Newly discovered device shows old deleted devices Alias value.

Products

CA Infrastructure Management CA Performance Management - Usage and Administration DX NetOps

Issue/Introduction

Environment

All supported Performance Management releases

Cause

When a device is first discovered via any data source, we automatically set the intial value of Name Alias to the same value as the device Name. This is never updated/changed again without user interaction. It is stored in the t_device.AlternateName field value in the database.

If the DA is the only Data Source (DS) contributing that device, when it is deleted from the DA we remove its alias values.

If the DA is one of multiple DSs contributing that device, when it is deleted from the DA it is removed from the dst_device table.

But because other DSs also contribute this device, the t_device table entry remains that contains the initial value of AlternateName.

That is the case here due to the devices being contributed by the Spectrum and NFA DSs alongside the DA. Even though deleted from the DA the alternatename remains in t_device for these devices.

We intentionally don't update the alias value after first setting it post 1st time discovery in the event users are setting alias values manually. We don't want to overwrite those changes.

But that leaves customers such as this out in the cold due to this "loophole" (for lack of a better term...) in the code. This user never set the Alias and want's it to just match the real Name.

Resolution

There are a few ways to resolve this issue.

A: Delete the devices from the DA, Spectrum and NFA. When Global Sync shows updates after those actions, and the devices no longer appear in CAPM Global Search results, rediscover the devices in the DA, Spectrum and NFA. When it resyncs the new items to the PM inventory it will set the alternatename Alias to the Name and correct this.

NOTE: Option A means you will lose all historical polled data for the deleted device and any component elements related to it.

B: The preferred mechanism, is via REST. The REST method is detailed here with an example:

https://techdocs.broadcom.com/content/broadcom/techdocs/us/en/ca-enterprise-software/it-operations-management/performance-management/3-7/apis/performance-center-rest-web-services/devices-web-service/set-the-alias-name-for-a-device.html

C: Using the update_alias_name.sh script to multiple devices at one time.

https://techdocs.broadcom.com/content/broadcom/techdocs/us/en/ca-enterprise-software/it-operations-management/performance-management/3-7/building/manage-devices/set-alias-names-for-multiple-monitored-devices.html

D: To edit a single device via the UI go to the devices context dashboard. Can get to this report by selecting the device name link from the Inventory->Devices list. On the Details tab, select the Pencil icon in the top right corner. This opens the Edit Properties window. The Alias name can be modified for a single device using that option.

Additional Information

Sample output from database showing issue is as follows. Note the following details:

Real device names and IP addresses have been changed to sample values.
In this case we see where the customer replaced 3800 model devices with newer 3900 model devices.
The IP address for the newly updated device remained the same as the one used for the old device.
ItemName and DisplayName match which show the correct and expected new device name
AlternateName shows old ItemName from 'old' device element

mysql> select itemid,itemname,itemdesc,v6_ntoa(Address),displayname, alternatename from t_device where itemname like 'device%'\G;

*************************** 1. row ***************************

itemid: 4994

itemname: device.domain.com

itemdesc: Cisco IOS Software, C3900 Software (C3900-UNIVERSALK9-M), Version 15.4(3)M5, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)

Technical Support: http://www.cisco.com/techsupport

Compiled Tue 09-Feb-16 06:02 by prod_rel_team

v6_ntoa(Address): 1.1.1.1

displayname: device.domain.com

alternatename: device.domain.com

*************************** 2. row ***************************

itemid: 4995

itemname: device2.domain.com

itemdesc: Cisco IOS Software, C3900 Software (C3900-UNIVERSALK9-M), Version 15.4(3)M5, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)

Technical Support: http://www.cisco.com/techsupport

Compiled Tue 09-Feb-16 06:02 by prod_rel_team

v6_ntoa(Address): 2.2.2.2

displayname: device2.domain.com

alternatename: device2.domain.com

2 rows in set (0.01 sec)