NerveCenterTM 3.8.08 is incompatible with previous releases of NerveCenter. There are changes to the software that prevent this version from interpreting with earlier releases of NerveCenter installed on other machines. Update all systems to v3.8.08.
The browser path must be entered correctly the first time NC is installed
When installing the NerveCenter Client and or the NCadmin the user is asked for a path to the browser. If this is not entered the during the first installation a subsequent installation will not correct the problem. The workaround is to uninstall and reinstall with the correct path the first time. (NerveCenter 3.7 and 3.8)
Installation of NCserver only on NT or Win2k results in message about registry permission
If you install the NerveCenter Server without the client and/or the ncadmin on either Win2k or NT then you will see two dialog boxes complaining about not being able to set registry permissions for the NC admins group and the NC users group respectively. This will not affect the behavior of the product. (NerveCenter 3.7 and 3.8)
SerializeDB import file types operate on both file types but only one is selected
The NerveCenter utility, SerializeDB, has an Import file to database option that enables you to import only .asc file types; however, SerializeDB will allow you (incorrectly) to also select .ncdb file types for import without displaying an error.
Some users might incorrectly think that the .ncdb file SerializeDB allowed them to select was actually imported. (NerveCenter 3.7 and 3.8)
Error message displays when disconnecting from a remote Server
When disconnecting a NerveCenter Client from a remote connection to a Windows server running an Access database, the following error message displays on the Client:
Can't remove system datasource
This message has no effect on the NerveCenter database; no data is lost.
Severities of nodes in node list do not show highest severity of current alarms
Nodes appearing in the node list should reflect the highest severity level of all of the alarms that have transitioned for that node. For example, if an alarm transitions a node to a Critical Severity but then another alarm transitions the node to a Minor Severity, then the aggregate severity for the node that appears in the node list should be Critical. In reality, the aggregate severity of the node in the node list changes to Minor. NerveCenter does not correctly track terminal states of alarms when those states have no outbound transitions.
You can run the ncstart script and the ncserver process will start, but when you run the ncstop script, the ncserver process will not stop. This is because after startup, ownership of the ncserver process changes to nervectr. To kill a process, you must be either "root" or the owner of that process (in this case the nervectr user).
When upgrading from NerveCenter 3.6 or 3.7 to 3.8 on UNIX systems, users (other than root) lose their Client and Administrator settings. The NerveCenter installation script does not translate user settings in the registry to an XML file, so things like autoconnect servers, alarm filters, and so on are lost for any users other than root.
Unable to access Netscape and online docs after installing NerveCenter
Prior to installing NerveCenter, Netscape Communicator 4.75, will run. After installing NerveCenter and running the ncenv environment script Netscape Communicator will no longer start. Instead, you now get the following error messages:
/usr/lib/dld.sl: Unresolved
symbol: fpsetmask(code) from
/opt/netscape/netscape
/usr/lib/dld.sl: Unresolved
symbol: fpsetmask(code) from
(dns helper)
You cannot load online documentation from the client. The solution is to remove /usr/lib from the SHLIB_PATH environment variable.This was put there by our ncenv script.
Server logs incorrect data for subobjects that are only partially supported in a polled agent's MIB
When NerveCenter polls an agent for more than one columnar object in a table -- and the first of these objects has more instances in the table than the secondary object has -- then "ghost" data for the missing instances of the second columnar object is logged to the log file if you have a Log-to-File action on the polling transition.
The workaround is to create an alarm that will transition out of ground on the table's index. In this way the user can poll (either separately or together) for the other attributes (outErrors, ifdescr) and use SNMPNOSUCHNAME to determine when the poll has reached the end of a row.
NetCool probe reports "Seagate Nerve Center" instead of Open NerveCenter
The NetCool probe reports NerveCenter informs to NetCool as coming from Seagate NerveCenter instead of Open NerveCenter. This is a NetCool problem.
The path to the NerveCenter CGI files is always defaulted to /program files/openservice/nervecenter even if the user installs NerveCenter using a different path. As a result, the user is unable to connect to the Webcollector. This only happens on a machine running Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS).
When NerveCenter is configured for SNMP v3 support and is installed co-resident with OpenView, OpenView does not successfully receive inform events from NerveCenter. This occurs because OVTrapD must be disabled before NerveCenter can support SNMP v3 communication, and NerveCenter uses ovtrapd to relay inform events to OpenView.
However, if NerveCenter is configured to send SYMBOL_ONLY or EVENT_AND_SYMBOL updates to OpenView, symbol color changes are successfully sent to OpenView.
NerveCenter terminates with an error when the NerveCenter Service is stopped
When the NerveCenter Service is stopped, it terminates and sends the following message to the Windows desktop:
ncserver.exe - Application
Error
The instruction at "0x7800d0b9"
referenced memory at
"0x00000005". The memory could
not be "written".
Click on OK to terminate the
application
Open modal dialog boxes appear to restrict activity in Client
On UNIX, NerveCenter Client appears to lock up if you are editing an alarm transition and click elsewhere within the main window while the alarm transition dialog box is still open.
If you're running CDE, modify the GUI settings from the toolbar. Select Window settings, turn off "Allow primary windows on top," then respond Yes to restarting your window manager. The dialog box now remains on top, forcing you to make any changes you need and select OK before attempting to use other elements.
If you choose to instead link the model directory to another location, make sure the other location is not a parent directory of NerveCenter (/opt and /opt/OSInc by default).
If this occurs, NerveCenter Client's browse feature (off of the Import Objects and Nodes dialog) will not be able to browse to your models, popping up an error dialog reading `no files found'.
Truncation of records from the log tables is not occurring at a reasonable point.
The NerveCenter Command Line Interface (CLI) incorrectly retrieves information about node severity. The information displayed through the CLI does not match severity information displayed in the NerveCenter Client's Node List window.
The NerveCenter Universal Platform Adapter (paserver) terminates when an OpenView Inform connection is made to it. The error is:
Run-time exception error;
current exception: xalloc No
handler for exception.
Paserver is not designed to handle OV informs, however, it is a very easy mistake to create the inform connection in the NerveCenter Administrator and forget to click the Netcool/Tivoli radio button.
NerveCenter unable to support eight-bit character sets used for internationalization
UNIX platforms require applications to set the LANG variable to a national locale for applications to be able to support eight-bit characters used in languages such as French and Spanish.
However, since all Open NerveCenter applications, and in particular, the ncserver process, does not run if the LANG variable is set to anything other than C, the variable binding information in a trap is not interpreted correctly when there are any eight-bit characters.
NerveCenter issues SNMP GETs for mismatches between a poll's base object and an alarm's subobject
NerveCenter issues SNMP GETs for polls even when there's a mismatch between a poll's base object and the associated alarm's subobject.
When an alarm's subobject (SO) does not match the poll's base object, the relevant trigger fired from the poll will never match the alarm's SO.
When using the NerveCenter Command Line Interface (CLI) and when more than one client is connected to the same server, issuing the command:
show server -c
causes NerveCenter to display information about the first server twice.
Client (sometimes) abnormally terminates and dumps core when attempting to edit an alarm
When attempting to edit an alarm, upon first opening the alarm the NerveCenter Client may crash and dump core. This does not happen all of the time, but it does happen often enough to be reproducible.
Client not properly notified of AutoClassification status on server startup
When the NerveCenter Server is auto classifying nodes at the time a NerveCenter Client connects, the connecting Client does not get an Autoclassify in progress... status bar message.
On the NerveCenter Administrator's Ports page, the SNMP Poll Port field enables you to specify the default port on the node used to communicate with SNMP agents. This feature is not working in version 3.7 or v3.8.08.
Repeated mouse clicking causes Client to abnormally terminate
When one performs actions in the NerveCenter Client that requires repeated mouse clicks, the Client can abnormally terminate.
NerveCenter uses white text automatically for all user-defined severities. If light colored backgrounds are chosen, severity text will not be readable. For pre-defined severities, NerveCenter is configured to use black text with light colored severities.
When the trigger ICMP_ERROR is fired after an SNMP poll, the trigger does not include variable bindings, such as uctype and uccode, that might be useful for determining the cause of the error. Currently, the trigger is fired along with PORT_UNREACHABLE, NET_UNREACHABLE, and/or NODE_UNREACHABLE triggers. (Varbinds are included when the trigger is fired after an ICMP poll.)
When the trigger ICMP_ERROR is fired, a few of the ICMP error codes are reported in log files with the type and code pasted together. For example, a uctype=5 and uccode=2 results in an error code of 52, whereas the error code should be 2.
NerveCenter concatenates values for the following types and codes:
- uctype = 5 with error codes 0, 1, 2, and 3
- uctype = 11 with error codes 0 and 1
- uctype = 12 with error codes 0 and 1
If you attempt to match nl-ping-uctype=5 and nl-ping-uccode=2 in a Perl subroutine or poll condition, the condition is not matched because NerveCenter returns an incorrect value.
Extra windows are listed in the NerveCenter Client's Window menu. Windows that are actually open are listed correctly after the extra ones.
When running the ipsweep process, you must convert ipsweep to background (Ctrl Z) before you can kill the process. You can not stop ipsweep with the Ctrl C command.
Variables listed in command actions must be preceded and followed by whitespace
When creating a command action for an alarm transition, you can not include a subobject variable after a base object. Placing a punctuation mark behind the base object variable causes that variable to be left out when processing the command.
For example: echo $NodeName $TriggerBaseObject.$TriggerInstance > /tmp/test
Should return something like the following:
Actually, it returns the following:
Workarounds for this example are: echo $NodeName $TriggerBaseObject $TriggerInstance $TriggerBaseObject >>/tmp/test1
echo $NodeName $TriggerBaseObject '.' $TriggerInstance $TriggerBaseObject >>/tmp/test1
In NerveCenter Client running against the Solaris 2.7 or 2.8 motif libraries, if you display help from the Help button, close help, then click the Help button again, sometimes HyperHelp will exit, shut down the Client, and log you out of CDE. HyperHelp 5.2 supports only XMotif1.2.
Two clicks are required for commands in the Transition Definition dialog box
When creating a transition for an alarm definition, after you open the Transition Definition dialog box, you must click any button two times (New Action, OK, Cancel, Help) before the command is activated.