Automating tasks

By creating event automation plans and applying them to specific systems, you can automate tasks and other responses to situations that occur in your systems-management environment. For example, when a specified threshold is reached or a specified event occurs, you can be notified by e-mail or phone. Or, you can configure an event automation plan to start a program on a system or change a system variable when a specific event occurs.

About this task

Important: If you are using predefined IBM® Flex System Manager roles, you must have SMAdministrator authority to use the automation tasks in the IBM Flex System Manager Web interface.
IBM Flex System Manager provides the Event Automation Plan wizard as a quick and simple way to create event automation plans that meet most systems-management needs. Using the Event Automation Plan wizard, you can create plans that monitor for the most typical situations in systems-management environments, including, but not limited to, the following examples:
  • Critical hardware events from all systems in your environment
  • Processor (CPU) use in a specific group of systems, such as all servers running Linux
  • All Common Agent managed systems to determine whether Common Agent goes offline
  • The status of updates that are underway
  • Disk space use in systems, such as those that store database data
Then, in response to the situations that you are monitoring, you can choose to send a page or e-mail, or you can start a program on a system. For more information about creating event automation plans and using the Event Automation Plan wizard, see "Creating an event automation plan."

The Event Automation Plan wizard also provides advanced event actions and event filter options that you can use to create event automation plans that can meet very specific needs in your systems-management environment.

Successful implementation of event automation plans requires planning and consideration of how you will implement them. Providing thoughtful descriptions for your event automation plans can be particularly helpful. For more information, see "Planning for event automation plan implementations."

  • Events, filters, and actions in event automation plans
    An event automation plan lets you automatically respond to a situation in your IBM Flex System Manager environment. By creating event automation plans and applying them to specific systems, you can be notified by e-mail, for example, when a specified threshold is reached or a specified event occurs. Or, you can configure an event automation plan to start a program on a system in response to the event.
  • Mapping SNMP traps to Flex System Manager events
    This topic explains how to modify the rules used to map SNMP traps to Flex System Manager events. This customization provides greater flexibility in what information gets presented to users and increases the event action plan filter options.
  • Viewing the automation manager summary
    You can view a summary of activity within the past 30 days that is associated with automation, including event automation plans, scheduled and run jobs, event management and Event Log, a list of systems with the most critical and warning events, and a list of the most frequent received critical and warning events. Note that information on this page is refreshed automatically when there are any changes.
  • Managing event automation plans
    Use event automation plans to automate tasks in your system-management environment. These plans are composed of event filters and event actions. The plans are triggered by events. You can create, copy, edit, deactivate, activate, and delete event automation plans. Also, you can view the Automation summary page.
  • Managing event actions
    Event actions specify the action that IBM Flex System Manager takes in response to a specific event or events. You can create, copy, edit, test, and delete event actions as well as view their properties. Also, you can record and view the history of an event action.
  • Managing event filters
    A filter specifies one or more events that you want your event automation plan to process. The event automation plan ignores any event instances that do not meet the specifications of the filter. You can create, copy, edit and delete event filters.
  • Exporting and importing event automation plans, event filters, and event actions
    Event automation plans, event filters, and event actions can be exported and imported as an XML file on the management node.
  • Migrating and importing event automation data from a previous version
    When you update and migrate IBM Flex System Manager, the existing event automation plans, event filters, and event actions are also migrated. You might also choose to import automation data that was created by using a previous version of Flex System Manager. A migrated or imported event automation plan that contains certain event actions might need to be reviewed to ensure that any related commands or tasks perform as expected.
  • Using command automation
    Use the Command Automation task to create, edit, copy, and delete command definitions. A command definition specifies and configures a command-line program that you want to run on a managed system. Anonymous command restrictions apply to command definitions.
Parent topic: Managing resources with the IBM Flex System Manager management software
Related tasks:
Creating an event automation plan