Managing Broadband Access Center
This chapter describes the various subcomponents within Cisco Broadband Access Center (BAC) that you can use to manage the system. These include:
•BAC Process Watchdog
•Administrator User Interface
•Command Line Interface
•SNMP Agent
•BAC Tools
BAC Process Watchdog
The Cisco BAC process watchdog is an administrative process that monitors the runtime health of all Cisco BAC processes. This watchdog process ensures that, if a process stops unexpectedly, it is automatically restarted. One instance of the Cisco BAC process watchdog runs on every system which runs Cisco BAC components.
You can use the Cisco BAC watchdog as a command-line tool to start, stop, restart, and determine the status of any monitored processes.
If a monitored application fails, it restarts automatically. If, for any reason, the restart process also fails, the Cisco BAC watchdog process server will wait a prescribed amount of time before attempting to restart again.
The period between restart attempts starts at 1 second and increases exponentially with every subsequent attempt until it reaches a length of 5 minutes. After that, the process restart is attempted at 5-minute intervals until successful. Five minutes after a successful restart, the period is automatically reset to 1 second again.
For example:
•Process A fails.
•The Cisco BAC process watchdog server attempts to restart it and the first restart fails.
•The Cisco BAC process watchdog server waits 2 seconds and attempts to restart the process and the second restart fails.
•The Cisco BAC process watchdog server waits 4 seconds and attempts to restart the process and the third restart fails.
•The Cisco BAC process watchdog server waits 16 seconds and attempts to restart the process.
Using BAC Process Watchdog from the Command Line
The Cisco BAC watchdog agent automatically starts whenever the system boots up. Consequently, this watchdog also starts those Cisco BAC system components installed on the same system. You can also control the Cisco BAC watchdog through a simple command-line utility by running the /etc/init.d/bprAgent command.
Table 9-1 describes the command line interface commands available for use with the Cisco BAC watchdog process.
Table 9-1 BAC Watchdog Agent CLI Commands
|
|
bprAgent start |
Starts the BAC watchdog agent, including all monitored processes. |
bprAgent stop |
Stops the BAC watchdog agent, including all monitored processes. |
bprAgent restart |
Restarts the BAC watchdog agent, including all monitored processes. |
bprAgent status |
Gets the status of the BAC watchdog agent, including all monitored processes. |
bprAgent start process-name |
Starts one particular monitored process. The value process-name identifies that process. |
bprAgent stop process-name |
Stops one particular monitored process. The value process-name identifies that process. |
bprAgent restart process-name |
Restarts one particular monitored process. The value process-name identifies that process. |
bprAgent status process-name |
Gets the status of one particular monitored process. The value process-name identifies that process. |
The process-name mentioned in Table 9-1 can be: •rdu—Specifies the RDU server. •dpe—Specifies the DPE server. •snmpAgent—Specifies the SNMP agent. •tomcat—Specifies the administrator user interface. •cli— Specifies the DPE command line interface. |
Note When the Solaris operating system is rebooted, the Cisco BAC process watchdog is first stopped, allowing Cisco BAC servers to shut down properly. To shut down or reboot the operating system, use the Solaris shutdown command. Remember, the Solaris reboot command does not execute application shutdown hooks and kills Cisco BAC processes rather than shuts them down. While this action is not harmful to Cisco BAC, it may delay server start-up and skew certain statistics and performance counters.
The events that trigger an action in the Cisco BAC watchdog daemon, including process crashes and restarts, are logged in a log file, BPR_HOME/agent/logs/agent.log. The watchdog daemon also logs important events to syslog under standard local6
facility.
Administrator User Interface
The Cisco BAC administrator user interface is a web-based application for central management of the Cisco BAC system. You can use this interface to:
•Configure global defaults
•Define custom properties
•Set up Classes of Service
•Manage firmware rules and configuration templates
•Add and edit device information
•Group devices
•Execute device operations
•View server status and statistics
•View device history
•View server logs
•Manage users
Refer to these chapters for specific instructions on how to use this interface:
•Understanding the Administrator User Interface, page 15-1, describes how to access and configure the Cisco BAC administrator user interface.
•Using the Administrator User Interface, page 16-1, provides instructions for performing administrative activities involving the monitoring of various Cisco BAC components.
•Configuring Broadband Access Center, page 17-1, describes tasks that you perform to configure Cisco BAC.
Command Line Interface
The Cisco BAC CLI is an IOS-like command line interface which you use to configure as well as view the status of the DPE by using Telnet. The CLI supports built-in command help and command autocompletion.
You can enable authentication of the CLI through a locally configured login and enable passwords, or through a remote username and password for a TACACS+ service.
To access the DPE CLI, open a Telnet session to port 2323 from a local or remote host.
Accessing the DPE CLI from a Local Host
To access the CLI from a local host, you can use:
or
Accessing the DPE CLI from a Remote Host
To access the CLI from a remote host, enter:
# telnet remote-hostname 2323
Note If you cannot establish a Telnet connection to the CLI, the CLI server might not be running. You may need to start the server; enter:
#
/etc/init.d/bprAgent start cli
After you access the CLI, you must enter the DPE password to continue. The default login and enable passwords are changeme.
See the Cisco Broadband Access Center DPE CLI Reference 3.5, 3.5.1, 3.5.2, for specific information on the CLI commands that a DPE supports.
SNMP Agent
Cisco BAC provides basic SNMP v2-based monitoring of the DPE and RDU servers. The Cisco BAC SNMP agents support SNMP informs and traps. You can configure the SNMP agent on the DPE by using the snmp-server CLI commands, and on the RDU by using SNMP configuration CLI commands.
The SNMP agent also provides support for monitoring essential Cisco BAC details, such as server state, server-specific statistics, communication between servers, and license information.
For additional information on the SNMP configuration command line tool, see Monitoring Broadband Access Center, page 11-1. For additional information on the DPE CLI, refer to the Cisco Broadband Access Center DPE CLI Reference 3.5, 3.5.1, 3.5.2.
BAC Tools
Cisco BAC provides automated tools that you use to perform certain functions more efficiently. Table 9-2 lists the various tools that this Cisco BAC release supports:
Table 9-2 List of BAC Tools
|
|
|
Configuration Tool |
Used to test, validate, and view BAC template and configuration files. |
Using the Configuration Utility, page 5-20 |
Cisco BAC Process Watchdog |
Interacts with the Cisco BAC watchdog daemon to observe the status of the Cisco BAC system components, and stop or start servers. |
Using BAC Process Watchdog from the Command Line |
SNMP Agent Configuration Tool |
Manages the SNMP agent. |
Using the snmpAgentCfgUtil.sh Tool, page 11-5 |
RDU Log Level Tool |
Sets the log level of the RDU, and enables or disables debugging log output. |
The RDU Log Level Tool, page 20-5 |
Device Export Tool |
Retrieves device information from the BAC backup database and exports the information to a flat file. |
Using the deviceExport.sh Tool, page 19-1 |
Disk Space Monitoring Tool |
Sets threshold values for one or more file systems. When these thresholds are surpassed, an alert is generated until additional disk space is available. |
Using the disk_monitor.sh Tool, page 19-4 |
Keytool Utility |
Manages certificates in a certificate store in support of HTTP over SSL services on the DPE. |
Configuring DPE Keystore by Using the Keytool, page 13-3 |
Password Reset Tool |
Enables you to temporarily reset bacadmin authentication to local RDU, when TACACS+ authentication is enabled. |
Using the resetAdminPassword.sh Tool, page 19-4 |
Event Monitor Tool |
Used to view the events that are being fired in Cisco BAC. |
Using the runEventMonitor.sh Tool, page 19-5 |