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Configuring UNIX and Solaris 8 systems for discovery

This topic describes the steps you must consider performing in your environment before you begin using BMC Discovery.

Process to communication mapping on UNIX systems (LSOF)

BMC Discovery uses the lsof command to map processes to network communications on some UNIX-like operating systems. This enables Reasoning to accurately map software applications that span multiple hosts. Some organizations choose not to install lsof and other diagnostic tools on their UNIX systems. If lsof (version 4.78 or later) is not installed on your UNIX systems you will not be able to relate the communication to processes on those systems.

Related topics

Limitations-and-restrictions-of-this-version

Warning

Do not use pfiles in Solaris Zones. It may cause potential data loss. The lsof utility cannot obtain process communication information from the local zone in Oracle Solaris operating systems. Performing a search on the Internet shows possible workarounds using pfiles. Using pfiles can result in data loss on the Solaris host. Oracle highlights the danger of using pfiles in the warnings section of their own documentation.

The default pfiles behavior changed in Solaris 11.4. Consult the Oracle documentation for your version of Solaris to determine whether using pfiles is acceptable in your IT estate.

NTP configuration

You should configure the NTP service on the Virtual Machine. This is of particular importance if it will be involved in consolidation. If you do not configure NTP, the appliance time can drift backwards, preventing the datastore from validating itself. This in turn prevents the system from restarting. For more information, see Performing-time-synchronization.

Solaris 8 and ifconfig

In Solaris 8 there are two ifconfig binaries:

  • /sbin/ifconfig

  • /usr/sbin/ifconfig
    In all versions of Solaris other than 8, there is a single binary and a symbolic link.
    The default path statement set by BMC Discovery ensures that /sbin/ifconfig is called first. In Solaris 8 this is the incorrect version, /usr/sbin/ifconfig must be run to obtain the correct information. To ensure this is the case, edit the ifconfig discovery script to specify the full path to ifconfig:

    IFCONFIG=`PRIV_IFCONFIG /usr/sbin/ifconfig -a 2>/dev/null`
    echo "$IFCONFIG"

    Do not modify the path statement to correct this issue as that will cause other problems.

 

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