Port/Interface alarming in CA Spectrum when a port/interface model goes down

Products

• CA Spectrum
• DX NetOps

Issue/Introduction

Out of the box, Spectrum does not proactively monitor port/interface models to determine the status and alarm if it detects the port/interface has gone down. The primary reason this is not done is because the port/interface model is the most common model in the database. Some databases could have 100,000+ port/interface models. Monitoring all of these port/interface models out of the box could have a significant performance impact. 

For most Spectrum users, there is only a specific subset of port/interface models they wish to monitor. For example, critical router and switch ports/interfaces. Spectrum can be configured to proactively monitor these ports/interfaces.

Environment

Release: All Supported Releases

Component: SPCAEM - Events and Alarms

Resolution

The port/interface models in Spectrum have a special set of attributes that can be used to tell Spectrum to proactively monitor the model to determine the status and alarm should Spectrum determine the port/interface model is down. These are:

Link Down trap - The device first needs to be configured to send link down traps to the SpectroSERVER system. When set to process the trap, Spectrum will assert a Critical "BAD LINK DETECTED" alarm on the interface model associated with the trap.

AlarmOnLinkDownTrap
Attribute ID: 0x11fc2
Determines how CA Spectrum handles a Link Down trap on this particular port. (0 for ignore the trap, 1 for process the trap).

In addition, the interface can be configured to assert a Minor alarm on the device model when a link down trap is received.

AssertLinkDownAlarm
Attribute ID: 0x12957
Determines whether CA Spectrum generates a yellow alarm on the device model when a link-down trap is received for this port.

Live Links (Pipes) - When Live Links is enabled on a link between two models, Spectrum automatically sets the value of the ok_to_poll attribute to True for both ports/interfaces associated with the link and proactively polls the status of both port/interface models associated with the link. Should Spectrum determine either of the ports/interfaces are down, then Spectrum will assert a Critical "BAD LINK DETECTED" alarm on the port/interface model and also turn the color of the link to red.

ok_to_poll
Attribute ID: 0x11dd8
Controls whether the pipe associated with this port is live. The status of the port is polled. Valid values are TRUE or FALSE.

PollPortStatus - Enabling PollPortStatus tells Spectrum to proactively poll for the status of the port/interface and if it detects the port/interface is down, will assert the "BAD LINK DETECTED" alarm on the port/interface model.

PollPortStatus
Attribute ID: 0x1280a
Controls status polling of a port whose connectivity is not modeled. Valid values are TRUE or FALSE.

In order for any status alarming to occur on a port/interface model, the GeneratePortStatusAlarms attribute must be set to True on the port/interface model. If set to False, then no status alarms will be asserted no matter what AlarmOnLinkDownTrap, ok_to_poll or PollPortStatus is set to.

GeneratePortStatusAlarms
Attribute ID: 0x12a54
Indicates whether a port status alarm is generated on this port. Valid values are TRUE or FALSE.

As stated previously, these attributes exist on the individual port/interface model and must be set on the individual port/interface model. The user can set these in a number of different ways:

1. Find and select the port/interface model and use the Attributes tab to set the value
2. Find and select the port/interface model, right mouse click and select Utilities-> Attribute Editor and use the Attribute Editor to set the value
3. Use the Locator to find a group of port/interface models then use the Attribute Editor to set the value of the group.
4. Create a Global Collection to find a group of port/interface models and then use a Policy to set the value