Architecture

BMC Client Management is a client/server system made up of several different computer programs. It contains a database with is integrated with the master server, a graphical user interface to access the data in the database and the agents installed on the clients providing the data for the database.

A highly scalable and flexible architecture ensures effective client systems management no matter how complex the enterprise infrastructure. BMC Client Management can scale from 150 to more than 200,000 heterogeneous client systems on geographically distributed locations. It provides a reliable way to monitor the status of all systems on a network and isolates the exact point of failure when problems occur to make it easy for network or systems difficulties to be resolved quickly.

The architecture of the BMC Client Management software is made up of the following components:

Master Server

The master server or administration server is the main server in the network topology which contains the database. It is responsible for answering requests from the console and executing the appropriate database communication. It receives and stores all information and data sent by the client agents and sends requests for additional information when necessary through the first-level relays. The master server database is an object model database system in which each network or system component is modelled by corresponding model objects. It operates in real time and reacts to changes in the real network and systems components by updating and changing the corresponding objects in the database. The BMC Client Management console connects to the master to display the collected data on the screen.

Relay

A relay or intermediate server is used to balance the network and resource load. Relays are present at multiple levels depending on the network topology to forward the down-going data/actions to their own lower level. They also collect up-going data/actions which they forward to their upper level based on a predefined schedule allocation. Each relay records a list of transactions and is configured for a number of retries before abandoning and informing the next higher level on error. Relays are basically clients with the extra feature of forwarding data in both upstream and downstream directions for software distribution and other operations to execute.

Console

The BMC Client Management console is the graphical user interface to the management system and its database. It is a Java application through which you may visualise all data collected in the database and execute any type of action on the objects in the database, such as create and delete objects, modify specific data of an object, execute reports and operational rules or remotely access a client to make modifications on the remote client's registry.

Client

The BMC Client Management client agent is installed on each client and operates completely independent of the master server, sending information either at regularly defined intervals or when polled by the master or any other module through its respective relay, such as reporting their connection status. Agents receive data/actions from and forward data to their upper level based on a pre-defined schedule allocation. They provide monitoring of and reporting on a very large number of parameters. The nature of these parameters depends on the operating system of the client on which the agent is installed, that is, if it is a Windows client, a Linux client or a Mac client.