
1 Before you begin:
Review the cartridge documentation for information about cartridge installation prerequisites. Ensure that the Foglight Management Server is running and that you have logged in to Foglight. Ensure that you are granted the required permissions by your Foglight administrator to access the dashboards under the Administration module.
2 Install or upgrade the cartridge:
If you are installing a new cartridge: Install the cartridge by following the instructions in Installing and Managing Cartridges in the Administration and Configuration Guide. In addition, you can install cartridges by means of the Extend Your Monitoring Reach dashboards. See Extending Your Monitoring Reach in the in the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information. If you are upgrading a cartridge: Install the cartridge by following the instructions for that cartridge in the Foglight 5.5.0 Upgrade Field Guide.
Caution Do not disable the previous version of the cartridge before installing the new one. Foglight automatically disables the older cartridge as part of the upgrade process. Once the new cartridge is enabled, you can then uninstall the previous version of the cartridge if you choose.
Installation and Setup Overview Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Agent Manager
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Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Agent Manager

The steps outlined in this section assume that you have already installed the cartridge that contains the Foglight Agent Manager installers. If you have not, refer to Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges for more information before proceeding. You can download Foglight Agent Manager installers from the Components for Download dashboard using your Web browser. Additionally, in situations where unauthenticated or headless access to the installers is required, you can access a URL for direct download using a browser or a file retrieval tool (for example, Wget).
1 Before you begin:
Ensure that the Foglight Management Server is running and that you have logged in to Foglight. Ensure that you have the required permissions from your Foglight administrator for the dashboards under the Administration module. Identify the host name and Management Server port of each Foglight Management Server with which the Foglight Agent Manager is supposed to communicate.
2 Download or retrieve the Foglight Agent Manager installer: The different
ways to obtain the installer for your platform (fglam-5_5_0<platform>.[bin|exe]) are described below. See the table in Foglight Agent Manager Installer Platform Support Matrix in the Installation and Setup Guide for the name of the installer for your platform. Download the installer from the Components for Download dashboard in Foglight to each machine where you want to install the Foglight Agent Manager: For instructions on navigating to and downloading installers from this dashboard, see Using the Components for Download Dashboard in the Installation and Setup Guide for your platform. Download or retrieve the installer from a URL to each machine where you want to install the Foglight Agent Manager: In situations where unauthenticated or headless access to the installers is required, you can access a URL for direct download using a browser or a file retrieval tool (for example, Wget). No login to Foglight is required. For instructions on navigating to and downloading installers from this URL, see Using the Components for Download Page in the Installation and Setup Guide for your platform.
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3 Install the Foglight Agent Manager:
If you are installing a new Foglight Agent Manager: There are different ways to install the Foglight Agent Manager: using the installer GUI, from the command-line, or using the silent (non-interactive) installer. Follow the appropriate set of instructions in Installing the Foglight Agent Manager in the Installation and Setup Guide for your platform. If you are upgrading from the Foglight Client to the Foglight Agent Manager: Consult the Foglight Upgrade Field Guide for detailed upgrade instructions.
4 Configure the Foglight Agent Manager: Some configuration of the Foglight
Agent Manager can be performed during installation. In addition, the Foglight Agent Manager can be configured after installation, for example, to set items such as: The host display name (the host name reported by the Foglight Agent Manager instance). This setting can be used in situations where you need to explicitly set the host name, for example, if the host name is already in use by another machine. Foglight Agent Manager connection options, such as the URL of a proxy used to connect to the Foglight Management Server or options to connect to the Management Server using HTTPS. An override option for using a self-signed server SSL certificate. The Foglight Agent Manager can automatically detect HA-enabled Management Servers and configure itself for them. However, you might need to perform some additional configuration if, for example, a Management Server in the HA cluster has special SSL certificate requirements or if it uses a proxy. Depending on the platform on which the Foglight Agent Manager is installed and the mode in which Foglight is running, you may need to perform additional configuration steps. For example: If you are running Foglight in HA mode, see Getting Started with Server Commands (in the chapter Managing the Foglight Management Server) in the Command-Line Reference Guide for information about configuring the Remote Monitor utility. If you want to run the Foglight Agent Manager as a daemon, see Configuring the Foglight Agent Manager to Run as a Daemon in the Installation and Setup Guide Installing on a UNIX System for the database you are using. If you want to run the Foglight Agent Manager as a Windows service, see Installing the Foglight Agent Manager as a Windows Service in the
Installation and Setup Overview Part 5: Deploying and Creating Agents
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Installation and Setup Guide Installing on Windows for the database you are using. On UNIX systems, certain Foglight agents require elevated permissions in order to gather the required system metrics. This is achieved by having the Foglight Agent Manager launch these agents with root privileges. To give these agents the required access, the Foglight Agent Manager is configured to launch these agents using an external application that allows privilege escalation (without a password), such as sudo. See Configuring Foglight Agent Manager Agent Privileges in the Installation and Setup Guide Installing on a UNIX System for the database you are using. See Configuring the Foglight Agent Manager in the Installation and Setup Guide for information about a Foglight Agent Manager configuration interface that you can run after installation and about other configuration you might need to perform.
5 Start the Foglight Agent Manager: See Running the Foglight Agent Manager
in the Installation and Setup Guide for information about starting the Foglight Agent Manager. See Running the Foglight Agent Manager in the Command-Line Reference Guide for information about starting the Foglight Agent Manager using the command-line interface on Windows or Unix platforms. Consult Installing and Running the Foglight Agent Manager FAQ in the Installation and Setup Guide if you encounter problems when performing the steps listed above.
Part 5: Deploying and Creating Agents

You must install and configure the Foglight Agent Manager before deploying agents (excluding some agents, such as Java EE Agents) that are installed on a monitored host. The steps outlined in this section assume that you are deploying agents managed by the Foglight Agent Manager. In addition, they assume that you have already installed and (if necessary) configured the Foglight Agent Manager on each host where you want to deploy agents. If you have not, refer to Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Agent Manager before proceeding. For information on installing and configuring Java EE Agents, see the Cartridge for Java EE Installation and Configuration Guide.
1 Before you begin:
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Review the documentation for the cartridge in which the agent is included for information about agent installation prerequisites. Ensure that the Foglight Management Server is running and that you have logged on to Foglight. Ensure that you are granted the required permissions by your Foglight administrator to access the dashboards under the Administration module. Ensure that the Foglight Agent Manager is running on the machine(s) where you want to deploy agents.
2 Deploy agents and create agent instances:
First, agent packages need to be deployed to the Foglight Agent Manager running on the host that you want to monitor. Once you have deployed agents, you can create agent instances on that host. There are two ways to deploy and create agents: from the browser interface or from the command line: See Deploying Agent Packages to a Monitored Host and Creating Agent Instances on a Monitored Host in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on deploying and creating agents from the Agent Status dashboard. See Deploying Agent Packages To Multiple Hosts and Creating Agent Instances On Multiple Hosts in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on deploying agents to multiple hosts and creating agents on multiple hosts from the Agent Hosts dashboard. See Using the command line to deploy agent packages and Using the command line to create agent instances in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on deploying and creating agents from the command-line. See Managing Agents in the Command-Line Reference Guide for details about the commands available for deploying and creating agents from the command-line.
3 Configure agents: After you deploy and create agents, you may need to edit the
agents properties. See Managing Agent Properties by Type in the Administration and Configuration Guide for information about agent properties. See the documentation for the cartridge in which the agent is included for information about the specific configuration options that are available for each agent.
4 Manage agents: You can perform agent-management tasks like starting,
stopping, activating, deactivating, deleting, and setting blackout periods for
Installation and Setup Overview Next Steps
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agents from the browser interface and from the command line. See Accessing the Agent Status Dashboard and Assigning Blackouts to Agent Instances in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on managing agents from the browser interface. See Managing Agents in the Command-Line Reference Guide for details about the commands available for managing agents from the command line.
Next Steps
Once you have completed the installation and setup process, you can get started using Foglight. See Starting Points in Foglight for descriptions of default views and dashboards where you can begin.
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4
Starting Points in Foglight
Foglight offers a wide range of functionality through its customizable dashboards. This means that there are multiple starting points and workflows available for users with different roles and needsadministrators in charge of managing Foglight, operational users interested in troubleshooting problems throughout their monitored environment, users focused on monitoring a specific domain or system, or users interested in services management. When you log in to Foglight, several dashboards are initially selected as starting points and listed under Homes in the navigation panel. This chapter introduces some of these dashboards. Terminology specific to the Foglight browser interface is used throughout this chapter; see Introducing the Browser Interface in the Foglight User Guide for more information about these terms.
Note This chapter uses a facing page layout: details about the numbered items shown in the images are provided on the following page. Select one of the facing page layout options in your PDF viewer before proceeding.
This chapter contains the following sections: Before You Get Started ...............................................................................................................56 Operators Welcome Page ..........................................................................................................58 Administrators Welcome Page ...................................................................................................60 Service Operations Console........................................................................................................62 Hosts Dashboard.........................................................................................................................64 Next Steps...................................................................................................................................66
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Before You Get Started

The section below provides getting started tips on common elements in the browser interface and features that can affect how you see data in the monitoring dashboards.
Working in a Current or a Diagnostic Time Range

This getting started tip helps you understand whether you are working in a real time range or a diagnostic time range and how to switch from one to the other.
Note Some pages do not take a time range input and so do not display a time range.
By default, the time range at the top of a dashboard is in real time. When the time range is in real time, the icon and the word Now are shown in the time range display. Figure 1 Hovering over the real time range icon displays a message that identifies the time range as real and informs you how to freeze the time range. Figure 2 If you drill down on an alarm, Foglight disconnects from real time and enters a diagnostic time range. The diagnostic time range spans the same length of time as the current time range did prior to the drill down. Within a diagnostic time range, Foglight typically sets three-quarters of this span to occur prior to the alarm being fired and one-quarter to occur after. For example, if the current time range spans four hours, when you drill down on an alarm, the diagnostic time range also covers a four-hour interval, from three hours prior to when the alarm fired to one hour after it fired (as shown in the image below).
Starting Points in Foglight Before You Get Started
57
Figure 3 In some cases, however, the alarm might have occurred close enough to the current moment that the last quarter of the diagnostic time range would cover a span of time that is in the future. If that is the case, Foglight sets the diagnostic time range to end at the current moment (shown as Now in the time range display). When you are working in a diagnostic time range, no new data is displayed in the views on the dashboard. Foglight indicates that you have frozen the time range and entered a diagnostic time range by presenting a frozen time range display. icon in the time range
Figure 4 Hovering over the icon displays a message that identifies the time range as frozen and informs you how to switch to real time. Figure 5 Until you unfreeze the time range, all drilldowns and navigation to views that use the global time range are frozen in this diagnostic time range. Unfreezing the time range causes it to revert to the last monitoring time range that you used. For more information on current and diagnostic time ranges, see Time Range in the Foglight User Guide.
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Operators Welcome Page

This section provides an introduction to the Operators version of the Welcome page. For details about this page, see the Foglight User Guide. The first time that you log in to Foglight, the Welcome page appears in the display area. The Welcome page lists commonly-performed tasks and provides easy access to typically-used dashboards. Most dashboards that can be accessed from this page can also be accessed from the navigation panel. If your user account includes the Operator role, you have basic access to dashboards from the Welcome page. Those with the Administrator role can access a wider range of dashboards. The Operators version of the Welcome page lists several tasks that you can perform. Clicking the task links on the Welcome page causes navigation pages or dashboards related to the selected task to appear in the display area. You can use these links as starting points for frequently-performed monitoring activities.
Note The Welcome page is your default home page unless you set a different home page. For instructions on changing your home page, see the Foglight User Guide.
Starting Points in Foglight Operators Welcome Page
59
1View, acknowledge and clear recent alarms: navigates to the Alarms dashboard. You can use this dashboard to view the state of all alarms across your monitored environment so you can take immediate action on an alarm. See the Foglight User Guide for more information.
Tip Use this dashboard to identify alarm storms or outage events by viewing the alarm count by time.
2View enterprise health organized by monitoring domain: takes you to the Domains dashboard, from which you can view an end-to-end summary of top-level views for all domains, organized by domain. See the Foglight User Guide for more information.
Tip From the Domains dashboard, drill down on a domain to view a high-level summary of its managed instances.
3View the health of critical services: causes the Service Operations Console to appear. In the Service Operations Console, you can choose a group of services as a focal point for your monitoring by subscribing to services of interest and viewing their service dependencies. See Service Operations Console on page 62 and the Foglight User Guide for more information. 4View the health of the monitored hosts in your enterprise: takes you to the Hosts dashboard. Navigate to the Hosts dashboard if you want to view a high-level summary of host-related alarms and performance on all monitored hosts. See Hosts Dashboard on page 64 and the Foglight User Guide for more information. 5Report on your enterprise: causes the Reports dashboard to appear. Use this dashboard to view reports that are scheduled, run a report using a report template, create a custom report, schedule a report to run at a specific time frame, and manage reports. See the Foglight User Guide for more information. 6Tap into the Foglight community: takes you to http://www.foglight.org, where you can read blogs about Foglight and actively participate in existing discussions.
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Administrators Welcome Page

This section provides an introduction to the Administrators version of the Welcome page. For details about this page, see the Administration and Configuration Guide. The first time that you log in to Foglight, the Welcome page appears in the display area. The Welcome page lists commonly-performed tasks and provides easy access to typically-used dashboards. Most dashboards that can be accessed from this page can also be accessed from the navigation panel. If your user account belongs to a group that has the Administrator role, you see the Administrators version of the Welcome page when you log into Foglight for the first time. The Administrators version of the Welcome page lists several tasks that you can perform. Clicking task links on the Welcome page causes navigation pages or administrative dashboards related to the selected task to appear in the display area. You can use these links as starting points for administrative tasks you typically perform upon logging in to Foglight.
Note The Welcome page is your default home page unless you set a different home page. For instructions on changing your home page, see the Foglight User Guide.
Starting Points in Foglight Administrators Welcome Page
61
1Extend Your Monitoring Reach: allows you to complete a configuration interview, generate a configuration plan for your environment, and then execute the plan step-bystep. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information. 2View Your Enterprise Health: causes the View Your Enterprise Health page to appear. This page provides links to dashboards that allow you to observe the overall health of your system by viewing existing alarms and the state of your domains, services, and monitored hosts. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information. 3Configure Email Settings: takes you to the Email Configuration dashboard, from which you can configure Foglight to direct outgoing mail and reports through your mail server. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information. 4Report on Your Enterprise: takes you to the Reports dashboard, from which you can view reports that are scheduled, run a report using a report template, create a custom report, schedule a report to run at a specific time frame, and manage reports. See the Foglight User Guide for more information. 5Do More with Foglight: causes the Do More With Foglight page to appear. This page provides links to dashboards that provide more details about each aspect of your system health. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information.
Tip Use the dashboards accessible through the Do More with Foglight page to define your own custom services, quickly build dashboards, view agent status, and perform other administrative functions.
6Tap Into the Foglight Community: takes you to http://www.foglight.org, where you can read blogs about Foglight and actively participate in existing discussions.
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Service Operations Console

This section provides an introduction to the Services Operations Console dashboard. New in Foglight 5.5.0, this dashboard is designed to replace the Services dashboard. For details about this dashboard, see Monitoring Services Using the Service Operations Console in the Foglight User Guide. For more information about services, see Services on page 30. The Service Operations Console is the best way to monitor a selected set of services. Use it to tailor the way Foglight presents information about monitored components so that it suits your specific needs. This dashboard allows you to focus on monitoring a specific group of services by subscribing those services and viewing their dependencies. In addition, using the Service Operations Console, you can select tiers that are relevant to you and display service breakdowns based on these tiers. Use this dashboard to view details about the services you want to monitor, such as the the state of your services and information about their contents.
Starting Points in Foglight Service Operations Console
63
1Service Operations Console Customizer link: opens the Service Operations Console Customizer, which allows you to subscribe to the services that interest you. Subscribing to services causes them to appear in the Service Operations Console table. The Service Operations Console Customizer allows you to select the services you want to monitor and the tiers you want to see; dwells and popups are provided to help you make your selections. See the Foglight User Guide for details. 2Service Name column: lists the services to which you subscribe. See Services on page 30 for more information about services.
Tip Click the name of a service to display a popup with details about that item and links to more detailed views. See the Foglight User Guide for more information about these links.
3 Service Level Compliance column: shows the service level for each service to which you subscribe. Foglight automatically creates a service level for each service. The level of compliance is determined by the component in the most severe state. See Service levels, alarms, and state on page 31 for more information.
Tip Click an icon in this column to display a popup with more information about the Service Level Agreement for the service. Follow the Explore > Service Level Agreement(s) link in the popup to navigate to the Service Levels dashboard populated with information specific to that service. See Viewing Service Levels in the Foglight User Guide for details.
4Alarms column: Shows the number of alarms for the services to which you subscribe. Clicking one of the icons in this column causes an Outstanding Alarm(s) view to appear with a list of alarms specific to that service. 5Tier columns: Show performance information for the tiers you chose to display using the Service Operations Console customizer. The tiers that are available to display in this table are based on the object groups to which you subscribed in the Tier Definition dashboard. See the Foglight User Guide for more information. The icons in each column show the aggregate state of that tier for that category or service. The state of a tier is determined by the most severe state of all the monitored components that belong to this tier. See Service levels, alarms, and state on page 31 for more information about how state is rolled up in Foglight.
Tip Click an icon in one of these columns to display a popup that lists the monitored components within that tier and their current state, as well as drill-downs for the components.
6Service Operations Console tabs: Display details for the selected category or service, such as its contents and dependencies. See the Foglight User Guide for details.
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Hosts Dashboard
This section provides an introduction to the Hosts dashboard and the views and dashboards to which you can drill down from it. You can use the Hosts dashboard to monitor problems in your environment by focusing on a set of hosts. From this dashboard, you can drill down to different dashboards and views, depending on the host type (physical or virtual). Drill down on a physical host (monitored by Cartridge for Operating Systems agents) to see a real-time monitor for a particular host, details about its alarms, or details about its CPU, memory, disk, or network-related performance. Drill down on a virtual host (monitored by Cartridge for VMWare agents) to see a vmMonitor Virtual Machine dashboard (if the host is a VMWare image); a vmMonitor ESX Server dashboard (if the host is an ESX server); details about its alarms or details about its CPU, memory, disk, or network-related performance. If you are responsible for the availability of a set of hosts and prefer to think in terms of systems, this dashboard is helpful as it allows you to view a summary of the state and performance of those hosts. Filter the list to show all hosts, only monitored hosts (hosts for which Foglight collects CPU and memory metrics), or only hosts that belong to a specific category, for example, all hosts with a particular operating system or all VMWare hosts. You can also search the list of hosts by name. Use this dashboard as the starting point in a host-oriented workflow.
Figure 6
Starting Points in Foglight Hosts Dashboard
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1State indicators: allow you to see at a glance the state of the listed hosts. Each indicator shows the aggregate alarm state of the host, which is determined by the most severe alarm for the host. In this dashboard, the indicator represents a state rollup from the host and its children, excluding the state of agents on that host. 2Host name: clicking the host name allows you to drill down to a real-time monitor that provides you with an overview of that hosts health. Drill down to this monitor if you want to see detailed information about how a host is functioning for the time range displayed at the top of the dashboard. A different monitor appears depending on whether the host is physical or virtual. For example, drilling down on a physical host displays a monitor with information such as the number of processes running on it and the top consumers of various metrics.
Tip You can drill down on items in the monitor. For example, if you are interested in investigating memory consumption on a physical host and drill down the monitor for that host, click the Memory button to view memory-related metric charts and tables, such as charts for the top memory consumers on that host.
3 Alarms column: shows the number of alarms for each host. If you are investigating alarms for a host, click one of the icons in this column to cause an Outstanding Alarm(s) view to appear with a list of alarms specific to that host. You can filter the alarms displayed in this view using the Alarm Filter Applied/Not Set dialog box (click Alarm Filter Applied or Alarm Filter Not Set in the title bar to launch this dialog); see Filtering the Alarms View in the Foglight User Guide for details. In addition, you can change the perspective on alarms by selecting one of the tabs at the top of the table; see Alarm List in the Foglight User Guide for details. In the Outstanding Alarm(s) view, click anywhere in the row for an alarm to display a popup with details about that alarm and links to drilldowns. See Alarm Details in the Foglight User Guide for details. 4 CPU, Memory, Disk, and Network columns: each column displays recent and current values for that category of metrics. These columns allow you to obtain a concise overview of CPU-, memory-, disk-, and network-related performance for each host. The values displayed in the sparkline change in accordance with the time range selected at the top right of the dashboard.
Tip If you want to perform further investigation on CPU-, memory-, disk-, and network-related performance for a host, click either the sparkline or current value to drill down to a dashboard with more detailed information for that metric category.
66
Next Steps
Your next steps depend on how you are using this guide and the way you want to use Foglight. Some examples are provided below. If you read this guide prior to installing Foglight: select the appropriate platform- and database-specific Installation and Setup Guide and follow the instructions for installing and configuring Foglight. If you are an operator responsible for monitoring a large environment: you can follow a service- or host-oriented workflow. For example, if you are responsible for ensuring the availability of your Accounting Application service, you can follow a service-oriented workflow that begins in the Service Operations Console. Alternatively, if you prefer a less abstract approach, you can follow a host-oriented workflow that begins in the Hosts dashboard. If you are a technical expert interested in monitoring a specific domain: start with the documentation included with the Foglight cartridge for monitoring that domain. If you are interested in monitoring services: you can follow a service-oriented workflow. See the Foglight User Guide for details about the drilldowns available from the Service Operations Console. If you want to customize aspects of the Foglight browser interface: begin by following the instructions in Customizing Foglight in the Foglight User Guide. If you are a Foglight administrator: consult the Administration and Configuration Guide and the Command-Line Reference Guide for information about performing administrative tasks (in addition to those described above) from the Foglight browser interface and from the command line. If you want to create custom dashboards: review the information in Creating a Custom Dashboard in the Foglight User Guide. You could then learn more about creating dashboards by following Tutorial 1: Creating a Dashboard in the Web Component Tutorial. If you want to create custom views: begin by following Tutorial 3: Adding Views in the Web Component Tutorial. After this tutorial, consult the Web Component Guide and the HTML Web Component Reference pages. These resources can help you create new views using the Quest Web Component Framework technology.
A
Appendix: Foglight Client Reference
This appendix contains material drawn from the chapters Introducing Foglight and Installation and Setup Overview for users who continue to use the Foglight Client.
Note This release of Foglight contains first and second generation middleware components: the Foglight Client (SPID) and the Foglight Agent Manager (FglAM). For recommendations on which middleware component is right for you, see Foglight Middleware on page 34.
This appendix contains the following sections: Introducing Foglight.....................................................................................................................68 Installation and Setup Overview ..................................................................................................69
68
Introducing Foglight
This section presents introductory material about Foglight with reference to the Foglight Client. See Introducing Foglight for a discussion how Foglight works, additional key concepts and terms, information about the Foglight Agent Manager, and descriptions of other Foglight components.
Key Concepts and Terms
Term Foglight Client
Definition A Foglight middleware component that manages agents installed on monitored hosts. See Foglight Middleware on page 34 for more information.
Foglight Components
Foglight command-line interface
Foglight provides commands that allow you to manage and work with Foglight components without having to use the browser interface. These commands allow you to perform tasks such as managing the Foglight Management Server, the Foglight Client, agents, cartridges, and licences, as well as work with entities such as metrics, monitoring policies, and schedules. For example, this interface allows you to automate component-management tasks using scripts or to use regular expressions to select multiple entities. See the Command-Line Reference Guide for more information.
Foglight Client
The Foglight Client manages certain types of agents installed on monitored hosts. It provides a centralized communications link between the Foglight Management Server and these agents and manages the agents life cycles. The Foglight Client also provides a number of support services such as deployment, upgrade, and the ability to configure agents.
Appendix: Foglight Client Reference Installation and Setup Overview
69
See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information.
Agents
Agents are deployed on machines in your monitored environment and send data to the Foglight Management Server. Agents can monitor the availability and performance of network services, operating systems, log files, file systems, disk space and utilization, top processes, custom applications, application servers, and Web servers. There are several types of agents. One or more instances of each type of agent managed by the Foglight Client can be deployed per host. For example, there is an agent that collects metrics from the operating system of the host machine. There are also agents that are embedded into systems or the software that they monitor. For example, the Java EE Agent, which collects service request traces, runs embedded in Java EE application servers. Foglight also includes internal agents that monitor Foglight components and services. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for more information about managing and configuring agents. See the documentation for the cartridge in which the agent was included for details about each agent.
Installation and Setup Overview

The instructions below continue from Part 2: Initializing the Database, Starting the Foglight Management Server, and Logging In on page 46. They provide an overview of Part 3, 4, and 5 of the installation and setup process for users who continue to use the Foglight Client.
Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges

In addition to cartridges that contain components for monitoring additional parts of your environment, Foglight also comes with a cartridge that contains the Foglight Client installers for all supported platforms. The cartridge is called SPI-Client-Installers5_5_0.car and can be found in the directory \Server\FoglightClient-SPID-5_5_0 on your install media. Once the cartridge for the Foglight Client is installed, you can download the installer for your platform and install the Foglight Client as described below in Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Client.
70
You can install and manage cartridges using either the command-line interface or the browser interface. In addition, you can download agent installers using the browser interface. The instructions below assume that you are using the browser interface. See Managing Cartridges in the Command-Line Reference Guide for information about performing cartridge-management tasks from the command line.
1 Before you begin:
Review the cartridge documentation for information about cartridge installation prerequisites. Ensure that the Foglight Management Server is running and that you have logged in to Foglight. Ensure that you are granted the required permissions by your Foglight administrator to access the dashboards under the Administration module.
2 Install or upgrade the cartridge:
If you are installing a new cartridge: Install the cartridge by following the instructions in Installing and Managing Cartridges in the Administration and Configuration Guide. If you are upgrading a cartridge: Install the cartridge by following the instructions for that cartridge in the Foglight 5.5.0 Upgrade Field Guide.
Caution Do not disable the older cartridge before installing the new one. Foglight automatically disables the older cartridge as part of the upgrade process. Once the new cartridge is enabled, you can then uninstall the older cartridge if you choose.
Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Client

The steps outlined in this section assume that you have already installed the cartridge that contains the Foglight Client installers. If you have not, refer to Part 3: Installing or Upgrading Cartridges for more information before proceeding.
1 Before you begin:
Ensure that the Foglight Management Server is running and that you have logged in to Foglight. Ensure that you have the required permissions from your Foglight administrator for the dashboards under the Administration module.
Appendix: Foglight Client Reference Installation and Setup Overview
71
Identify the host name of the Foglight Management Server with which the Foglight Client is supposed to communicate. See Installing the Foglight Client in the Installation and Setup Guide for details.
2 Download the Foglight Client installer: From the Components for Download
dashboard in Foglight, download the installer for your platform (Spid-5_5_0install_<platform>.[bin|exe]) to each machine where you want to install the Foglight Client. See Accessing the Components for Download Dashboard in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on navigating to and downloading installers from this dashboard.
3 Install the Foglight Client:
If you are installing a new Foglight Client: There are different ways to install the Foglight Client: from the installer GUI, in silent mode, or in console mode (UNIX only). Follow the appropriate set of instructions from Installation Processes in the Installation and Setup Guide. If you are upgrading the Foglight Client: Consult the Foglight Upgrade Field Guide for detailed upgrade instructions.
4 Configure the Foglight Client: The Foglight Client may need to be configured
after installation depending on the platform on which it is installed and the mode in which Foglight is running: If you are running the Foglight Client on a UNIX System, see Configuring Foglight Client Agent Privileges For UNIX in the version of Installation and Setup Guide Installing on a UNIX System for the database you are using. If you are using an external database and are running Foglight in High Availability mode, see Configuring the Foglight Client for High Availability in the Installation and Setup Guide for the platform and type of external database you are running.
5 Start the Foglight Client: See Running the Foglight Client in the Installation
and Setup Guide for information about starting the Foglight Client and connecting it from a monitored host to the Foglight Management Server through a firewall. See Foglight Client Commands in the Command-Line Reference Guide for information about starting the Foglight Client using the command-line interface. Consult Installing and Running the Foglight Client (SPID) FAQ in the Installation and Setup Guide if you encounter problems when performing the steps listed above.
72
Part 5: Deploying and Creating Agents

You must install and configure the Foglight Client before deploying agents (excluding some agents, such as Java EE Agents) that are installed on a monitored host. The steps outlined in this section assume that you are deploying agents managed by the Foglight Client. In addition, they assume that you have already installed and (if necessary) configured the Foglight Client on each host where you want to deploy agents. If you have not, refer to Part 4: Installing, Configuring, and Starting the Foglight Client before proceeding. For information on installing and configuring Java EE Agents, see the Cartridge for Java EE Installation and Configuration Guide.
1 Before you begin:
Review the documentation for the cartridge in which the agent is included for information about agent installation prerequisites. Ensure that the Foglight Management Server is running and that you have logged on to Foglight. Ensure that you are granted the required permissions by your Foglight administrator to access the dashboards under the Administration module. Ensure that the Foglight Client is running on the machine(s) where you want to deploy agents.
2 Deploy agents and create agent instances:
First, agent packages need to be deployed to the Foglight Client running on the host that you want to monitor. Once you have deployed agents, you can create agent instances on that host. There are two ways to deploy and create agents: from the browser interface or from the command line: See Deploying Agent Packages to a Monitored Host and Creating Agent Instances on a Monitored Host in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on deploying and creating agents from the Agent Status dashboard. See Deploying Agent Packages To Multiple Hosts and Creating Agent Instances On Multiple Hosts in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on deploying agents to multiple hosts and creating agents on multiple hosts from the Agent Hosts dashboard. See Using the command line to deploy agent packages and Using the command line to create agent instances in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on deploying and creating agents from
Appendix: Foglight Client Reference Next Steps
73
the command-line. See Managing Agents in the Command-Line Reference Guide for details about the commands available for deploying and creating agents from the command-line.
3 Configure agents: After you deploy and create agents, you may need to edit the
agents properties. See Managing Agent Properties by Type in the Administration and Configuration Guide for information about agent properties. See the documentation for the cartridge in which the agent is included for information about the specific configuration options that are available for each agent.
4 Manage agents: You can perform agent-management tasks like starting,
stopping, activating, deactivating, deleting, and setting blackout periods for agents from the browser interface and from the command line. See Accessing the Agent Status Dashboard and Assigning Blackouts to Agent Instances in the Administration and Configuration Guide for instructions on managing agents from the browser interface. See Managing Agents in the Command-Line Reference Guide for details about the commands available for managing agents from the command line.
Next Steps
Once you have completed the installation and setup process, you can get started using Foglight. See Starting Points in Foglight for descriptions of default views and dashboards where you can begin.
74
Index
75
Index
A
about Foglight 8 about Quest Software 18 Administration home page 33 Administrators Welcome Page starting points 60 after reading this guide next steps 66 agent 25, 36 agent management component 68 alarm 31 history 32 impact 32 alarm rollup for services 31 Alarms column Hosts dashboard 65 Outstanding Alarm(s) for Selected Categories view 63 Outstanding Alarm(s) view 65 Service Operations Console 63 Alarms dashboard 59 availability measurement on services 24 availability of services 31 changing information categories Outstanding Alarm(s) view 65 client 25 component Foglight Agent Manager 68 configuring Foglight Agent Manager 49 Foglight Client 70 configuring browser interface next steps 66 contacting Quest 19 core 10 CPU, Memory, Disk, Network columns details dashboard 65 Hosts dashboard 65 sparkline values 65 creating and editing services service creating and editing 30 creating custom dashboards next steps 66 creating custom views next steps 66 current time range 56 customizable dashboards 55
B
business processes 24
D
dashboards Alarms 59 Do More with Foglight page 61 Domains 59 Email Configuration 61 Extend Your Monitoring Reach 61 Hosts 59 Reports 59, 61
C
cartridge 17, 25, 35 Categories and Services view details popup 63 changing alarm perspective Outstanding Alarm(s) view 65
76

downloading from SupportLink 40 Foglight Agent Manager 34, 68 configuring 49 embedded 47, 48 installing 49 starting 49 Foglight browser interface 33 Foglight Client 25, 34 configuring 70 installing 70 starting 70 Foglight community 59, 61 Foglight component agent 25, 36 browser interface 33 cartridge 25, 35 Foglight Agent Manager 34 Foglight Client 25, 34 Foglight Management Server 25, 33 middleware 34 Foglight components 33 Foglight Management Server 25, 33 Foglight middleware 34 Foglight registry 26 freezing the time range 56
Service Operations Console 59 View Your Enterprise Health page 61 Welcome page 58, 60 data collected from your monitoring environment 24 details dashboard CPU, Memory, Disk, Network columns 65 Host name 65 details popup Categories and Services view 63 Outstanding Alarm(s) view 65 Service Level Compliance column 63 determining compliance levels severe state components 63 diagnostic time range 56 Do More with Foglight page 61 documentation 9, 10, 17 domain 23, 28 Custom Applications 28 Databases 29 End User 29 Infrastructure 29 list 28 Packaged Applications 29 Domains dashboard 59 downloading Foglight from SupportLink 40
E
Email Configuration dashboard 61 embedded Foglight Agent Manager 47, 48 environment monitored by Foglight 23 establishing a SupportLink account 40 Extend Your Monitoring Reach dashboard 61
G
getting started with SupportLink 40 grouping objects 24 grouping of objects 32
H
history of an alarm 32 Homes navigation panel 55 Host name details dashboard 65 Hosts dashboard 65
F
feedback 17 filtering alarms Outstanding Alarm(s) view 65 Foglight
Index
77
real-time details monitoring 65 Hosts dashboard 59 Alarms column 65 CPU, Memory, Disk, Network columns 65 Host name 65 monitoring hosts 64 starting host-oriented workflows 64 starting points 64 State indicators 65
N
navigation panel Homes 55 next steps after reading this guide 66 configuring browser interface 66 creating custom dashboards 66 creating custom views 66 large environment monitoring 66 performing administrative tasks 66 services monitoring 66 specific domain monitoring 66
I
impact of an alarm 32 installing Foglight Agent Manager 49 Foglight Client 70
O
object group 24, 32 observation 24 Operators Welcome Page starting points 58 Outstanding Alarm(s) for Selected Categories view Alarms column 63 Outstanding Alarm(s) view Alarms column 65 changing alarm perspective 65 changing information categories 65 details popup 65 filtering alarms 65
L
large environment monitoring next steps 66 list 28 list of domains 28 list of subdomains 28 logging in to SupportLink 40
M
Management Server 25 measuring availability on services 24 metric 24 model 23 models topology 23 monitored environment 23 organizing principle for data from 23 relationship between items 23 monitoring data 24 monitoring hosts Hosts dashboard 64
P
performing administrative tasks next steps 66
R
real time range 56 real-time details monitoring 65 registry variable 26 Remote Monitor 50 Reports dashboard 59, 61 rollup of alarms for services 31
78

State indicators Hosts dashboard 65 subdomain 28 .NET 28 AIX 29 DB2 29 End User 29 FTR 29 FxM 29 HP-UX 29 JBoss 28 Linux 29 Oracle 29 Oracle AS 28 Oracle eBusiness 29 PA for Oracle 29 PA for SQL Server 29 PeopleSoft 29 SAP 29 Siebel 29 Solaris 29 SQL Server 29 SQL Server 2005 29 Sybase 29 VMWare 29 WebLogic 28 WebSphere 28 Windows 29 subscribing to services 63 suite 9 support 19 SupportLink 40 establishing an account 40 logging in 40 resetting your password 40
rule 25
S
service 24, 30 availability 31 subscribing 63 service level 24, 31 service level agreement 25 Service Level Compliance column details popup 63 Service Operations Console 63 Service Operations Console 59 Alarms column 63 Service Level Compliance column 63 starting points 62 viewing the state of services 62 Service Operations Console Customizer 63 services monitoring next steps 66 Setup & Support dashboards Email Configuration 61 severe state components determining compliance levels 63 SLA 25 sparkline values CPU, Memory, Disk, Network columns 65 specific domain monitoring next steps 66 starting Foglight Agent Manager 49 Foglight Client 70 starting host-oriented workflows Hosts dashboard 64 starting points Administrators Welcome Page 60 Hosts dashboard 64 Operators Welcome Page 58 Service Operations Console 62 state 31 viewing for services 62
T
technical support 19 text conventions 18 tier 25
Index
79
tiers 62 time range current (real time) 56 diagnostic (frozen) 56 topology 23 topology object property 24
U
unfreezing the time range 56
V
View Your Enterprise Health page 61 viewing the state of services Service Operations Console 62
W
Welcome Page Administrator 60 Operator 58

Foglight: Getting Started Guide

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Foglight: Getting Started Guide

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Foglight

Getting Started Guide

2009 Quest Software, Inc. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

License Credits and Third Party Information

Getting Started Guide July 2009 Version 5.5.0

Introducing Foglight ..........................................................................................................................................21

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Installation and Setup Overview ...................................................................................................................... 43

Starting Points in Foglight ............................................................................................................................... 55

Appendix: Foglight Client Reference .............................................................................................................. 67

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Introduction to this Guide

Foglight Getting Started Guide

About this Guide

Introduction to this Guide Foglight Documentation Suite

Foglight Documentation Suite

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Core Documentation Set

Introduction to this Guide Foglight Documentation Suite

Core Documentation Set in Detail

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Introduction to this Guide Foglight Documentation Suite

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Foglight Video Tutorials

Cartridge Documentation Sets

Feedback on the Documentation

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Files, components, and documents

About Quest Software, Inc.

Introduction to this Guide About Quest Software, Inc.

Contacting Quest Software

Contacting Quest Support

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Foglight Getting Started Guide

How Foglight Organizes and Presents Data

How Foglight Helps

Introducing Foglight Key Concepts and Terms

Key Concepts and Terms

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Term Monitoring Data

Topology Object Property Observation

Metric Object Group

Introducing Foglight Key Concepts and Terms

Term Service Level Agreement (SLA) Tier

Foglight Management Server Foglight Agent Manager Cartridge

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Term Registry Variable

How Foglight Works

Introducing Foglight How Foglight Works

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Introducing Foglight How Foglight Works

End User FTR FxM

AIX HP-UX Linux Solaris VMWare Windows

Oracle eBusiness PeopleSoft SAP Siebel

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Introducing Foglight How Foglight Works

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Introducing Foglight Foglight Components

Foglight Browser Interface

Foglight Getting Started Guide

Foglight Command-line Interface