Importing Management Packs
After the initial
installation, OpsMgr includes only a few management packs. The
management packs contain all the discoveries, monitors, rules,
knowledge, reports, and views that OpsMgr needs to effectively monitor
servers and applications. One of the first tasks after installing OpsMgr
2007 is to import management packs into the system.
There is a large
number of management packs in the Internet catalog on the Microsoft
website. These include updated management packs, management packs for
new products, and third-party management packs. It is important to load
only those management packs that
are going to be used because each additional management pack increases
the database size, adds discoveries that impact the performance of
agents, and in general clutters up the interface.
The key management packs for an Exchange Server 2010 environment follow:
For each of these
management packs, it is important to load the relevant versions only.
For example, if the environment includes Windows Server 2008 only, load
only the Windows Server Core OS 2008 management pack. If the environment
includes both Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008, load both
the Windows Server Core OS 2003 and the Windows Server Core OS 2008.
In versions of OpsMgr
prior to R2, the management packs had to be downloaded from the
Microsoft website one by one, the MSI installed one by one, and the
management packs imported one by one. Dependencies would not be checked
unless additional steps were taken to consolidate the management pack
files prior to importing. This was a labor-intensive process. Also,
there was no easy way to check for updates to already installed
management packs.
In OpsMgr 2007 R2, a
new Management Pack Import Wizard was introduced. This wizard connects
directly to the Microsoft management pack catalog and downloads, checks,
and imports management packs. It even does version checks to ensure
that the management packs are the latest versions. This is a huge
improvement over the old method to import management packs.
To import the key management packs, use the following steps:
1. | Launch the Operations Console.
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2. | Select the Administration section.
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3. | Select the Management Packs folder.
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4. | Right-click the Management Packs folder and select Import Management Packs.
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5. | Click the Add button and select Add from Catalog.
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6. | Click the Search button to search the entire catalog.
Note
The
View pull-down in the Management Pack Import Wizard includes four
options, which are All Management Packs in the Catalog, Updates
Available for Installed Management Packs, All Management Packs Released
in the Last 3 Months, and All Management Packs Released in the Last 6
Months. The Updates option will check against the already installed
management packs and enable the download of updated versions of those.
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7. | Select
the key management packs from the preceding bulleted list and click Add
for each of them. Each of the major management packs might include a
number of submanagement packs for discovery, monitoring, and other
breakdowns of functionality.
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8. | When done adding management packs, click OK.
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9. | The
wizard now validates the added management packs, checking for versions,
dependencies, and security risks. It allows problem management packs to
be removed and dependencies to be added to the list.
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10. | Click Install to begin the download and import process. Progress will be shown for each of the management packs imported.
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11. | After all the management packs complete, click Close to exit the wizard.
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After the
import completes, the management packs take effect immediately. Agents
begin discovering based on the schedule specified in the management
packs and monitors and rules begin deploying.
