FAQ
Here are some answers to the most frequently asked questions about the BMC Helix IT Operations Management containers.
BMC Helix Operations Management
Is it possible to export BHOM policies to a file?
Yes, please contact BMC Support.
Can we import BHOM policies from a file?
Yes, please contact BMC Support.
Can we generate a PATROL Agent Report of all agents BHOM tenant in csv file format?
Yes, please contact BMC Support.
Device Report generated of BHOM tenant to csv ?
Yes, please contact BMC Support.
Can we test connectivity between a host and the target BHOM tenant?
Yes, please contact BMC Support.
Can we generate a solution deployment report detailing all solutions and versions deployed to PATROL Agents that match the given regex pattern?
Yes, please contact BMC Support.
How to move PATROL Agents from one Helix instance to another?
See, Migrating PATROL Agents from TSOM to BHOM and Migrating PATROL Agents in the BMC PATROL Agent for BMC Helix Operations Management documentation.
What are the supported versions of PATROL Agents for BHOM?
See, BMC PATROL Agent documentation.
Where are details for Monitoring Solutions for BHOM?
See, Monitoring solutions in BMC Helix Operations Management in the BMC Infrastructure Management-PATROL Repository documentation.
What are the supported versions of the Infrastructure Components?
See, System-requirements.
Does BMC Helix support Forward Proxy for PATROL Agents?
Yes, we have documented an example using Squid. However you can utilize your own forward proxy. Discuss it with your Network Administrator.
For more information, see Configuring a Squid proxy server in the BMC PATROL Agent for BMC Helix Operations Management documentation.
Certificates
Can we use self-signed or custom CA certificates?
Yes, for more information see Using-custom-CA-signed-certificates.
How do I get a Certificate Authority (CA) signed certificate for load balancer configuration?
- Create a certificate signing request (csr) file by using OpenSSL.
- Submit the the file < your.domain.com >.csr to your CA and request for signed certificate.
- Import the CA's reply.
Enablement
Does BMC offer installation and migration assistance?
Yes, for more information see Success Subscriptions.
Does BMC offer Education subscriptions for on-premises deployments?
Health check
How do I obtain the ITOM and Helix Portal (Common Services) Health Check Tool?
Kubernetes
How is high availability achieved?
High availability is achieved through Kubernetes, which uses virtual services to load balance application pods across the cluster.
High availability is enabled for all but the compact sized deployments using multiple pods for each service.
For more information about system usage profiles, see Sizing-and-scalability-considerations.
What is the difference between an Nginx ingress controller (internal to the cluster) and a network load balancer (external to the cluster)?
The Nginx Ingress controller is used to route requests to the appropriate services and pods within the cluster. Network load balancing is used to distribute the load of incoming requests across multiple nodes.
Do the container images of the application provide a liveliness probe and a readiness probe?
Where appropriate both readiness and liveness probes are defined in BMC images.
Does BMC support any other Ingress controllers other than Ingress NGINX?
No, currently only Ingress NGINX is supported.
How are the logs managed?
BMC Helix Logging is not available if you install BMC Helix ITOM version 23.2.02 or upgrade to BMC Helix ITOM 23.2.02 from an earlier version.
For an alternate method to view logs, see Why is Helix Logging not available in ITOM Deployment version 23.2.02?.
Does the deployment use CI/CD pipelines?
BMC provides deployment software automation and does not support Webhooks or CI/CD pipelines.
Does BMC use "latest" tags in container images?
BMC does not use "latest" tags and uses versions wherever possible.
Does the container registry require access to the internet?
BMC software supports air-gapped deployments from a local registry which has been synchronized with the BMC containers.bmc.com.
For more information, see Setting-up-a-Harbor-registry-through-a-proxy-connection-for-an-air-gapped-deployment.
Does BMC set limits in the deployment, the DeploymentConfig, the StatefulSet, or the respective Kubernetes object used?
We set default requests and limits for all services.
Migration
Can we migrate TSOM configurations to BHOM?
Can we migrate TSOM Blackout Policies to BHOM Blackout Policies?
Yes, you must to do it manually.
Network
Are application DNS aliases required before running installation?
Yes, all DNS aliases must be set up before the installation and should resolve to the network load balancer.
For more information, see Load-balancer-requirements.
What type of load balancers has BMC tested?
For local testing purposes, we have used an F5 load balancer.
You can use your existing vendor-specific load balancer. You must make sure the DNS resolution and lookups are working fine.
For more information, see Load-balancer-requirements.
Is Static IP mandatory for the common services (ADE platform)?
The Static IP is a requirement for the common services and not for BMC Discovery.
To get Static IP reach out to the in-house IT team to generate or assign for the environment.
The IP requirements are for the load balancer and the DNS. If we have a Static IP then making and maintaining configuration changes becomes less cumbersome when compared to maintaining a DHCP setup.
What ports must be enabled for the Helix Platform?
See, Network-ports.
What firewall settings are required?
See, Network-ports.
On-premises deployment
Where can I find the important configuration files for on-premises deployments?
Where can I find sample configuration files for BMC Helix Operations Management?
Where can I find sample configuration files for BMC Helix Continuous Optimization?
Where can I find sample configuration files for BMC Helix Intelligent Automation?
Does BMC Helix on-premises support a single Helix Portal (Common Services) with ITSM and ITOM?
Yes, we do support a single Helix portal with BMC Helix ITSM and BMC Helix ITOM.
Please raise a case with BMC Support to help you confirm requirements.
Security
Should I update the default passwords after installation?
We recommend that you update default passwords for VMs, databases, and products to be compliant with your security policy to prevent any security issues.
Does BMC perform security scans on their images before they release?
Yes, we do. However, if you find any subsequent security vulnerabilities, please raise a case with BMC support.
Do containers have a default users?
We use our own canonical container images which use a bmcuser in the majority of cases. We will not be able to align with the base container images used by customers as these can vary widely.
For data layer services (such as Kafka, Postgres, and ElasticSearch), we use Community Edition containers which include all default users and libraries. We might amend these images if we identify security exceptions but otherwise, they are unaltered.
Sizing
I am unsure about the sizing of the Helix on-premise platform. How do I get advice?
Software
How do I obtain access to the on-premises software?
Please contact BMC Account Manager.
How do I download the deployment manager and container images?
Does BMC Helix ITOM utilize Jenkins to deploy the product?
No, BMC Helix ITOM does not utilize Jenkins to deploy the product.
Does BMC provide Docker files for each container image?
No, we do not provide a Docker manifest for container images.
Can I use latest versions software for Kubernetes, Helm, and Docker?
Supported versions are detailed in the product documentation. You many encounter issues with unsupported versions.