Using Deployments to distribute the agent and extensions packages

This topic describes how to distribute agent and extensions packages. We recommend obtaining the bootstrap package for your system that contains the agent package and other common packages.

Alternatively, you can manually transfer the files, as described in Distributing-the-MVMM-Extensible-Agent-and-extensions-manually.

Permissions for Agent and Extensions Packages page
To obtain the relevant bootstrap package for your system
Fields on the Agent and Extensions Packages page

Permissions for Agent and Extensions Packages page

Make sure you have the following permissions:

To access the Agent and Extensions Packages page and to download the packages, the user must belong to a group that has the Access Package Distributions Tab and Agents Download page permission enabled.
To acquire complete administrative rights over the Agent and Extensions Packages page, the user must belong to a group that has the Edit Package Distributions and Agents Download page permission enabled.

For more information, see Default permissions for MainView Middleware Monitor.

To obtain the relevant bootstrap package for your system

To access the MVMM Launch page, see Getting-started-for-users.
On the MainView Middleware Monitor launch page, click the Launch under the Agent and Extensions Packages section.
The BMC MainView Middleware Monitor login page is displayed.

On the BMC MainView Middleware Monitor login page enter your credentials.
In the Agent and Extensions Packages page:
- Click Create new Package to create an agent bootstrap package.
- If existing packages are available on the Agent and Extensions Packages page, click + New Package to create another agent bootstrap package.
The Create Package window is displayed, which contains a list of fields that you must populate to create a package. For more information, see Fields in the Create Package window.
Click Continue to accept the changes.
The Package Summary window is displayed with a summary of the information that you have provided for the new package.
Click Save. The Agent and Extensions Packages page is displayed with the new package.
Under the Actions column, click the button corresponding to a package to expand a list of action items. These action items enable you to perform various operations on the package. For more information, see Operations in the Action column.

Tip

You can create one or more customized scripts to add it in a package. For more information, see Scripts.

Fields in the Create Package window

The following table describes the fields in the Create Package window:

Fields	Description
Name	(Required) Enter a name for the package.
Description	Enter a description for the package.
Extract into folder name	(Required) Enter the name of the top-level directory of the agent and extensions. The default root folder name is bmcsoftware.
Platform	(Required) Click the field to expand a list of supported OS platforms. Select a platform on which you want to deploy the package.
Content	(Required) After you select a platform, this field automatically displays the agent and extensions components required to create a valid package, which you can install on the OS you choose. You can click this field to display an expanded list of agent and extensions components. You can select multiple agent and extensions components from this list for the OS type you choose. You can also use the Filter options field to search for a specific extension.
Agent Description	(Optional) Enter a description for the Agent, which can be used to match expressions defined in an agent policy. For example, an Agent Description of TECH=DataPower can be used to match with IBM DataPower monitoring policies included in the MVMM Event Packs.
Agent Configuration	(Required) Select one of the following Secure Tunnel Configuration options based on your agent package type: (Default) Agent does not use a Secure Tunnel Configuration Agent initiates Secure Tunnel Configuration to MVMM Services MVMM Services initiate Secure Tunnel Configuration to Agent Important To see all three options of the tunnel configuration, you must configure the MVMM services as described in Connecting-services-and-agents-with-a-secure-tunnel.
Scripts	Click this field to expand a list of scripts that are defined for all the supported OSs You can select multiple scripts from the list. You can also delete one or more scripts that you have selected. In the field itself, you can rename a script according to your preference or the functionality of the script. Renaming a script does not affects its functions. Important A script name can't exceed 50 letters or have special characters. The following characters are allowed in a script name: a-z, A-Z, and 0-9. Renaming the script while creating the package does not change the name of the original script. You can also customize scripts and save them in the following directory on the services machine: service_install\AGENT_DIST\scripts. MVMM automatically displays them in this list. For example, see Usage-Scenarios-for-Linux-and-Windows-platforms.

Fields on the Agent and Extensions Packages page

The following table describes the fields displayed on the Agent and Extensions Packages page:

Field	Description
Advanced filter	Filter and select a package as per their name, platform, or description
Name	Name assigned to the package
OS	Operating system that is compatible with the package
Creation date	Date when you created the package
Last Modification date	Date when you modified the package parameters
Modified by	Username of the user who modified the package
Description	Description of the package
Actions	Provides a list of actions that you can perform on a package, when you click the icon

Warning

If the corrupted package icon.png icon appears beside a package, it indicates that the package has validation errors and cannot be downloaded. Click on the icon for more information.

Operations in the Action column

The following table describes the actions on the Agent and Extensions Packages page:

Action	Description
Edit	Edit the package parameters
Clone	Clone the package. This opens a new Create Package window with a cloned package name that has the format CLONE_packagename. The cloned package has the same parameters as the original package.
Download	Download the package file in one of the following file types: .zip, .tar, and .tgz. Scroll down the Download window that is displayed to view the download options. Clickoption to copy the file information and use it to save the package on a system by using curl command line prompts. For example, see Usage-Scenarios-for-Linux-and-Windows-platforms.
Delete	Delete the package.
Unzip executable	Download the executable unzip file that is compatible with the OS type of the package.

To install and control the MVMM Extensible Agent, see Installing-the-bootstrap-package.

To upgrade the agent installation, see Updating-or-upgrading-the-agent-installation.

Important

For the i5/OS platform, you must choose the bootstrap download file format in .zip format, and unpack the file on the i5/os machine using the Java jar command.

jar xvf pkg-i5os-bootstrap.zip.

If you do not have access to Java on your i5/OS machine, you must use FTP to transfer the qpagent.savf from the AGENT_DIST directory on the server machine, as described in the i5/OS sections under Installing-agents-and-extensions-in-the-Flat-Directory-layout.