3
New Agent Features for 9i

Topics covered in this document include:

• Blackouts

• New Control Utility

Blackouts

Blackouts allow Enterprise Manager users to suspend any or all management and/or data collection activity on one or more managed targets. This capability permits maintenance or emergency operations to be performed

Specifically, blackouts can suspend:

• Events: All events registered on a target will not be evaluated or triggered for the duration of the blackout.

• Jobs: All jobs submitted to a target will not be scheduled or run for the duration of the blackout. Job skipped notifications will be sent to the Enterprise Manager Console for regular interval jobs scheduled during a blackout on a target.

• Data Collections: All current historical data collection activities for a target are stopped. However, loading of data collected for a target prior to the blackout will continue as long as the database is up. New collections can be submitted but will not proceed unless the blackout ends.

Defining Blackouts

Blackouts must be created at the target-level, i.e., they must be defined on the node where the Intelligent Agent resides. Blackouts are controlled with a command line interface. The blackout subsytem associates any command line request with a special type of Agent user called the CLI user. Only one immediate blackout can be set at a time. Multiple target blackouts can exists simultaneously.

Once in effect, blackouts cannot be modified. To change the status of a particular blackout, you must first delete the existing blackout and then re-create a new blackout with the desired changes.

Blackout Command Line Interface

The blackout command line tool exists on the node where the Agent resides and can be used by administrators to set/cancel blackouts. The Intelligent Agent must be running in order to set a blackout. User commands are as follows:

Table 3-1

agentctl start blackout  [-d [DD] HH:MM] [<target name>]

agentctl stop blackout [<target name>]

agentctl show blackout

Command Line Examples

The following examples illustrate how to use the blackout command line utility under different situations and the output generated.

Situation 1: You want to start a blackout on the target vnukal-pc.world for 10 minutes.

$ agentctl start blackout -d 0:10 vnukal-pc.world
Blackout registered on vnukal-pc.world database

Situation 2: You want to stop any blackout set by (the CLI user) effective on target vnukal-pc.world. Note: Blackouts set by other Agent users are not cancelled.

$ agentctl stop blackout vnukal-pc.world
Blackout canceled on vnukal-pc.world database

Situation 3: You want to start blackouts on all managed targets for an indefinite length of time. This is equivalent to blacking out the entire Agent.

$ agentctl start blackout
Do you wish to blackout the entire agent (Y/N) ? [N] y
All targets on the agent are blacked out.

Situation 4: You want to stop blackouts on all registered targets.

$ agentctl stop blackout
Do you wish to cancel blackout on all targets (Y/N) ? [N] y
Blackout canceled on all targets.

Situation 5: You want to know the status of blackouts on a target.

$ agentctl status blackout 
vnukal-pc.world is blacked out. Blackout will end in 2 hours.

Situation 6: You want to set a blackout on a target whose name matches another target of a different type. In this case, the command line interface allows you to interactively select the desired target.

$ agentctl start blackout payroll 
Following targets matching "payroll" have been found.
1.  payRoll ( Database )
2.  payRoll ( Listener )
Choose the target to blackout [1] : 2
Blackout registered on "payroll" listener

New Control Utility

Beginning with the 9i version of the Intelligent Agent, the Intelligent Agent has its own control utility.