Installing AIX robot using the nimldr utility in DX UIM 23.4.x

Products

DX Unified Infrastructure Management (Nimsoft / UIM) CA Unified Infrastructure Management On-Premise (Nimsoft / UIM) CA Unified Infrastructure Management SaaS (Nimsoft / UIM)

Issue/Introduction

Customer guidance on installing DX UIM robots on AIX in DX UIM 23.4.x or higher.

Environment

DX UIM 23.4
DX UIM Robot v23.4.3 for AIX includes support for:
- AIX v7.2
- AIX v7.3
Robot v23.4.3
As per Engineering, this process to install the 23.4.3 robot on AIX 7.2 and 7.3, will also work on DX UIM v23.4.1 and v23.4.2.

Cause

Robot install guidance for AIX 7.2 and 7.3

Resolution

Uninstall DX UIM Robot for an AIX system

Deactivate the robot if a robot is running:

./niminit stop
./niminit status

or stop the controller, hdb and spooler processes using kill -9.

Check for any leftover processes using ps -ef|grep nim

Then remove the robot installation directory, for example,

rm -rf <robot install directory>

e.g., rm -rf /opt/nimsoft

If wget is already installed on the AIX system, you may use it to download the appropriate nimldr tar file in the future when it becomes available (GA) at support.nimsoft.com, e.g., on the AIX system, cd /tmp and run-> /usr/bin/wget http://support.nimsoft.com/Files/Archive/00056/nimldr-23.4.3.tar.Z

Installing an AIX robot using the nimldr utility in DX UIM 23.4.x

Tested on DX UIM v23.4.3 a.k.a. CU3.
AIX 7.2/7.3 robot installation using nimldr v23.4.3.
Note that during the current install process outlined below, it might be a bit confusing when the installer displays the prompt and it shows AIX_6:
- "What is the installation file called?"
  ==>[install_AIX_6_64]
The installer package currently displays as "Installation archive for 64bit AIX 7.x" on the uimhome page, yet ultimately, it does use the correct file automatically->

http://<Primary_hub_hostname_or_IP>/uimhome/archiveFiles/install_AIX_6_64.zip
This version still currently contains the files necessary for the AIX 7.2/7.3 install. Engineering will be correcting it to "install_AIX_7_64" as soon as possible to avoid any confusion.

Required Files

aix_dependency_libs-1.0.0.zip for nimldr has been attached to this article and is included in the following Solution Doc:

23.4 CU3 Server Solution Doc
https://support.broadcom.com/web/ecx/solutiondetails?aparNo=99112347&os=MULTI-PLATFORM

Download the nimldr installer package and the dependent libraries

Download and extract the aix_dependency_libs-1.0.0.zip file (which will become available in the Nimsoft Support site soon), to /tmp/aix-ppc64.

The zip file contains the required libgcc_s.a , libiconv.a and libstdc++.a files and for now, it is attached to this knowledge article as well.

Download the nimldr.tar.Z installer package

- ***Note that nimldr.tar.Z-23.4.3 file is attached to this KB Article as nimldr.tar.Z. This will become generally available in support.nimsoft.com after the GA version is officially released.***

Installation Procedure

The following install process is just an example but it is taken from a live robot install.

login as: root
root@<robot_ip> password:

Double-check for any running/leftover robot processes: controller, hdb, and spooler using ps -ef|grep nim and if you stopped the robot but you see leftover processes use kill-9 to kill them.

Confirm the AIX OS version:

#oslevel
7.2.0.0

Check robot status:

#./niminit status
Subsystem Group PID Status
nimbus 12845538 active

Stop the robot if necessary:

#./niminit stop
0513-044 The nimbus Subsystem was requested to stop.

Check for leftover processes:
#ps -ef|grep nim

#cd /tmp
Download and use nimldr.tar.Z from this KB article from https://support.nimsoft.com

1. Unzip the nimldr installer package

gunzip nimldr.tar.Z

Note: if you get an error when trying to unzip via gunzip, try a different decompression method, e.g., uncompress nimldr.tar.Z

-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 32716800 Dec 16 16:07 nimldr.tar

#cd /tmp

2. Extract the nimldr package files

#tar -xvf nimldr.tar

Results
x aix-ppc64
x aix-ppc64/nimldr, 7451848 bytes, 14555 tape blocks
x hpux-ia64
x hpux-ia64/nimldr, 8021400 bytes, 15667 tape blocks
x linux-ppc64le
x linux-ppc64le/nimldr, 4739832 bytes, 9258 tape blocks
x linux-x64
x linux-x64/nimldr, 4222632 bytes, 8248 tape blocks
x linux-x86
x linux-x86/nimldr, 3838992 bytes, 7499 tape blocks
x solaris-sparcv9
x solaris-sparcv9/nimldr, 4426448 bytes, 8646 tape blocks

3. Change directory to the correct installer directory

#cd /tmp/aix-ppc64
#ls -la

drwxr-xr-x 2 root system 256 Dec 16 04:18 .
drwxrwxrwt 25 bin bin 4096 Jan 11 03:56 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 7451848 Dec 16 04:18 nimldr

4. Change Permissions

#chmod 755 on the directory where you saved the nimldr utility

chmod 755 /tmp/aix-ppc64

cd to the sub-directory to which your UNIX platform was copied and run,

#chmod 755 nimldr (to enable program execution)

#cd /tmp
#ls -l

...
drwxr-xr-x 2 root system 256 Dec 16 04:18 aix-ppc64
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 7943358 Jan 10 03:41 aix_dependency_libs-1.0.0.zip
...
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 2555802 Aug 5 18:22 libgcc_s.a
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 3041470 Aug 7 16:41 libiconv.a
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 35119291 Aug 5 09:22 libstdc++.a
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 32716800 Dec 16 16:07 nimldr.tar
...

Start the Robot install process

#cd /tmp/aix-ppc64
#ls -la

aix-ppc64:

drwxr-xr-x 2 root system 256 Jan 11 04:15 .
drwxrwxrwt 25 bin bin 4096 Jan 15 02:00 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 2555802 Aug 5 18:22 libgcc_s.a
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 3041470 Aug 7 16:41 libiconv.a
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 35119291 Aug 5 09:22 libstdc++.a
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root system 7451848 Dec 16 04:18 nimldr
-rw-r--r-- 1 root system 4338 Jan 11 04:21 nimldr.log

5. Run nimldr to install the robot on AIX

#./nimldr -I <robot_ip_address>
=====================================================
nimldr version 23.4.3 [Build 23.4.3.565, Dec 15 2024]
Copyright(c) 1998-2024, CA. All rights reserved.
=====================================================

This program will help you install the Nimsoft infrastructure components (such as a robot or a secondary hub) on the current system.

You will be given a series of questions, default answers are in brackets.

Example: <Question>? ==>[default]

Pressing Enter directly will use the default value, otherwise you should
type in the requested information.

If express installation is specified, the default value will be used
automatically.

A log of the installation can be found in the file: nimldr.log

Hit Enter/Return key to continue.
WARNING: The temporary files directory is removed after installation!

Where should nimldr store temporary files?
==>[/opt/nimsoft/tmp]
Beginning installation:

Do we have the installation file locally?
==>[no]

Is there a host running a Nimsoft Hub we can query for the installation file?
==>[yes]

What is the IP address of the host running a Nimsoft Hub?
==>[<robot_ip_address_default>] <Enter relevant Hub IP address>

Preparing to search for Archives:

What is the Nimsoft Domain called (*=search)?
==>[USXXXXXXX-example_domain]

What is the Nimsoft Hub called (*=search)?
==>[USXXXXXXX-example_domain_hub]

What is the installation file called?
==>[install_AIX_6_64]

Searching for Archives:

We need to log in to NMS to query for available archives

Attempting to log in to NMS...
Enter Nimsoft username and password...
Username: administrator
Password: <password>
1 /USXXXXXXX-example_domain/USXXXXXXX-example_hub/USXXXXXXX-example/distsrv
Beginning download of install_AIX_6_64
\
Done!

What are we installing? (1=Robot,2=Infrastructure)
==>[1]
Extracting files from archive /opt/nimsoft/tmp//install_AIX_6_64.zip to temp directory /opt/nimsoft/tmp/

Where should NMS be installed?
==>[/opt/nimsoft]

Automatically unregister Robot from Hub on termination?
==>[no]

Should this Robot run in passive mode?
==>[no]

What is this Nimsoft Domain called?
==>[USXXXXXXX-example_domain]

Which Nimsoft Hub should this Robot connect to?
==>[USXXXXXXX-example_domain_hub]

What is that Nimsoft Hub's IP address?
==>[<Hub IP address>]
inst_init.sh: Starting NimBUS

Cleaning up temporary files
Finished installation!
root@<hostname>(/tmp/aix-ppc64)#

Additional Information

Upon reboot of the AIX server, the nimsoft robot and its associated processes should start up cleanly.

root 5636370 8519958 0 04:57:57 - 0:00 nimbus(cdm)
root 8061210 1 0 04:28:59 - 0:00 ./nimbus /opt/nimsoft
root 8519958 8061210 0 04:57:51 - 0:00 nimbus(controller)
root 13173214 8519958 0 04:57:55 - 0:00 nimbus(hdb)
root 13500916 8519958 0 04:57:53 - 0:00 nimbus(spooler)

All bin/niminit stop, status and start commands should work as expected.

./niminit start
./niminit status
./niminit stop

Rt-click ->restart of the robot should work as expected.

Check the controller.log for further details/robot health check.

As of Jan. 15, 2025, DX UIM 23.4 CU 3 was released and nimldr and AIX robot install packages have been updated.

UIM Server 23.4 - Cumulative Update 3

Please refer to the techdocs for more information:

Deploy Secondary Hubs and Robots

Attachments

aix_dependency_libs-1.0.0.zip get_app

nimldr.tar.Z get_app