TADDM Change Detection Connector

Use the TADDM Change Detection Connector to communicate with IBM® Tivoli® Application Dependency Discovery Manager (TADDM) database for directly detecting changes using TADDM Java APIs (TADDM SDK).

Introduction to TADDM Change Detection Connector

TADDM is a management tool that supports configuration items (CIs) and relationships between them. This configuration information is collected through periodic automatic discoveries, which can scan the entire application infrastructure of a business organization. The collected data includes deployed software components, physical servers, network devices, virtual LAN and host data.

When an initial scan is performed, all subsequent discoveries detect new changes, if any, which are occurred in the infrastructure. The TADDM Change Detection Connector directly retrieves these changes without scanning the entire TADDM database.

The TADDM Change Detection Connector is based on TADDM Connector and shares the following common features:

• Supports both the unified schema to exchange data with all CDM-related components:
  • Native mode - direct data representation
  • IdML mode - unified schema created for consistent data transfer between CDM-aware systems.
• Support for configuration items and relationships between them.
• Uses system attributes such as $classType, $id, and $cycle.
• Retrieves additional information for each configuration item, for example, the owning Management Software System, extended and domain attributes.
• Uses iterate-all function to iterate all CDM class types present in TADDM.

The TADDM Change Detection Connector operates only in Iterator mode.

TADDM change detection

The TADDM Change Detection Connector detects changes for a specified time interval, for example, from 01 Jan 2010 00:00:00 to 10 May 2010 02:00:00. If the interval is not specified, the connector detects changes from the earliest possible date 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 and returns everything since then.

In the TADDM Change Detection Connector, the changes are retrieved at discrete points in time. If the waiting period is 180 seconds, the reported changes are shown at the end of this interval, when compared to its beginning. Therefore, if a configuration item is created and updated several times, the output shows a single create and a single update event. Because the content of configuration items is updated at the end of the waiting interval, both the events show the same attributes. If a configuration item is created and subsequently deleted, no event is returned because it did not exist at either end of the waiting interval. If you require a more fine-grained detection, reduce the value of the Sleep Interval parameter.

Delta tagging support

The TADDM Change Detection Connector provides Delta tagging at the Entry level. This connector sets only the Entry operation depending on the change type.

For example:

*** Start dumping Entry
	Operation: delete
	Entry attributes:
	guid (replace):	'30EFCB75FDAF3B3F92274803BAE6FB01'
	$classType (replace):	'sys.linux.LinuxUnitaryComputerSystem'
	$id (replace):	'30EFCB75FDAF3B3F92274803BAE6FB01'

In this example, a deleted model objects, and its Guid is shown. Also, for the added or modified objects, the attribute list is shown. The IdML mode is used in this example.

*** Start dumping Entry
	Operation: add
	Entry attributes:
	$classType:	'sys.ComputerSystem'
	$id:		'CBEEDF3618633CDFA56039E39AE833FF',
	cdm:Guid:	'CBEEDF3618633CDFA56039E39AE833FF',
	cdm:Signature:	'testSignature',
	cdm:CreatedBy:	'administrator',
	cdm:LastModifiedTime:	1279790297569,
	cdm:DisplayName:	'testDisplayName'

The Entry operation can be get or set as shown in the following script.

var entryOperation = work.getOperation();	//get entry operation

work.setOperation("modify");			//set entry operation 
work.setOp ("m");

For more information about Delta tagging and other Delta features, see the "Delta Features" section in IBM Tivoli Directory Integrator V7.1.1 Users Guide.

Data source schema of TADDM Change Detection Connector

This section describes input schema of TADDM Change Detection Connector.

Input schema

The following table lists attributes of the Input Map.

Configuration

This section describes the parameters of TADDM Change Detection Connector.

Artifact Type

Use this parameter to specify the resource type, Configuration Item or Relationship, to be processed by the connector.

Class Type

Use this parameter to specify the type of configuration item or relationship to be processed.

Note:

If this parameter is not specified when reading from TADDM, for example, in Iterator or Lookup operation mode, all configuration items or relationships are traversed.

If this parameter is not specified when writing to TADDM, an appropriate class type is supplied at run time.

To select a supported class, click the Select button in the Configuration Editor.

IdML Mode

Use this parameter to specify whether the IdML compatible data to be used for processing or not.

Depth

Use this parameter to specify the level of relationships to be traversed when reading model objects from TADDM.

Hostname

Use this parameter to specify host name of the TADDM server.

Port

Use this parameter to specify the port number to connect to the TADDM server. If this parameter is not specified, the default port number of the TADDM SDK is used.

Username

Use this parameter to specify a valid user ID to login to the TADDM server.

Password

Use this parameter to specify the password associated with user ID for the TADDM server.

TADDM SDK

Use this parameter to specify the location of TADDM SDK.

Note:

The TADDM SDK must be on the same system, where Tivoli Directory Integrator instance, with the TADDM Connector, is running.

Also, the TADDM server version and TADDM SDK version must be same. For example, if TADDM 7.1.2 server is used, the TADDM 7.1.2 SDK must be on the same system, where Tivoli Directory Integrator instance, with the TADDM Connector, is running.

Click the Select button in the Configuration Editor to locate the TADDM SDK.

Iterator State Key

Use this parameter to store the last change processed by the connector. The connector resumes from this stored timestamp when restarted. Click the Delete button in the Configuration Editor to delete currently stored timestamp and restart the change detection from the beginning.

Start At

Use this parameter to specify the timestamp from which the connector starts reading Entries when the Iterator State Key parameter is blank. If this parameter is left blank, all changes from 01/01/1970 00:00:00 are detected. If the EOD (End Of Data) option is selected, the connector returns changes that are occurred after it is started.

To specify a past timestamp, use the current TADDM server time as a reference point. Click the Check time button to get the current of TADDM server time. If a value beyond the current server time is specified, the current time is used for change detection.

Create

Use this parameter whether to detect changes for created model objects.

Update

Use this parameter whether to detect changes for updated model objects.

Delete

Use this parameter whether to detect changes for deleted model objects.

State Key Persistence

The State Key Persistence parameter specifies when to save the timestamp in the System Store. The choices are:

• After read - System Store is updated every time a change is read.
• End of cycle - System Store is updated with the Iterator State Key when all connectors and other components in the AssemblyLine are evaluated and are run.
• Manual - System Store is not updated with the connector state details. You need to use the taddm-cd-connector-name.connector.saveStateKey() method from the hook or AssemblyLine.

Sleep Interval

Use this parameter to specify the sleep interval before querying TADDM server again for the new changes. The default value, 180 seconds, is used if this parameter is left blank.

Timeout

Use this parameter to set the maximum timeout in seconds for the connector to wait for the next change detection. If a value of zero is specified, the connector waits indefinitely or until there are changes in the database. If this parameter is blank, the value zero is considered.

For example, if the poll interval is 180 seconds and the timeout is 300 seconds, the connector checks for changes, waits for three minutes, checks again and exits if there are no changes.

MSS Guid

Use this parameter to specify the Management Software Systems (MSS) Guid from the TADDM server. MSS Guid can be used as a filter when reading or can be added to the new configuration item when writing.

Click the Select MSS button in the Configuration Editor to select an MSS Guid.

Use SSL

Use this parameter to indicate whether an SSL connection needs to be established on the TADDM server.

Domain Attributes

Use this parameter to specify whether the connector input to be enhanced or not with domain information such as host or port.

Note:

The domain data is available only in enterprise TADDM infrastructures.

Extended Attributes

Use this parameter to specify whether a non-CDM data to be used for a specific configuration item and are defined only for a certain class type of items.

MSS Information

Use this parameter to specify whether to return the information or not for the MSS associated with the read item. You can also have a stand-alone item, which is not associated with the MSS.

See also