This article will look at the most common issues you may encounter when you are configuring GSX Monitor to retrieve statistics from a BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) Management Information Base (MIB). In particular the configuration of the SNMP service running on the BES machine. The most common issue with this part is that access to the SNMP is restricted. The hostname or IP address of the GSX Monitor workstation needs to be added to the SNMP security settings allowed list.
Symptoms
- No SNMP connection with the BES host:
How to Troubleshoot the Issue
There are two components needed in order for GSX Monitor to be able to read the Management Information Base (MIB). There needs to be a shared community string, and permission to communicate between the GSX Monitor host and the BES host at the SNMP level.
You will need:
- The IP addresses of any BlackBerry Server configured in GSX Monitor.
- The IP addresses of the GSX Monitor station(s).
- Administrator credentials to stop and start services on any BlackBerry Server configured.
- Administrator credentials for the GSX Monitor station to stop and start services, and install applications.
What we would normally see if there was an issue with the SNMP security is that you can resolve the BES hostname with a ping command but it fails to communicate at the Windows SNMP level. Here we will check the Windows SNMP service running on the BES and make sure that we are using the correct community string and that the GSX Monitor station is an allowed host.
First we are going to open a remote session on the target BES and access its Windows services. Then we will look at the properties of the SNMP service and check this against what we have configured in GSX Monitor.
- Open Services.msc and locate the Windows SNMP Service.
- Check that it is running.
- Right-click the service and select Properties.
- Select the Security tab.
- Check the Accepted community name is the same as the one used in the GSX Monitor configuration.
- Check that the GSX Monitor hostname or IP is in the allowed list. If you have Accept SNMP packets from these hosts selected, then the IP or hostname of the GSX Monitor workstation must be in this list.
- Restart the SNMP Service if you made any changes.
Once you have confirmed the security settings are good and you still have issues with reading the MIB, you may want to try to connect to the MIB using a third party tool next.