What is "This is address of remote management node"?

[user54119]

In Node Properties on register 'Communications' is an option 'This is address of remote management node'.
What is this for. I didn't found it in the documentation. And I can't remember it was there before.

Thanks

[victor]

Hi!

It's a new feature intended for monitoring devices without IP address and/or network connectivity. For example, you have serial attached UPS that you want to represent in monitoring as separate node. Then your configuration could be following:

1. connect UPS to some machine with network adapter (node A), setup agent (usually separate instance) and configure UPS subagent as usual
2. configure DEVEMU subagent if needed (it can return fake interface list)
3. create node for UPS (node B), set it's IP address to 0.0.0.0
4. set node B primary IP address to that of node A and check "This is address of remote management node"

After that all requests to NetXMS agent on node B will be actually directed to agent of node A. It is different from just defining node A as proxy node for DCIs on node B because server will handle all information provided by agent (interface list for example) as coming from node B. This gives you ability to use agent for status polls of non-networked box.

This option was created for two purposes - 1) to monitor serial attached controllers - we setup number of agents on a PC, each agent communicating with one controller and impersonating it for NetXMS; and 2) for simulating multiple hosts on one machine without need to create VM for each.

Best regards
Victor

[Jmp_3f8h]

@victor said in What is "This is address of remote management node"?:

Hi!

It's a new feature intended for monitoring devices without IP address and/or network connectivity. For example, you have serial attached UPS that you want to represent in monitoring as separate node. Then your configuration could be following:

1. connect UPS to some machine with network adapter (node A), setup agent (usually separate instance) and configure UPS subagent as usual
2. configure DEVEMU subagent if needed (it can return fake interface list)
3. create node for UPS (node B), set it's IP address to 0.0.0.0
4. set node B primary IP address to that of node A and check "This is address of remote management node"

After that all requests to NetXMS agent on node B will be actually directed to agent of node A. It is different from just defining node A as proxy node for DCIs on node B because server will handle all information provided by agent (interface list for example) as coming from node B. This gives you ability to use agent for status polls of non-networked box.

This option was created for two purposes - 1) to monitor serial attached controllers - we setup number of agents on a PC, each agent communicating with one controller and impersonating it for NetXMS; and 2) for simulating multiple hosts on one machine without need to create VM for each.

Best regards
Victor

Hi,

seems a good idea, I tried with an UPS but as far as I can see the node B will inherit the interfaces of the node A, can be avoided?

Bet regards,
Marco

[user54119]

Thanks for the detailed explanation. At the moment I don't have such a case. But maybe later. Is it already in documentation?

[victor]

Not yet. Hopefully will be documented until 1.2.15 release.

Best regards,
Victor

[user54119]

ok. The documentation is still one of the weakest points of NetXMS. I'm not fit enough on NetXMS otherwise I would help with documentation.

[victor]

@jmp_3f8h said in What is "This is address of remote management node"?:

seems a good idea, I tried with an UPS but as far as I can see the node B will inherit the interfaces of the node A, can be avoided?

you need devemu subagent for that. This is how config for emulated device on my PC looks like:

MasterServers = 0.0.0.0/0
LogFile = C:\DevEmu\ATM001\log\nxagentd.log
ListenPort = 9001
EnableSubagentAutoload = no
SubAgent = devemu.nsm

*DEVEMU
IpAddress = 192.168.84.11
IpNetMask = 255.255.255.0
MacAddress = 551010000001
InterfaceName = Local Area Connection

Best regards,
Victor

[Jmp_3f8h]

@victor said in What is "This is address of remote management node"?:

@jmp_3f8h said in What is "This is address of remote management node"?:

seems a good idea, I tried with an UPS but as far as I can see the node B will inherit the interfaces of the node A, can be avoided?

you need devemu subagent for that. This is how config for emulated device on my PC looks like:

MasterServers = 0.0.0.0/0
LogFile = C:\DevEmu\ATM001\log\nxagentd.log
ListenPort = 9001
EnableSubagentAutoload = no
SubAgent = devemu.nsm

*DEVEMU
IpAddress = 192.168.84.11
IpNetMask = 255.255.255.0
MacAddress = 551010000001
InterfaceName = Local Area Connection

Best regards,
Victor

I guess I need a 1.2.15 agent (win x64) to use it:

[13-Jun-2014 15:48:44.590] Error loading subagent module "devemu.nsm": The specified module could not be found.

No matter, when you have time.

Best regards,
Marco

[victor]

I forgot to put it into installer. x64 version attached.

Best regards,
Victor

---

devemu.nsm

[Jmp_3f8h]

@victor said in What is "This is address of remote management node"?:

I forgot to put it into installer. x64 version attached.

Best regards,
Victor

Good job, it works!  ;D

Best regards,
Marco

[flytech-ben]

Hi Victor,

is it possible that this feature is some sort of broken in version 2.0-RC1?
I tried to use it for a some printers attached to a single print server, because I like to have separate node with status for each printer. But I can't set the printers IP to the same as of the print server after I check the option "This is address of remote management node", because of an IP address conflict.

Regards,
Ben