FileCatalyst Central

Introduction

FileCatalyst Direct has an optional management package called FileCatalyst Central that includes the ability to monitor Server and HotFolder “nodes” and send alarms according to status. With this package, the administrator may:

• View the status of nodes using the web-based console
• Remotely control and administer connected Server and HotFolder nodes
• Configure alerts to be sent using SNMP and/or email.

The package includes files needed to run the application, as well as the MIBs to be used by both SNMP v1 traps and v2c notifications.

The web-based console includes the ability to view ongoing transfers in real time, see the overall health of your system, and dig into transfer history and statistics. Administrators with full privileges may configure the monitoring console service, or launch Java applets for remote control of connected nodes.

Deployment Diagram

Web-based FileCatalyst Central is the centerpiece for monitoring and managing FileCatalyst Direct products. Within the console the administrator may view ongoing transfer tasks, check on alarms raised by any connected nodes, remotely control a FileCatalyst node, and configure nodes or FileCatalyst Central itself.

The above illustration shows how connections are configured for a full monitoring and management scenario:

1. FileCatalyst Central is deployed to a location reached through firewall and NAT:
   • The web interface is exposed via HTTP (port 8080 by default)
   • Administrative activities (node status, alarms, and remote management) are exchanged over TCP (port 12500 by default)
2. Web browsers allow the administrator to view and administer the system. There is typically no need on the administrator's end to configure the required connections:
   • The web interface is served by FileCatalyst Central over the HTTP port.
   • Remote administration applets are served passively by FileCatalyst Central over the TCP port.
3. FileCatalyst Servers are available for file transfer through firewall and NAT:
   • TCP and UDP for the control connection (port 21 by default)
   • UDP for the data port range (8000–8999 by default)
4. FileCatalyst Servers have the additional ability to report status, alarms, and other information to the console. Usually, no special configuration is needed on the server side to form this passive connection.
5. FileCatalyst HotFolders typically requires no configuration to form passive connections to the Server (for transfers), nor to the console (for reporting status, alarms, and other information).

Verify Java Version

FileCatalyst products require Java 1.6 or higher to function. Open a command prompt/terminal and type:

which will give you the version number of your Java installation.

If Java is present and sufficient, you are ready to begin installation. Otherwise, download and install Java from Java.com. Only Oracle products (HotSpot or OpenJDK) are officially supported.

Stop Service From Running

If upgrading rather than installing from scratch, you may have a FileCatalyst MonitoringAgent service already running. You must stop this service before proceeding.

Windows

1. Download the FileCatalyst MonitoringAgent installer (install_fc_monitoringagent.exe) to your desktop
2. Launch installer:
   • Vista/2003/2008/7: you should right-click the icon and select “Run as Administrator”. You will also need to trust the installer application.
   • 2000/XP: double-click icon to launch installer
3. Step through the wizard to choose installation directory and shortcut options
4. At end of wizard, click “Finish”
5. The application on Windows will automatically install and start as a service. Changes to the configuration file (if required – see guide below) only come into effect by stopping and restarting the service.

Linux, Solaris, AIX, Unix

1. Create directory at /opt/utechsoft/monitoringagent
2. Download tarball (fc_monitoring_agent.tar.gz) to this directory
3. Use GUI-based archive tool to unpack the tarball, or open a terminal and enter with the following commands:
   > cd /opt/utechsoft/monitoringagent
> gunzip fc_monitoring_agent.tar.gz
> tar –xvf fc_monitoring_agent.tar
4. Make a backup of the file maconfig.conf, naming it maconfig.bak or another easily identifiable name.
5. Open README and continue following the instructions in order to complete installation
6. The MonitoringAgent should be installed as a service. Instructions on how to accomplish this can be found in the ./service_wrapper/SERVICE_WRAPPER_README file.

Mac OSX

FileCatalyst Central is currently only supported for “standalone” execution:

1. Copy the Mac OSX zip archive (FileCatalystMonitoringAgentWC.zip) to your desktop.
2. Double-click the zip archive to extract the application to your desktop. A new icon (FileCatalystMonitoringAgentWC) will appear on the desktop.
3. Double-click the icon to launch the monitoring console. A small window will appear, presenting the user with the option to stop the server:
   

Configure FileCatalyst Central

Configure FileCatalyst Server

Monitoring is disabled by default. To allow the FileCatalyst Server to report to and be managed by FileCatalyst Central:

1. Click “Central Mgt” in the main menu at the left
2. Check “Enable remote monitoring…” checkbox
3. Set the address and port of FileCatalyst Central
4. Enter username and password set during configuration
5. You may also select the IP and Alias (an easy-to-recognize name of your own choosing) which the Monitoring Agent will use to contact and identify this Direct Server
6. Click “Apply”

Configure FileCatalyst HotFolder

A HotFolder will not be able to share its status and admin privileges with FileCatalyst Central until it has been enabled:

1. Click “Central Mgt” in the main menu at the left
2. Check “Enable remote monitoring…” box
3. Set the address and port of FileCatalyst Central
4. Enter username and password set during FileCatalyst Central configuration
5. You may also select the IP and Alias (an easy-to-recognize name of your own choosing) which the Monitoring Agent will use to contact and identify this HotFolder
6. Set which transfer events trigger a notification (note that “Success” is a valid notification as well; on a high-volume deployment you may not wish to notify for all successful transfers.
7. Click “Apply”

Main Page Views

1. Current Transfers
2. Bandwidth Usage Graph
3. Alarms Overview
4. Managed Nodes
5. Transfer Statistics

The first three share a common approach: up to ten records are displayed. To view more, the administrator will switch to a details view by clicking the header or selecting the view from the main navigation.

The fourth, “Transfer Statistics,” shows historical information related to volume of traffic, with retention of up to a week.

Main Page Data

Current Transfers

The columns are a subset of the full details seen in the Current Transfers view.

1. Select which server's bandwidth usage will be shown. Disconnected servers are grayed out.
2. Dark orange line: total bandwidth used on the selected server
3. Green line: total outbound bandwidth (clients downloading from server)
4. Blue Line: total inbound bandwidth (clients uploading to server)

Bandwidth Usage

1. Source/Destination: The alias or IP of source and destination nodes
2. Filename: The filename (minus full path) being transferred
3. Status: Specific activity occurring for the transfer task
4. Progress: Progress bar may be hovered to see percent as integer

Alarms Overview

The columns are a subset of the full details seen in the Alarm Details view.

1. Node: The FileCatalyst node raising an alarm or notification
2. Alarm Name: A label for the type of alarm
3. Severity: From “Notification” to “Critical”
4. Time: The date and time the alarm was first raised
5. Description: Plain-English description of the alarm

Managed Nodes

The columns are a subset of the full details seen in the Node Details view.

1. Node: Alias or IP of a FileCatalyst node (3rd-party clients are not managed)
2. Hostname: IP or “name” of the machine with FileCatalyst installed on it
3. # Alarms: How many alarms are currently raised by this node

Transfer Statistics

Each of the four statistics (Volume Transferred, Files Transferred, Successful Transfers, and Failed Transfers) has data available for the last hour, day, or week. Volume Transferred statistics will be shown using the most appropriate unit of measurement; small files will be in Bytes, while large transfers may use GB (Gigabytes) or TB (Terabytes).

Current Transfers

A continuously-updated view of the ongoing individual file transfers on the managed FileCatalyst system.

1. Source/Destination: The node's alias or IP is shown, along with an icon designating the product type. Administrators may click the alias to open a separate window with a remote administration applet for full control of the node.
2. Username: the name of the user account on the FileCatalyst Server.
3. Filename: the full filename plus extension(s) being transferred.
4. Start Time: Day and time the file transfer was initiated. Hover over (iOS single-tap) the item to see the full value in a tooltip.
5. Status: The current status of the file transfer. These statuses include: “Not Attempted”, “Success”, “Cancelled”, “Error”, “Transferring”, “Verifying”, “Compressing”, “Initializing”, “Updating Timestamp”, “Changing Permissions”, “Task Complete”, “Done Transfer”, “Checking”, “Creating Signature”, “Creating Delta”, “Rebuilding”, “Creating DMG”, “Moving with STOR”, “Reconnecting”, “Monitoring”. For a full description of each status, see Appendix: Status Codes
6. Progress: represented in terms of percentage (%) of total data to be sent (hover progress bar to see % as a number) and also as amount of data sent thus far. This amount is represented in Bytes, KB, MB, GB, or TB according to which unit is most appropriate.
7. Rate: current effective transfer rate in Kbps, Mbps, or Gbps according to which is most appropriate.
8. Packet Loss: percentage (%) of packets being dropped; this is a reflection of network conditions and how well your system is configured to prevent loss (for example, using congestion control).
9. File ETA: based on amount of data to send, as well as current effective rate, the system will estimate a time for arrival in dd:hh:mm format.

Nodes

Nodes are any instances of FileCatalyst or 3rd-party applications communicating with one-another within a FileCatalyst deployment. Richer details are available from FileCatalyst applications, though some details are available through the context of 3PP file transfers.

1. Node: the user-defined name for the node
2. Version: version number for the FileCatalyst node
3. Hostname: name of the machine to which the FileCatalyst product is installed
4. # Alarms: the number of alarms currently raised by this node
5. Highest Severity: Alarms have 5 degrees of severity, from “None” to “Critical”. This column shows the highest severity of any one alarm raised by the node
6. # Sessions: the total number of separate transfer tasks ongoing to and from this node
7. Transmit Rate: total rate for upload from this node, in the most appropriate unit of measurement (Kbps, Mbps, Gbps)
8. Receive Rate: total rate for download to this node, in the most appropriate unit of measurement (Kbps, Mbps, Gbps)
9. Discard: Remove this node from being monitored by FileCatalyst Central. Discarded nodes may reappear after they are restarted or after a configuration change on the node side.

Session History

This view shows an ongoing history of transactions with definable start and end times. A session begins when a file transfer is initiated between two nodes, and ends when the last file has been finalized or when the connection is otherwise closed.

1. Session ID: Unique ID for this particular session. Administrators may click this ID to see the individual file transfers that comprise the session. Columns for the session detail view reflect those of the “Current Transfers” view.
2. Source/Destination: The node's alias or IP is shown, along with an icon designating the product type. Administrators may click the alias to open a separate window with a remote administration applet for full control of the node.
3. Username: the name of the user account on the FileCatalyst Server.
4. Status: the final status of this session; may be “SUCCESS”, “ERROR”, or “CANCELLED”
5. Start Time: Day and time the session was initiated. Hover over (iOS single-tap) the item to see the full value in a tooltip.
6. Duration: Total time taken by the session in dd:hh:mm format
7. Total Transferred: amount of data sent during the transfer, represented in bytes, MB, GB, or TB according to which unit is most appropriate.
8. Avg Rate: The average effective speed of the transfer, in Kbps, Mbps, or Gbps as appropriate
9. Avg Packet Loss: percentage (%) of packets dropped for this session; this is a reflection of network conditions and how well your system is configured to prevent loss (for example, using congestion control).

Alarm Details

All alarms have multiple values assigned to them to better understand the fault and the service raising the alarm.

1. Details: Click the “+” widget to show details related to the row. Some of these details are already visible in the table row itself, but the expanded view provides the full text for each, along with some details not otherwise available:
   • Node Type: the type of FileCatalyst product raising the alarm (HotFolder, Server, Central)
   • Node Alias: user-defined name for the node
   • Node AgentID: a unique ID assigned to the node automatically during the installation process
   • Hostname: the machine name, if available
   • Node IP: IPv4 address for the machine if available; otherwise will show the IPv6 address
   • Alarm Name: the full name of the Alarm as used internally by FileCatalyst Central
   • Alarm State: the only expected value should be SET. Other alarms are moved to the Alarm History view
   • Alarm Severity: one of “Critical”, “Major”, “Minor”, “Notification”, “None” in descending order of urgency
   • Alarm TimeStamp: full date the alarm was raised, with GMT time zone
   • Alarm Description: human-readable description of the alarm, also containing technical information when relevant
   • Alarm Transaction: a unique transaction number for this particular instance of the alarm
2. Node: user-defined name for the node
3. Hostname: name of the machine with the FileCatalyst product installed to it
4. Alarm Name: a shortened version of the internal “Alarm Name” visible in the details view.
5. Severity: one of “Critical”, “Major”, “Minor”, “Notification”, “None” in descending order of urgency. Items in the severity column are also color-coded based on severity, with bold red being the most severe.
6. Time of Alarm: time the alarm was raised in dd:hh:mm format
7. Alarm Description: human-readable description of the alarm. If text is truncated, hover (iOS single-tap) to view in a tooltip, or click on the “Details” icon to view all alarm details including full description.
8. Discard All / Discard: Clicking “Discard All” in the header will discard all current alarms. Click “Discard” on a per-row basis to discard individual alarms. Note: discarding an alarm does not necessarily permanently remove it. If a node continues to have a communications error, for example, the alarm will be re-raised at the set interval. Notifications will not re-appear in this view once discarded.

Making Modifications

The only reliable way to work with this file is:

1. Stop the FileCatalyst Central application from running. In most cases, this will mean stopping the service.
2. Modify the configuration file using the editor of your choice
3. Save the configuration file
4. Run the FileCatalyst Central application. This will usually mean restarting the service.

The format of the configuration file is relatively straightforward. Hash symbols (#) denote comments, with the remaining parameters in a “parameter=value” syntax with each parameter having its own line. Here is a sample of the maconfig.conf file:

# Location of alarm history file and active alarm XML file.
# If full path if not indicated, a relative path is used (where JVM is launched).
FCMonitoringAgent.config.active.alarm.list=alarmactive.xml
FCMonitoringAgent.config.historical.alarm.log=alarmhistory.log

# List of agents to be monitored.
FCMonitoringAgent.config.agents=agentlist.xml

# Polling interval of MonitoringAgent towards monitored applications
# Default value once per minute (60000)
FCMonitoringAgent.config.polling.interval.millis=60000

Parameters Only Found in maconf.conf

Certain parameters are not exposed to the web interface. In some cases, the defaults are expected to provide the best scenario; in others there are practical limitations to exposing the parameter (for example, changing web server port).

• Windows service configurations: a collection related to how the service behaves in Windows. Among these are heap size parameters (wrapper.java.initmemory, wrapper.java.maxmemory) and Java class path (wrapper.java.classpath.x
• Wrapper Logging Properties: a collection related to logging behaviour:
  • wrapper.console.loglevel
  • wrapper.logfile
  • wrapper.logfile.format
  • wrapper.logfile.loglevel
  • wrapper.logfile.maxsize
  • wrapper.logfile.maxfiles
  • wrapper.syslog.loglevel
• Wrapper NT Service Properties: These properties may not be modified while FileCatalyst Monitoring Agent is installed as a service. Please uninstall the service before modifying, and then reinstall the service once complete.
  • wrapper.netservice.name
  • wrapper.ntservice.displayname
  • wrapper.ntservice.starttype
  • wrapper.ntservice.interactive

Alarm Polling

The MonitoringAgent handles fault management by polling active services. Should a fault occur and be cleared inside of the polling interval, alarms may not be raised.

The longer the polling interval, the longer it will require for the alarm condition to be raised.

Note: Communication between the FileCatalyst Server and the MonitoringAgent is verified/reestablished at every polling interval. If using the Server Administration GUI to view alarms, restarting the FileCatalyst Server (example, as the result of a configuration change) will automatically sever communication sockets, preventing alarms to be viewed until the next polling interval. It is recommended to have the polling interval value set to between 10 seconds to 5 minutes (5 000 to 300 000 ms).

Behavior based on Severity

All alarms that are sent out have a severity assigned to them. They are defined as follows:

• CRITICAL alarms indicate a complete loss of file transfer ability
• MAJOR alarms indicate a partial loss of file transfer ability
• MINOR alarms indicate a partial or complete loss of sub-functionality not related to file transfer
• NOTIFICATION alarms indicate a one-time event of interest

CRITICAL, MAJOR, or MINOR alarms that are SET will be explicitly cleared when the fault condition is resolved. A matching transaction number can be used to pair up SET and CLEAR alarms to indicate that the fault no longer exists. If the alarm condition persists after a set period (broadcast interval), the alarm will be resent to overcome possible message loss (email server down, SNMP UDP packet loss).

NOTIFICATION alarms have no matching CLEAR alarm sent out. Instead, the alarm is considered to have a limited lifetime (default 15 minutes) before the alarm is considered invalid and consumed (decay). If the alarm condition persists after the alarm has decayed, a new fault condition will be raised.

Alarms Currently Configured

UNLIMI-TECH-GENERAL-MIB

The general MIB contains general company information and structure. This sparse MIB provides a base of extensibility for future releases.

Currently, the only other available MIB in production is unlmtchAlarms:

UNLIMI-TECH-ALARMS-MIB

Alarms are the current central reasons for implementing SNMP at this stage (getters/setters are not implemented).

All traps (SNMPv1) and notifications (SNMPv2c) have the same set of varbinds sent out to help identify the source of the alarm. These correspond to roughly the variable entries in the AlarmBase:

• Varbind1unlmtchAlrmsAlarmType
• Varbind2unlmtchAlrmsSeverity
• Varbind3unlmtchAlrmsSeverityHRF
• Varbind4unlmtchAlrmsState
• Varbind5unlmtchAlrmsStateHRF
• Varbind6unlmtchAlrmsTransactionNumber
• Varbind7unlmtchAlrmsTimeStamp
• Varbind8unlmtchAlrmsTimeStampHRF
• Varbind9unlmtchAlrmsServiceDescr
• Varbind10unlmtchAlrmsServiceAlias
• Varbind11unlmtchAlrmsServerIP
• Varbind12unlmtchAlrmsServerHostname
• Varbind13unlmtchAlrmsAlarmDescription

Connecting to the FileCatalyst Central Database

FileCatalyst Central provides the ability to enable external access to its database of transfer information. For more information, please read the “Connecting to FileCatalyst Central Database” document.