Configured email notification for Server Automation?

1

Has anyone configured email notification for Server Automation? I am looking for an example of email notification in use. I have tried to use the configured install, but not working. I need to know if a log file exists that can tell me if SA is not configured for email correctly. Thanks!

2

Hi Frank,

So first of all, just the obligatory reference the config documentation on the notification service: http://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SS63NW_9.2.0/com.ibm.tivoli.tem.doc_9.2/Platform/Config/sa_commonnotification.html?lang=en
Just to confirm, you followed this but still no joy? Can you tell me what youā€™ve tried so far?

There are logs for the notification service alright - they are in this directory:

<Server Root Dir>\Applications\Logs

and thereā€™s 2 of them:

  • ns-notifier-app.log: this is for the component in the service that actually send the emails (you should see any failed attempts get logged in here, with hopefully some details why they failed)

  • ns-monitor-app.log: this is for the component in the service that looks for actions containing the notification notation (see here for details). This essentially detects these actions and passes a notification request to the notifier component.

The level of these logs is also configurable in this file.

<Server Root Dir>\Applications\NotificationService\resources\config\nsLogConfig.json

(it may be useful change the ā€œlevelā€ properties to ā€œdebugā€ if thereā€™s not enough details showing initially)

The actual configuration of your SMTP server (that you would have set up using fixlet #2240 from the BES Support site) gets written to this file:

<Server Root Dir>\Applications\NotificationService\resources\config\messagingConf.json

Hereā€™s an example of what that file might look like after youā€™ve run the fixlet. Letā€™s say youā€™re using an SMTP server called smtp.acme.com (on port 25) that does not require any authentication to use it (e.g. if it uses a white list of IP addresses, the root serverā€™s being one of the entries):

{
  "smtp":{
    "service": "smtp",
    "host": "smtp.acme.com",
    "secure": false,
    "port": 25,
    "ignoreTLs": false,
    "authMethod": "none",
    "tls": {
      "rejectUnauthorized": false
    }
  }
}

Or another example using gmailā€™s SMTP server (this does require username/password authentication):

{
  "smtp": {
    "service": "smtp",
    "host": "smtp.gmail.com",
    "secure": false,
    "port": 587,
    "ignoreTLs": false,
    "authMethod": "plain",
    "auth": {
      "user": "XXXX@gmail.com",
      "pass": "U2FsdGVkX1+b/msSA84fLQ1JRxAejivOJZ6AUdTMpFE=|~|"
    },
    "tls" :{
      "rejectUnauthorized": false
    }
  }
}

Maybe look over the logs and the config file examples above and see if anything jumps out at you there.

Cheers,
Paul.

3

ā€¦ so actually, all the details in the post above relate to setting up the notification service itself.

Server Automation does integrate with the service to send notifications, and that documentation is here:
http://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SS63NW_9.2.0/com.ibm.tem.sa.doc_9.2/ServerAutomation/com.ibm.tivoli.tpm.wkf.doc/Server%20Automation%20plan/sa_notification.html?lang=en

Basically, you enable it using fixlet #152 from the Server Automation site.

That enables it globally, but you then also need to indicate in your automation plan that you want your plan to actually send a notification when itā€™s completed (or indeed, you can add the Send a Notification fixlet from the BES Support site as a step in the plan if you want to send yourself updates during the execution of the plan). This is done on the Settings tab when defining the plan.

Cheers,
Paul.

4

thank you,
The ns-nitifier-app.log had something for me to go on. This log was not mentioned in the configuration instructions.
my error:
2016-05-22 05:45:19.592 - error: [500]: [NOT012E] ERROR: Mail not sent because: ā€œError: Error upgrading connection with STARTTLSā€

I will look into this.

5

Great - thanks for the feedback Frankā€¦ Iā€™ll make a note for the documentation team.

Do let us know how you get on.

-Paul.

6

Good news, the issue was resolved by simply modifying the line with ā€˜ignoreTLsā€™ to ā€˜ignoreTLSā€™ (note the lettercase) from the messagingConf.json file
I am now getting notifications with my SA jobs!

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