13.3 Post-Installation Configuration for the Appliance

After you install Sentinel, you need to perform additional configuration for the appliance to work properly.

13.3.1 Configuring WebYaST

The Sentinel appliance user interface is equipped with WebYaST, which is a Web-based remote console for controlling appliances based on SUSE Linux Enterprise. You can access, configure, and monitor the Sentinel appliances with WebYaST. The following procedure briefly describes the steps to configure WebYaST. For more information on detailed configuration, see the WebYaST User Guide.

  1. Log in to the Sentinel appliance.

  2. Click Appliance.

  3. Configure the Sentinel Server to receive updates as described in Section 13.3.3, Registering for Updates.

  4. Click Next to finish the initial setup.

13.3.2 Creating Partitions

As a best practice, ensure that you create separate partitions to store Sentinel data on a different partition than the executables, configuration, and operating system files. The benefits of storing variable data separately include easier backup of sets of files, simpler recovery in case of corruption, and provides additional robustness if a disk partition fills up. For information about planning your partitions, see Section 6.6, Planning Partitions for Data Storage. You can add partitions in the appliance and move a directory to the new partition by using the YaST tool.

Use the following procedure to create a new partition and move the data files from its directory to the newly created partition:

  1. Log in to Sentinel as root.

  2. Run the following command to stop the Sentinel on the appliance:

    /etc/init.d/sentinel stop

  3. Specify the following command to change to novell user:

    su - novell

  4. Move the contents of the directory at /var/opt/novell/sentinel to a temporary location.

  5. Change to root user.

  6. Enter the following command to access the YaST2 Control Center:

    yast

  7. Select System > Partitioner.

  8. Read the warning and select Yes to add the new unused partition.

    For information about creating partitions, see Using the YaST Partitioner in the SLES 11 documentation.

  9. Mount the new partition at /var/opt/novell/sentinel.

  10. Specify the following command to change to novell user:

    su - novell

  11. Move the contents of the data directory from the temporary location (where it was saved in Step 4) back to /var/opt/novell/sentinel in the new partition.

  12. Run the following command to restart the Sentinel appliance:

    /etc/init.d/sentinel start

13.3.3 Registering for Updates

You must register the Sentinel appliance with the appliance update channel to receive patch updates. To register the appliance, you must first obtain your appliance registration code or the appliance activation key from the NetIQ Customer Care Center.

Use the following steps to register the appliance for updates:

  1. Log in to the Sentinel appliance.

  2. Click Appliance to launch WebYaST.

  3. Click Registration.

  4. Specify the e-mail ID that you want to receive updates, then specify the system name and the appliance registration code.

  5. Click Save.

13.3.4 Configuring the Appliance with SMT

In secured environments where the appliance must run without direct Internet access, you can configure the appliance with the Subscription Management Tool (SMT), which enables you to upgrade the appliance to the latest versions of Sentinel as they are released. SMT is a package proxy system that is integrated with NetIQ Customer Center and provides key NetIQ Customer Center capabilities.

Prerequisites

  • Get the NetIQ Customer Center credentials for Sentinel to get updates from NetIQ. For information on getting the credentials, contact NetIQ Support.

  • Ensure that SLES 11 SP3 is installed with the following packages on the machine where you want to install SMT:

    • htmldoc

    • perl-DBIx-Transaction

    • perl-File-Basename-Object

    • perl-DBIx-Migration-Director

    • perl-MIME-Lite

    • perl-Text-ASCIITable

    • yum-metadata-parser

    • createrepo

    • perl-DBI

    • apache2-prefork

    • libapr1

    • perl-Data-ShowTable

    • perl-Net-Daemon

    • perl-Tie-IxHash

    • fltk

    • libapr-util1

    • perl-PIRPC

    • apache2-mod_perl

    • apache2-utils

    • apache2

    • perl-DBD-mysql

  • Install SMT and configure the SMT server. For more information, refer to the following sections in the SMT documentation:

    • SMT Installation

    • SMT Server Configuration

    • Mirroring Installation and Update Repositories with SMT

  • Install the wget utility on the appliance computer.

Configuring the Appliance

For information on configuring the appliance with SMT, see the Subscription Management Tool (SMT) for SUSE Linux Enterprise 11 documentation.

To enable the appliance repositories, execute the following command:

smt-repos -e Sentinel-Server-7.0-Updates sle-11-x86_64

smt-repos -e Sentinel-Collector-Manager-7.0-Updates sle-11-x86_64

smt-repos -e Sentinel-Correlation-Engine-7.0-Updates sle-11-x86_64

Upgrading the Appliance

For information about upgrading the appliance, see Section 25.3, Upgrading the Appliance by Using SMT.

13.3.5 Installing VMware Tools (Applicable only to VMware ESX Server)

For Sentinel to work effectively on the VMware ESX server, you need to install VMware tools. VMware tools are a suite of utilities that enhances the performance of the virtual machine’s operating system. It also improves management of the virtual machine. For more information on installing VMware tools, see VMware Tools for Linux Guests.

For more information on the VMware documentation, see Workstation User’s Manual.