Support for HTTP communication

This topic explains about the automatic registration of the PATROL Agent with load balancer in the BMC Helix Operations Management environment. This topic contains the following sections:

Automatic registration with the load balancer

The PATROL Agent can connect to the load balancer, register itself, and start sending its performance data to BMC Helix Operations Management. The PATROL Agent will establish an https connection with the load balancer. The PATROL Agent can also be configured to authenticate the load balancer using password-less authentication, based on the load balancer public-private keys and existing PATROL's kdb file based certificate validation. 

With the automatic registration with the load balancer, the load balancer will now have the ability to accept inbound connections from PATROL Agents and use these connections for gathering performance data from these PATROL Agents. 

API key details

When you install the PATROL Agent from the  BMC Helix Operations Management console, the API key of the load balancer is saved in the /SecureStore/mca/tenant/apiKey pconfig path.

The PATROL Agent will connect to the load balancer using https protocol. The message data sent by the PATROL Agent as part of the connection request will be encrypted using the load balancer API key. After a successful connection, the PATROL Agent will also provide its elementary metadata (includes hostname, port, IP-address, OS, and security level) to the load balancer. As the PATROL Agent connection with the load balancer is based on public or private keys, it will use its default account or the system account for all activities related to this connection.

You can update the API key in one of the following ways:

• During the installation of PATROL Agents

• After the installation of PATROL Agents

To update the API key during the installation of PATROL Agents

1. In BMC Helix Operations Management, click Administration and select Repository.
2. Click Copy API key.
3. Enter the API key details when you run the RunSilentInstall command. 
   RunSilentInstall.exe -apikey=<api key>
For details, see Installing PATROL Agents.

To update the API key after the installation of PATROL Agents

Do the following to update API key details after the PATROL Agent is installed:

1. In the BMC Helix Operations Managementconsole, on the Administration > Repository > Deployable Packages page, click Copy API Key, and note the API key details.

2. Set the /SecureStore/mca/tenant/apiKey configuration variable as shown in the following example: 

   #Syntax
   PATROL_CONFIG "/SecureStore/mca/tenant/apiKey" = {REPLACE = "MCA/<API key details>"}
   
   
   #Example - Set the API key details that you copied in the previous step
   PATROL_CONFIG "/SecureStore/mca/tenant/apiKey" = {REPLACE = "MCA/a3908418-a963-4e3b-91d1-0664eaf73217"}

3. Restart the PATROL Agent.

Specifying the load balancer path

The PATROL Agent can use any of the following options to initiate a connection with the load balancer:

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• Command line arguments:
  Syntax: -integrationservice https:<loadBalancer_host_name>:<port_no>
Example: -integrationservice https:app_loadBalancer:443
  
  
• Pconfig variables: 
  Syntax: "/AgentSetup/integration/integrationServices" = {REPLACE="https:<loadBalancer_host_name>:<port_no>"}
Example: "/AgentSetup/integration/integrationServices" = {REPLACE="https:app_loadBalancer:443"}
To modify the PATROL Agent configuration variables, see Using the pconfig utility to modify PATROL Agent configuration variables.
  Note: The advantage of setting the configuration variable is that you can reconfigure the load balancer connections from a central point.
  
  
• Environment variables:
  Syntax: set INTEGRATIONSERVICES=https:<loadBalancer_host_name>:<port_no>
Example: set INTEGRATIONSERVICES=https:app_loadBalancer:443

To specify multiple Nginx application load balancers, use a comma-separated list of load balancer strings. If the PATROL Agent fails to connect to the first load balancer, then it uses the next one. 

You can use the following pconfig variables, to control the behavior of the PATROL Agent to load balancer connection:

• /AgentSetup/integration/integrationMaxNumRetries
• /AgentSetup/integration/integrationRetryPeriod
• /AgentSetup/integration/integrationConnectTimeout
• /AgentSetup/integration/publishHostName

For more information about these variables, see Integration variables.

Load balancer precedence

If you use more than one method to specify the load balancer connections, the PATROL Agent uses the information specified in these options in the following order:

1. Command line argument
2. Configuration variable
3. Environment variable

When a value is undefined, the next value is tried. When a value is defined but has no valid strings in the list (for example, the string can not be parsed or the hostname can not be resolved), the next value is not tried.