How-to Activate and Configure AutoNotify for MDS 9000 Family Multilayer Switches [Cisco MDS 9000 Series Multilayer Switches]

Document ID: 28303

Introduction
Prerequisites
      Requirements
      Components Used
      Conventions
Activate and Configure AutoNotify
      Activate the AutoNotify Service
      Add a User
      Configure the Profiles
      The Notification Profiles
      Case Creation Profiles
      Reporting
Verify
Troubleshooting Procedure
Related Information

Introduction

AutoNotify is a feature of Cisco SMARTnet and SMARTnet Onsite for the Cisco MDS 9000 family. It utilizes the MDS 9000 call-home feature to open a Priority 3 Technical Assistance Center (TAC) case, with event information, through the Internet on behalf of a customer when a MDS 9000 call-home event occurs.

With AutoNotify, the TAC can be informed of problem events faster with information that helps a TAC engineer resolve the problem more quickly than if a TAC case was opened manually. Often, this can happen before a problem is even realized.

Note: When an MDS 9000 event impacts your business, AutoNotify is not a substitute for opening a TAC case directly by telephone. If you have a situation that impacts your business, contact the TAC in the normal manner, open a case, and assign it the appropriate priority. Local TAC access numbers can be found at Customer Service Contacts.

In addition to automatic TAC case generation, AutoNotify allows flexible notification configuration with user-defined profiles, which can email or page multiple destinations if desired. These profiles are created and maintained through use of the AutoNotify administration tool.

As a customer of the AutoNotify service, you are assigned one of two levels of access. You are either a customer administrator or a customer user.

As a customer administrator, your responsibility is to activate the AutoNotify service and configure the profiles of the AutoNotify users. There are several activities required to initially activate and configure the AutoNotify service. They do not need to be performed in one attempt; the process can be interrupted at any time. However, they are required to be performed in a specific order.

A customer administrator has the ability to do these tasks:

Configure which of the users to receive notifications each time an AutoNotify (call-home) event occurs.
Configure which of the users have TAC cases (trouble tickets) created for them each time an AutoNotify (call-home) event occurs.

The customer users are able to view the status of this configuration but make no changes. You see your configured profile, and a list of the people within your organization who are configured as the administrator.

Prerequisites

Requirements

There are no specific requirements for this document.

Components Used

This document is not restricted to specific software and hardware versions.

Conventions

For more information on document conventions, refer to the Cisco Technical Tips Conventions.

Activate and Configure AutoNotify

In this section, you are presented with the information to configure the features described in this document.

Activate the AutoNotify Service

To activate the AutoNotify service, there are five steps. These steps are detailed here, and should be performed in order:

Verify that the AutoNotify pre-requisites are fulfilled.
- There must be an active SMARTnet service contract that exists against this MDS 9000 family switch.
- The switch must have access to an email server that can relay emails across the public Internet.
- The MDS 9000 family switch must be configured for the Call Home feature as shown in the documentation that accompanys the product. The key parameter not shown in the product documentation is the destination email address for the AutoNotify service with Cisco. This email address is auto-notify@cisco.com. The MDS 9000 family device must be configured to send XML formatted messages to this address. The MDS 9000 family product documentation, which includes configuration guides, is available at MDS 9000 Family Product Literature.
Collect information required in order to activate AutoNotify.

Before you contact the TAC, ensure that you have access to the MDS 9000 family switch, the configuration is correct (including the destination AutoNotify email address), and that you have this information available:
- The SMARTnet contract number that covers your MDS 9000 family switch.
- Your name, company address, your email address, and your CCO ID.
- The serial number of your MDS 9000 family switch. To obtain this, look at the serial number label on the back of the switch, or by execute the show sprom backplane 1 operating system command. The serial number is in the ABC12345XYZ format.
  
  Note: Keep mind that case is significant. All characters should be in upper case.
- The exact product number of your MDS 9000 family switch. To obtain this, execute the same operating system command as above. For example, some valid product numbers include: DS-C6509, DS-C9216-K9, and SSE-1120-K9. An example of the required information is shown in this graphic:
  
  This information is required of you by the agent who owns your request for AutoNotify service activation.
Contact TAC to activate AutoNotify.
- Once the configuration of the switch is complete, the AutoNotify service for this device must be activated at Cisco in order to listen to call-home messages from your MDS 9000 family switch. To activate the Cisco end of the service, send an email to the AutoNotify support team at: autonotify-help@cisco.com with a subject line that reads "AutoNotify Activation". In the message body, request activation of the MDS 9000 AutoNotify service. Provide these items to enable the support team to respond to your request promptly:
  - Company name and address
  - Service Contract number
  - Part (model) number of each MDS 9000 device; for example, DS-C9509, DS-C9216-K9
  - Chassis serial number of each MDS 9000 device
  - Cisco.com (CCO) User ID of the person delegated to be the administrator user
Test that AutoNotify is successfully activated.
- Once you have provided this information, you need to send a test call-home. This allows Cisco to verify that the parameters you have manually provided match those in your device. To issue a test call-home, use the MDS 9000 callhome test command.
- If the test call-home is successful, both the Cisco agent that owns your request and the person configured as the device's sysContactEmail receive confirmation emails in response. At this time, the Cisco end of the service is fully enabled.
Send the device's inventory.
- Before any AutoNotify messages can be processed by Cisco, the MDS 9000 family switch must send an inventory message. This is required so that subsequent field replaceable unit types can be matched against slot numbers. It is recommended that the MDS 9000 family switch is tasked to send the device inventory immediately after completion of the test call-home. To complete an inventory call-home, issue the callhome test inventory command.
- To verify that the inventory information was received correctly, visit the Reports section of the AutoNotify Administration Tool. The reports tool is summarized in the Reporting section of this document.
- At this point, it is possible for the device to send AutoNotify call-home messages and automatically create cases with the TAC. As the customer administrator, you are the default profile to which all notification messages are sent and cases are created against. However, you have the ability to configure additional individuals within your organization to receive notifications or to be case owners.
- Further information on commands and configuration is available in the MDS 9000 family product documentation, available at MDS 9000 Family Product Literature.

Add a User

In order to create profiles for other users, the first step is to add CCO user IDs and/or email addresses to be used later in the profile configuration.

If you add a CCO ID, you are allowed to configure this customer user as an AutoNotify call-home notification email receiver and/or AutoNotify case owner.
If you add an email address, you are allowed to configure this customer user to receive AutoNotify call-home notifications only. This user is not be able to be an AutoNotify case owner.

Note: It is very important to remember that CCO IDs and email addresses are not validated when entered. For example, you may wish to enter the CCO ID of a co-worker, James Smith. This individual's CCO ID may be jsmith, jimsmith, or jpsmith, and so on. Therefore, if you enter an email address or CCO ID, ensure that you have taken appropriate steps to ensure its validity.

This graphic shows this interface used to add a user profile. The text added to the graphic explains the step to add a profile. Follow Steps 1 through 5 to add an AutoNotify user.

Once the CCO IDs and email addresses have been configured, the next action is to configure the notification and case open profiles.

Configure the Profiles

There are two profile types that require configuration:

The notification profile
The case creation profile

A notification profile specifies when an individual (or individuals) within your organization are notified that an AutoNotify (call-home) event has occurred.

A case creation profile specifies which individual within your organization is the case owner of an AutoNotify (call-home) event.

To begin the configuration process for these profiles, select Profile on the AutoNotify Administration Tool.
The first screen that is displayed under Profile is the Notification Rules configuration.

The Notification Profiles

To create notification profiles, there are two steps:

Create a set of rules which define when someone should be notified.
Link a contact or several contacts to each rule.

Create a set of rules:
- It is possible to create multiple sets of rules based upon these data points:
  - call-home message type
  - device type that is calling home
  - appliance reporting the fault
  - unique device that is calling home
  Select from each drop-down menu one of the entries and select Submit.This creates a unique rule, based upon the entry combinations. Refer to the screenshot here for an example:
  
  To delete a rule, select Delete Rule.
Link a contact or several contacts to each rule:

Once a notification rule is created, it is simple to add one or more of the previously defined contacts to that rule. To do this, select the rule to which you want to add a contact and select Add Contact.

This graphic shows an example of the notification Add Contact screen. The table shows the rule you have selected along with any existing contacts listed against that rule. The drop-down menus allow for a faster retrieval of a contact. Once the drop-downs are all filled in, select Submit and that contact is added to the rule.

The notification level behaves in this manner:
- 0 - Debugging
- 1 - Normal
- 2 - Notification
- 3 - Warning
- 4 - Minor
- 5 - Major
- 6 - Critical
- 7 - Fatal
- 8 - Disaster
- 9 - Catastrophic
These correspond to the message severity indicated by the MDS 9000 call-home message. The lower the level selected within the tool, the more notifications that are received.

In the example above, adcd@someplace.com receives notifications if these conditions are true:

Message type = Call Home

Source = MDS9000

Appliance = DS-9509@C@FOX06300CLO

Device = All (such as any)

Notification level = minor (or more severe)

The creation of notification profiles continues in this manner by adding notification rules and then adding pre-defined contacts to those rules. Additional notification profiles can be added at any time from this point onwards.

Note: When a device calls home, the rules are checked for the closest match in order to perform notification. With this in mind, it is recommended that there always exist a notification rule (and associated contact) configured as such:

Message Type: All

Source: All

Appliance: All

Device: All

Contact notification level = 0 - Debugging

This ensures that a notification occurs for any appliances or devices not represented by a specific rule. If this does not exist or there is no contact for that rule, and a call-home occurs where there is not an exact match to another rule, the notification is performed by the customer administrator by default.

Case Creation Profiles

The purpose of this section is to create a set of TAC case creation rules that are later associated with a contact or list of contacts, and create a profile. In the same way as it is done for notification profiles, to create a case creation profile, first create the rule(s) and then add contact(s) to a rule. To create case creation profiles, there are two steps:

Create a set of rules which define when a contact has TAC cases (trouble tickets) created for them.
Link a contact or several contacts to each rule.

Create the a set of rules:
- The first screen that is displayed under Profiles is Notification rules. To modify the Case Creation rules, select the sub-link titled Case Creation, as shown here:
  
  For case creation, there are only two rule parameters:
  - The device that sent the message
  - The appliance that forwarded it to Cisco
To add a rule, select from each drop-down menu one of the entries and select Submit. This creates a unique rule, based upon the entry combinations. For an example, refer to the above graphic.

To delete a rule, select Delete Rule.
Link a contact or several contacts to each rule:

Once a case creation rule is established, it is simple to add one or more of the previously defined contacts to that rule. To do this, select the rule to which you want to add a contact to and select Add Contact.

This graphic shows an example of the case creation Add Contact screen. The table shows the rule you have selected along with any existing contacts listed against that rule. Once the drop-downs are all filled in, select Submit and that contact is added to the rule.

The notification level behaves in this manner:
- 0 - Debugging
- 1 - Normal
- 2 - Notification
- 3 - Warning
- 4 - Minor
- 5 - Major
- 6 - Critical
- 7 - Fatal
- 8 - Disaster
- 9 - Catastrophic
These correspond to the message severity indicated by the MDS 9000 call-home message.

There are a couple of key points to note when you assign contacts to case creation rules, lised here:
- Unlike the notifications, it is only possible to have one contact, per notification level, per rule. This corresponds to the fact there may only be one individual who is a TAC case owner at any one time.
- Only contacts with a CCO ID can be assigned to a case creation rule.
Note: When a device calls home, the rules are checked for the closest match in order to perform case creation. With this in mind, it is recommended that there is always a case creation rule (and associated contact) configured as such:
- Appliance: All
- Device: All
- Contact notification level = 0 - Debugging
This ensures that a case creation occurs for any appliances or devices not represented by a specific rule. If this does not exist, or there is no contact for that rule, and a call-home occurs where there is not an exact match to another rule, the case creation is performed against the customer administrator by default.

Once the service has been activated, users added, notification and case creation profiles have been configured, it is possible to interrogate the system for status and call-home event reporting.

Reporting

The reporting interface allows a user to examine the appliance(s) to which they are associated, see an inventory of devices that have been reported by an individual appliance, and a log of messages sent by a particular appliance.

To view the reports, select the Report tab within the AutoNotify Administration Tool.

The first screen to be displayed shows the appliances that are linked to the user logged in. As mentioned previously, the current implementation of AutoNotify allows only a direct one-to-one relationship between the appliance and a customer administrator or customer user. Therefore, only a single appliance shows in the inventory. However, multiple devices may be attached to, and reported by, a single appliance.
For the appliances shown in the reporting section of the tool, there are two links selectable; the first being the inventory of devices reported by that appliance, the second being a log file of messages sent by that appliance.

An example of the appliance inventory is shown here:

This example shows two devices, ordered by their unique device identifier, and their status as last communicated to the AutoNotify tool by the appliance.

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Cisco MDS 9000 Series Multilayer Switches