Table of Contents
Distributing Policies
Use the Distribution Manager application to distribute policies to network devices. These sections describe the use of Distribution Manager, and other tasks associated with distributing policies:
The Distribution Manager serves three main functions:
- Starts the process of distributing the policies to network devices.
- Monitors the progress of the policy distribution process on PDPs and network devices.
- Tracks and archives job history.
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Note For the scope of this chapter, the term "job" refers to a Distribution event---all activities that occur with a policy as it is deployed to a PDP. This includes errors and history tracking. |
The distribution proceeds as follows:
- The Distribution manager notifies all PDPs about a new distribution event.
- On receiving such an event, PDPs fetch the policies from the QoS database on the QPM server and download them to the devices. (The Distribution manager does not directly communicate with devices.)
- After deployment, policies are automatically exported to a directory if Policy Export Directory settings are defined.
QPM-COPS supports multiple projection and multiple deployment of Policy databases. You can deploy a database while another deployment/projection process is running.
Before You Begin
Before you begin, make sure you have set Policy Export Directory Settings.
See "Getting Started" for more information.
When you finish creating your policies and QoS configurations, you can deploy those settings to network devices.
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Note Deployment distributes the policies and QoS configuration in the database to all PDPs whether on the same system as the QPM server or on remote systems. Each PDP downloads the appropriate policies to its assigned devices. |
Procedure
Step 1 In the menu bar, choose Distribution Manager. The Current Deployment Job page appears with the Distribution Manager option bar.
Step 2 In the option bar, choose Deploy. The Deploy page appears.
Figure 8-1: Deploy Page
Step 3 Complete the fields as desired. The fields are as follows:
- Owner---The login userid is given.
- DB Version---The current database is highlighted by default. You may choose a different database from the dropdown list.
- Job Name---This is the name of the deployment job.
- Resolve CNR tags---Check this box if you want automatic resolution of CNR tags. Otherwise, the deployment may rely on cached data. Click Preview if you want to preview the CNR tags as they will be deployed.
- Resolve DNS names---Check this box if you want automatic resolution of DNS names. Otherwise, the deployment may rely on cached data. Click Preview if you want to preview the DNS names as they will be deployed.
Step 4 Click Deploy. The database is deployed to the devices. This may take a few minutes.
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Note If you make changes to a policy database, you must save the changes before you deploy the database. |
Step 5 The Current Job page appears displaying details of the deployment process.
Related Topics
The Job Details page is divided into several sections:
Figure 8-2: Job Details Page
The Job Details box contains the following fields:
- Job Details---The name of the job is listed here.
- Job Number---A unique number that identifies the job.
- DB Version---This is the policy database that was deployed for this job.
- Owner---This is the login of the person who deployed the job.
- Start Time---This is the time that the deployment started.
- End Time---This is the time that the deployment finished.
This link takes you to the Roles page. (See "Working with Roles and Policies" for more information.)
The deployment status shows the status of job deployment to the devices. The statistics reveal how many PDPs and devices have received and implemented the deployment.
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Note In the case where the information listed in this Deployment Status is different than the information listed in the Deployment Status in the PDP table (see PDP Table), the information in the table is more updated. |
The Expand All link expands the view of the PDP table in the lower half of the page. For each PDP, it displays any devices that are currently connected to that PDP.
The Show All Devices link displays a different table with a list of devices.
Figure 8-3: Show All Devices Page
These devices can belong to one of three categories:
- Never connected---These include all devices that are known to the Device Configuration but are not connected to a PDP.
- Unknown to the Device Manager---These are devices that are connected to PDPs but about which the Device Configuration does not know. (The Device Configuration does not know about devices which you directly configure.)
- Reported by PDP---These are devices that are currently active. They are connected to a PDP, but may or may not be known to the Device Configuration.
You can choose to view one of these categories (from the Show Devices dropdown list) or All to display all devices in this table.
The fields in the table are as follows:
- ID/IP---This is the identification or the IP address of the device.
- Type---The device identifies its client type when it connects to a PDP. If the device has never been connected, the client type is unknown. Type can be either DS client, RSVP client, or N/A.
- Deployment Agent---This field shows either the PDP to which this device is connected or N/A.
- Connected---Displays whether the device is Connected to a PDP or Unreachable.
- Status---The choices for this field are Normal, Completed, In Progress, Failed, or Completed with Warning.
- Messages about device status are stored in the Policy Information Base (PIB) database. After policy distribution, devices report on whether they can succeed or fail with the policy execution and deliver warning and error messages. These messages appear as PIB messages. Click the link to view the PIB message. The following page appears:
Figure 8-4: PIB Message Page
- Primary PDP---This field can contain any of the following data:
- For devices which are not connected to a PDP, the primary PDP IP addresses both COPS-PR and COPS-RSVP protocols are displayed.
- For devices connected to a PDP, only the particular protocol with which the device communicates to the PDP is listed.
- N/A---This is listed for devices whose information is obtained from the Device Configuration only and not from the PDP.
- Unknown---This indicates devices that are unknown to the Device Configuration.
- Assigned---This lists the IP address for each protocol that runs between the device and a PDP.
- Unassigned---This indicates devices about which Device Configuration knows, but which have no primary PDP.
- Select list box---The Select list box enables you to quickly choose the entire group for redirection. The choices for this list box are as follows:
- blank---All of the check boxes in the Primary PDP column are left blank. You can choose which devices you want to redirect.
- all---Enables all check boxes in the Primary PDP column.
- none---Clears all checked check boxes in the Primary PDP column.
- Redirect button---If a device is connected to a PDP that is not its primary, a check box appears in the Primary PDP column for that device. Check this box and then click Redirect to redirect its assignment to its primary PDP. (In this case, the Deployment Agent and the Primary PDP will be the same.) This redirect may take a few minutes before you see the results on the page.
The following fields are in the PDP table:
- Initial icon---There are two icons that can appear in the first column:
Table 8-1: Initial Icon in the PDP Table
| Icon
| Meaning
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| Click this icon to deploy the Policy Database to an LDAP device via a projector. The copy of the database can be used by other applications.
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| Click this icon to reach the Lost Devices page. This page displays devices that have this PDP listed as their primary, but are connected to another PDP. You have the option to redirect the devices to their primary PDP.
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- PDP Name---Name and link to a PDP or LDAP Projector. Click this link to access a page with information about that PDP only.
- Type---The choices for this field are either LDAP Policy Export Service (for LDAP projector) or Device Deployment Agent (for PDP).
- Connected---This field displays Connected with the connection time, Unreachable if it is turned off or otherwise not available, or N/A if the device is not connected.
- Deployment Status---For an LDAP device, the choices include Normal, Completed, In Progress, or Failed. For a PDP, the statistics display the sum of the PDP-to-device status.
- Status---The choices for this field are Normal, In Progress, Failed, or Warning.
- Status String---This field is reserved for future use.
Related Topics
The QPM Distribution Manager keeps a read-only archive of deployment job history.
Procedure
Step 1 Select History from the Distribution Manager option bar. The following page appears:
Figure 8-5: Job History Page
The current job is highlighted in pink. Other job history details provide information on how the system was configured at a particular point in history. This information may be useful for troubleshooting a problem or compiling statistics.
The fields in this page are as follows:
- Mark---See Deleting Old Jobs for a complete explanation.
- Job Name---The name of the job is listed here.
- DB Version---This is the policy definition that was deployed for this job. Only the policy definition for the current job is listed.
- Owner---This is the login of the person who deployed the job.
- Start Time---This is the time that the job started.
- End Time---This is the time that the job finished.
You may delete old jobs from the Job History archive.
Procedure
Step 1 Selecting History from the Distribution Manager option bar.
Step 2 For each job you want to delete, click the check box for that job under the Mark column.
Step 3 Click the Delete button. The selected jobs are deleted from the Job History archive.
You can detect devices in the Distribution Manager based on the real-time PDP-device connection information. You can display detected devices that were connected to PDPs by an external method, such as Telnet. You can then add one or more of these devices to the Device Configuration database. Refer to "Working with Devices" for more information.
Posted: Wed Jul 12 10:52:29 PDT 2000
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