Sun Microsystems Sun Fire V480, Administration Manual

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C H A P T E R
11
Monitoring the System
When something goes wrong with the system, diagnostic tools can help you figure
out what caused the problem. Indeed, this is the principal use of most diagnostic
tools. However, this approach is inherently reactive. It means waiting until a
component fails outright.
Some diagnostic tools allow you to be more proactive by monitoring the system
while it is still “healthy.” Monitoring tools give administrators early warning of
imminent failure, thereby allowing planned maintenance and better system
availability. Remote monitoring also allows administrators the convenience of
checking on the status of many machines from one centralized location.
Sun provides two tools that you can use to monitor servers:
■
Sun Management Center
■
Sun Remote System Control (RSC)
In addition to these tools, Sun provides software- and firmware-based commands
that display various kinds of system information. While not strictly a monitoring
tool, these commands enable you to review at a glance the status of different system
aspects and components.
This chapter describes the tasks necessary to use these tools to monitor your Sun
Fire V480 server. These include:
■
“How to Monitor the System Using Sun Management Center Software” on
page 190
■
“How to Monitor the System Using RSC” on page 195
■
“How to Use Solaris System Information Commands” on page 203
■
“How to Use OpenBoot Information Commands” on page 204
If you want background information about the tools, turn to Chapter 6.