Help/Systems Opens SNMP Flow in Robot/TRAPPER

Published: January 17, 2006

by Alex Woodie

When Help/Systems debuted its simple network management protocol (SNMP) product, Robot/TRAPPER, about four years ago, the product offered the capability to gather and route messages from non-iSeries systems to an OS/400 server, where management decisions could be made. With the latest release of the product, Help/Systems has reversed this flow, and now enables users to gather and route SNMP messages from iSeries servers so users can manage them from enterprise systems management tools running on Unix and Windows boxes.

Help/Systems would have no trouble operating in an iSeries-only world, where the venerable OS/400 server was the sole provider of enterprise-strength computing, and nobody knew what a Unix, Linux, Windows, or mainframe server looked like. After all, developing tools for automating the operations of iSeries servers has been the lone goal of this Eden Prairie, Minnesota, company since it was founded, and the company still devotes 100 percent of its effort to developing iSeries tools.

But of course, we don't live in an iSeries-only world, and the reality is that companies of all stripes spend a significant amount of their time dealing with the operational differences of these platforms. To simplify matters, these multi-platform shops often pick the platform they're most comfortable with to control their other servers. Sometimes this is an iSeries server, and sometimes it's a Windows or a Unix server.

When the iSeries is the primary server in an organization, Help/Systems is more than happy to sell that organization one or more OS/400-based systems management tools from its Robot suite of products, which includes integrated components for backup and recovery, job scheduling, messaging automation, report distribution, virtual partition management, and performance monitoring, among other components.

Even if users had significant non-iSeries assets, Help/Systems would enable customers to monitor and control them to some extent through products such as Robot/TRAPPER and Robot/CLIENT. While Help/Systems supported other platforms, it was always from the standpoint of bringing those other platforms under the direction and control of an iSeries server and the vendor's collection of OS/400-based automation tools.

That iSeries-central view has skewed slightly with the release of Robot/TRAPPER version 1.12, which the company started shipping this month. With this release, Help/Systems is now enabling third-party systems management programs to view and respond to OS/400 messages, thereby putting a non-iSeries-centric management tool in control of the iSeries.

Robot/TRAPPER 1.12 does this by enabling two-way flow of SNMP traffic between iSeries servers and third-party systems management tools, such as IBM's Tivoli and Micromuse NetCool suites, Hewlett-Packard's OpenView suite, BMC's PATROL line, and Computer Associates' UniCenter suite. To make this work, users need another Help/Systems product, called Robot/CONSOLE, to capture OS/400 messages, which Robot/TRAPPER then sends to the third-party systems management tool as an SNMP trap. As long as the third-party systems management tool is properly configured to reply back to Robot/TRAPPER in the format that Robot/TRAPPER expects, then the system can be setup for monitoring and control of iSeries servers.

There are many third-party tools on the market that will give users the capability to manage iSeries servers from Unix and Windows machines, but this is a first for Help/Systems. It just depends on what customers need, says Tom Huntington, Help/Systems' vice president of technical services.

"There are just a ton of political battles out there, where the iSeries guys don't want to give up to the Unix guys, where the Unix guys don't want to give up to the Windows guys, and where the Windows guys don't want to give up to the iSeries guys," Huntington says. "It's a battle that goes on, who's going to manage what, and where are we going to manage from."

By enabling users to monitor and control iSeries servers from Windows or Unix boxes via Robot/TRAPPER, Help/Systems is providing increased flexibility, which benefits customers, Huntington says. "From a Help/Systems standpoint, we don't really care [where customers manage from], as long as we're in the mix for the iSeries."

Robot/TRAPPER 1.12 is available now. Pricing is tier-based and ranges from $1,600 to $19,700. Two-way SNMP flow also requires Robot/CONSOLE, which ranges in price from $2,500 to $39,600. For more information, visit www.helpsystems.com.