Deploying Gateway Server on Windows Server 2008

Applies To: Operations Manager 2007 R2, Operations Manager 2007 SP1

Gateway servers are used to enable agent-management of computers that are outside the Kerberos trust boundary of management groups, such as in a domain that is not trusted. The gateway server acts as a concentration point for agent-to-management server communication. Agents in domains that are not trusted communicate with the gateway server and the gateway server communicates with one or more management servers. Because communication between the gateway server and the management servers occurs over only one port (TCP 5723), that port is the only one that has to be opened on any intervening firewalls to enable management of multiple agent-managed computers. Multiple gateway servers can be placed in a single domain so that the agents can failover from one to the other if they lose communication with one of the gateway servers. Similarly, a single gateway server can be configured to failover between management servers so that no single point of failure exists in the communication chain.

Because the gateway server resides in a domain that is not trusted by the domain that the management group is in, certificates must be used to establish each computer's identity, agent, gateway server, and management server. This arrangement satisfies the requirement of Operations Manager for mutual authentication.

Note

To monitor computers that lie outside the management servers' trust boundary without the use of a gateway server, you need to install and manually maintain certificates on the management servers and the computers to be monitored. When this configuration is used instead of using a gateway server, additional ports must be opened for agent-to-management server communication. For a listing of all ports that are necessary, see Agent and Agentless Monitoring and Operations Manager R2 2007 Supported Configurations https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=144400.

Procedure overview

  1. Request certificates for any computer in the agent, gateway server, management server chain.

  2. Import those certificates into the target computers by using the Operations Manager 2007 MOMCertImport.exe tool.

    Note

    For information about obtaining and importing a certificate by using an enterprise certification authority, see https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=100716. For information about using a stand-alone certification authority, see https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=100717.

  3. Distribute the Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.GatewayApprovalTool.exe to the management server.

  4. Run the Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.GatewayApprovalTool.exe tool to initiate communication between the management server and the gateway

  5. Install the gateway server.

Preparing for Installation

Before you start

  1. Deployment of gateway servers requires certificates. You need to have access to a certification authority (CA). This can be a public CA such as VeriSign, or you can use Microsoft Certificate Services. This procedure provides the steps to request, obtain, and import a certificate from Microsoft Certificate Services.

  2. Reliable name resolution must exist between the agent-managed computers and the gateway server and between the gateway server and the management servers. This name resolution is typically done through DNS. However, if it is not possible to get proper name resolution through DNS, it might be necessary to manually create entries in each computer's hosts file.

    Note

    The hosts file is located in the \Windows\system32\drivers\etc directory, and it contains directions for configuration.

Obtaining Computer Certificates from Microsoft Certificate Services

For more information, see the sections How to Obtain a Certificate Using a Stand-Alone CA in Operations Manager 2007 and How to Obtain a Certificate Using an Enterprise CA in Operations Manager 2007 in the Security Guide athttps://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=97878.

Distributing the Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.GatewayApprovalTool

The Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.GatewayApprovalTool.exe tool is needed only on the management server, and it only has to be run once.

To copy Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.GatewayApprovalTool.exe to management servers

  1. From a target management server, open the installation media \SupportTools directory.

  2. Copy the Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.GatewayApprovalTool.exe from the installation media to the Operations Manager 2007 installation directory, which is typically c:\Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007.

Registering the Gateway with the Management Group

This procedure registers the gateway server with the management group, and when this is completed, the gateway server appears in the Discovered Inventory view of the management group.

To run the gateway Approval tool

  1. On the management server that was targeted during the gateway server installation, log on with the Operations Manager Administrator account.

  2. Open a command prompt, and navigate to the \Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007 directory or to the directory that you copied the Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.gatewayApprovalTool.exe to.

  3. At the command prompt, run Microsoft.EnterpriseManagement.gatewayApprovalTool.exe /ManagementServerName=<managementserverFQDN> /GatewayName=<GatewayFQDN> /Action=Create

  4. If the approval is successful, you will see The approval of server <GatewayFQDN> completed successfully.

  5. If you need to remove the gateway server from the management group, run the same command, but substitute the /Action=Delete flag for the /Action=Create flag.

  6. Open the Operations console to the Monitoring view. Select the Discovered Inventory view to see that the gateway server is present.

Installing Operations Manager 2007 Gateway Server

This procedure installs the gateway server. The server that is to be the gateway server should be a member of the same domain as the agent-managed computers that will be reporting to it.

Tip

An installation will fail when starting Windows Installer (for example, installing a gateway server by double-clicking MOMGateway.msi) on a computer running Windows Server 2008 if the local security policy User Account Control: Run all administrators in Admin Approval Mode is enabled (which is the default setting on Windows Server 2008).

To run Operations Manager 2007 Gateway Windows Installer from a command prompt for Windows Server 2008

  1. On the Windows desktop, click Start, point to Programs, point to Accessories, right-click Command Prompt, and then click Run as administrator.

  2. In the Administrator: Command Prompt window, navigate to the local drive that hosts the Operations Manager 2007 installation media.

  3. Navigate to the directory where the .msi file is located, type the name of the .msi file, and then press ENTER.

To install Operations Manager 2007 gateway server

  1. Log on to the gateway server with Administrator rights.

  2. From the Operations Manager 2007 installation media, start SetupOM.exe.

  3. In the Install area, click the Install Operations Manager 2007 R2 Gateway link.

  4. On the Welcome screen, click Next.

  5. On the Destination Folder page, accept the default, or click Change to select a different installation directory, and then click Next.

  6. On the Management Group Configuration page, type the target management group name in the Management Group Name field, type the target management server name in the Management Server field, check that the Management Server Port field is 5723, and then click Next. This port can be changed if you have enabled a different port for management server communication in the Operations console.

  7. On the Gateway Action Account page, select the Local System account option, unless you have specifically created a domain-based or local computer-based gateway Action account. Click Next.

  8. On the Microsoft Update page, optionally indicate if you want to use Microsoft Update, and then click Next.

  9. On the Ready to Install page, click Install.

  10. On the Completing Installation page, click Finish.

Importing Certificates with the MOMCertImport.exe Tool

Perform this operation on each gateway server, management server, and computer that will be agent-managed and that is in a domain that is not trusted.

To import computer certificates by using MOMCertImport.exe

  1. Copy the MOMCertImport.exe tool from the installation media \SupportTools\<platform> (i386 or ia64) directory to the root of the target server or to the Operations Manager 2007 installation directory if the target server is a management server.

  2. As an administrator, open a Command Prompt window and change the directory to the directory where MOMCertImport.exe is, and then run momcertimport.exe /SubjectName <certificate subject name>. This makes the certificate usable by Operations Manager.

Configuring Gateway Servers for Failover Between Management Servers

Although gateway servers can communicate with any management server in the management group, this must be configured. In this scenario, the secondary management servers are identified as targets for gateway server failover and the Clustered RMS is excluded from failover. This is a typical best practice that is done to prevent unnecessary load on the RMS.

Use the Set-ManagementServer-gatewayManagementServer command in Command Shell, as shown in the following example, to configure a gateway server to failover to multiple management servers. The commands can be run from any Command Shell in the management group.

To configure gateway server failover between management servers

  1. Log on to the management server with an account that is a member of the Administrators role for the management group.

  2. On the Windows desktop, click Start, point to Programs, point to System Center Operations Manager, and then click Command Shell.

  3. In Command Shell, follow the example that is described in the next section.

Description

The following example can be used to configure gateway server failover to multiple management servers.

Code

$primaryMS = Get-ManagementServer | where {your filter here}
$failoverMS = Get-ManagementServer | where {your filter here}
$gatewayMS = Get-ManagementServer | where {your filter here}
Set-ManagementServer -gatewayManagementServer: $gatewayMS -ManagementServer: $primaryMS -FailoverServer: $failoverMS

Comments

In the preceding example, you must create a filter statement for the first three commands. The following is an example of a filter command written to find the computer computername.com that will be assigned to the $failoverMS variable:

$failoverMS = Get-ManagementServer | where {$_.Name –eq ’computername.com’ }

For help with the Set-ManagementServer command, type the following in the Command Shell window:

Get-help Set-ManagementServer -full