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System Requirements for IBM InfoSphere Guardium v9.0

Product Documentation


Abstract

This document summarizes the recommended hardware and supported databases and operating system platforms for IBM® InfoSphere® Guardium® v9.0.

Content

The Guardium products related to the specifications are: Database Activity Monitor; Advanced Compliance Workflow Automation; Enterprise Integrator; Vulnerability Assessment, Entitlement Reports, Data-Level Access Control; and, Central Manager and Aggregator.

Cross-Platform Security

Guardium’s cross-platform solution is ideal for heterogeneous environments because it supports all major DBMS data sources and protocols running on all major operating systems.

This table shows all data sources and versions currently supported in v9.0.

Data sourceSupported Versions
Oracle9i, 10g (r1, r2), 10g RAC,11gR1, 11gR2, 11g RAC
Oracle (ASO, SSL)9i, 10g (r1, r2), 11gR1, 11gR2
Oracle Exadata11gR2
Microsoft SQL ServerMS SQL Cluster, 2000, 2005, 2005 x64, 2005 IA64,
2008, 2008 x64, 2008 IA64, 2008 R2 x64/x32/Cluster, 2012 (Windows Platform only)
Microsoft SharePoint2007, 2010
IBM DB2 (Linux, UNIX)9.1, 9.5, 9.7, 10.1, 10.5
IBM DB2 (Windows)9.1, 9.5, 9.7, 10.1, 10.5
IBM DB2 Purescale9.8, LUW, 10.1, 10.5
IBM DB2 for z/OS11
IBM DB2 for i6.1, 7.1
IMS9, 10, 11, 12
VSAMsee OS version support, part of z/OS (not separately versioned)
IBM Informix10, 11.10, 11.50, 11.70, 12.10
Sun MySQL and MySQL Cluster5.0, 5.1, 5.5
Sybase ASE15, 15.5, 15.7
Sybase IQ15.0, 15.1, 15.2, 15.3, 15.4
IBM NetezzaNPS 4.5, 4.6, 4.6.8, 5,0, 6.0, 6.02, 7.0
PostgreSQL8, 9, 9.1, 9.2
Teradata12, 13, 13.10, 14
IBM BigInsights1.4
ClouderaCDH3 Update 2, 3, 4
CDH4
Cassandra1.2.x
CouchDB1.2.x
Greenplum DB4.0, 4.1, 4.2
Greenplum HD1.2
Horton Works1.2
MongoDB2.0, 2.2, 2.4
FTP
Window File Share (WFS)Windows 2003, 2008

Host-Based Monitoring

Unique in the industry, S-TAPs are lightweight software probes that monitor both network and local database protocols (shared memory, named pipes, etc.) at the OS level of the database server. S-TAPs minimize any effect on server performance by relaying all traffic to separate Guardium appliances for real-time analysis and reporting, rather than relying on the database itself to process and store log data. S-TAPs are often preferred because they eliminate the need for dedicated hardware appliances in remote locations or available SPAN ports in your data center.

This table shows all OS platforms and versions for which S-TAPs are currently available.

OS TypeVersion32-Bit & 64-Bit
AIX5.3Both (Note: DB2 SHM and Informix SHM on 32-bit AIX not supported)
6.1, 7.164-Bit
z/OS1.11 or higher
HP-UX11.11, 11.23, 11.31Both
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (includes
Oracle Linux) +
4, 5, 6Both
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for System z +5.4
SuSE Enterprise Linux +9, 10, 11Both
SuSE Enterprise Linux for System z +9, 10, 11
Solaris - SPARC9, 10, 11Both
Solaris - Intel10, 1110-Both, 11-64-Bit only
Windows2003, 2008, 2012Both
IBM i6.1, 7.1

+ Note: Linux kernels 3.16 and higher (this includes kernels 4.x) are not supported.
* Supports network activity monitoring, local activity via Enterprise Integrator

End of Service

Guardium supports database and operating system versions up to their End-of-Service (EOS), Premier, or Mainstream support end dates. For IBM, they are published in http://www-01.ibm.com/software/support/lifecycle/ for IBM. For other vendors, please contact your vendor representative to confirm their support end dates. IBM offers optional extended service support after EOS. Please contact your IBM representative for further information. Guardium will support the hardware system it is running on up to the End-of Marketing (EOM) date plus 5 years or end of support date, whichever is sooner.


Flexible Deployment

Guardium is available as a hardware or software offering, ensuring the solution can be easily deployed in a wide variety of environments. As a hardware offering, the solution is delivered with licensed software fully loaded and tested on a physical appliance provided by IBM (hardware appliance), When delivered as a software offering, the solution is delivered as software images ready to be deployed by the user on their own hardware (software appliance), either directly or as virtual appliances. While the software images can be installed on any VMware product, the VMware ESX server is the recommended platform for a virtual solution.

The following table summarizes major hardware requirements for software appliances. The Guardium solution is designed to work on Intel-based platforms with Xeon processors. Only platforms and hardware that are officially supported by RedHat Linux 5.8 can be used as Guardium platforms, however, not all officially supported RedHat Linux 5.8 platforms can be used. Platforms that require additional drivers or specialized post-install configuration are not supported at this time.

Recommended Resources per software/virtual appliance

ResourceRequired Range*Comments
Physical CPUs4-16 coresIntel XEON processors required
Virtual CPUsMinimum 4 vCPUs
RAM (32-bit)

8 GB (min) to 16 GB (max)

Quick search not supported on 32-bit

(64-bit)

16 GB (min) to motherboard max

With quick search enabled, it is required to use
24 GB

Some of Guardium's newer features are memory intensive. In order to take full advantage of these features, Guardium strongly encourages customers to have a minimum of 24 GB of RAM 4-core memory

With quick search enabled, Guardium requires a minimum of 24 GB of RAM 4-core memory.

Ports (NICs)

1 Gbit per second card recommended

10 Gbit per second card can be used in 64-bit system with sufficient memory

1-4Each port can be an actual NIC, or a virtual switch that can be configured to use multiple NICs, optionally with failover IP teaming.

Optional: The third port may also be configured to team with the primary interface in order to provide failover IP teaming. Alternatively, the last port on the device may be configured as a secondary management interface with a different IP, NETMASK and GW from the primary.

When using Inspection Engines to capture traffic (not
S-TAPs) on software appliances, additional ports may be required. Note that this collection method is not applicable for virtual appliances.

Multiple network interfaces is supported only on a Guardium hardware appliance. Guardium software appliance only supports one network interface.

Disk Size300 GB to 1 TBUsing RAID is recommended.

RAID-0, RAID-1, RAID 0+1, RAID 1+0 are supported.

Note: Larger disks may hold more audit records for longer periods of time, but are more likely to impact performance.

If customers want to work outside the required range, consult with Guardium Technical Support.

Disk Speed7200 RPM to 15,000 RPMWith 7200 RPM, scale back the sizing ratio by 70%
DVD Drive1
* Refer to IBM x2000 high end configuration table for physical ranges (See Software Appliance 9.0 Technical Requirements)

Application Monitoring

Guardium identifies potential fraud by tracking activities of end-users who access critical tables via multi-tier enterprise applications rather than direct access to the database. This is required because enterprise applications typically use an optimization mechanism called connection pooling. In a pooled environment, all user traffic is aggregated within a few database connections that are identified only by a generic application account name, thereby masking the identity of end-users.

InfoSphere Guardium identifies potential fraud by tracking activities of end-users who access critical tables via multi-tier enterprise applications rather than direct access to the database. This is especially important for applications that use connection pooling where all user traffic is aggregated within a few database connections, thereby masking the identity of end-users.

Guardium offers out-of-the-box support for the major off-the-shelf enterprise applications (see table below), and provides built-in tools to configure and add end-user identification for niche application and home-grown applications. Note: for most applications, some basic configuration is needed, to tailor the solution to your environment.



Supported Enterprise ApplicationsSupported Application Server Platforms
(for other enterprise & custom developed applications)
Oracle E-Business SuiteIBM WebSphere
PeopleSoftBEA WebLogic
SiebelOracle Application Server (AS)
SAPJBoss Enterprise Application Platform
Cognos+ Others based on customer demand
Business Objects Web Intelligence
+ Others based on customer demand

Original Publication Date

14 September 2012

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Document Information

Modified date:
16 July 2018

UID

swg27035836