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JDisc Discovery#

JDisc Discovery makes an inventory of whole networks and recognizes all important operating systems (including HP-UX, Solaris and AIX). It recognizes hardware and software, IP networks, Windows domains and Active Directory. In addition, JDisc Discovery identifies all important virtualization technologies, as well as many cluster environments.

Installation#

The installation of JDisc server components on a Microsoft Windows system (preferably the server version) is required for its operation. The necessary installation files can be downloaded via the following web address:

http://www.jdisc.com/en/downloads.html

During the setup you will be asked which passwords are to be used for the PostgreSQL-DBMS, which is applied in the background. This concerns the administrative account postgres and the account postgresro, which only has read permission for the JDisc database. The latter account is required for the interface to i-doit. Besides, with the setup you have to specify that the PostgreSQL instance should be accessible to the outside. As a default, it observes port 25321. You have to activate the port in the Windows firewall.

Should you have questions regarding the installation or configuration of JDisc, contact the manufacturer's customer support:

http://www.jdisc.com/en/support.html

This article addresses the interface between i-doit and JDisc Discovery.

Configuration#

The configuration of the interface is under Administration → Interfaces / external data → Import → JDISC → JDisc configuration. You can define any number of instances of JDisc Discovery. This allows complex inventory scenarios with separated networks.

jdisc-discovery-interface

Common Settings#

Parameter Comment
Default Server Is the instance involved which is to be suggested with a manual import?
Host Host name / FQDN or IP address of the JDisc instance; this has to be accessible from the i-doit instance.
Port Open port of the PostgreSQL instance which runs in the background of JDisc Discovery.
Database JDisc Discovery uses the inventory database as a standard.
Username
Enter one of the accounts which were requested during setup. You can use the account postgresro with limited rights, because i-doit only needs reading access for the database.
Password The password assigned during setup which belongs to the used account.
Allow import of older JDisc version? This query is only relevant for older versions of JDisc Discovery.

After the parameters are saved, you can test the connection to the JDisc database with the Check connection button.

Discovery Settings#

The user can activate a scan with the configured JDisc instance with i-doit. For this purpose, the JDisc Discovery web service is used, provided it is installed and activated.

Parameter Comment
Username
The account to be used for the web service.
Password Password for the account
Port Default: 9000
Protocol Default: http

After saving the parameters, you can test whether the configuration was successful with the Check connection button.

The PHP extension SOAP has to be installed on the i-doit host so that the connection to JDisc Discovery works. With a Debian-based operating system you already have this extension by having installed PHP. It is very likely that there are suitable distribution packets for other operating systems.

Profiles#

The JDisc profiles of i-doit provide the possibility to define the connection of object types and their attributes between JDisc and i-doit. Under Administration → Interfaces / external data → Import → JDISC → JDisc profiles you can specify how the objects found by JDisc find their way into the IT documentation.

jdisc-discovery-profiles

The i-doit default installation already provides predefined profiles. Among these predefined profiles is the Complete import profile which has the purpose to import all data in i-doit which have been inventoried by JDisc.

General Configuration#

Option Description
JDisc Server Which JDisc instance do you want to preselect during import? See also "Configuration" as explained above.
Title Name of the profile
Description Description of the profile

Object-type Assignment#

For each type in JDisc you can select an equivalent object type in i-doit. If none is selected, devices of this type will not be imported. The order of allocations is observed during import. In order to identify an allocation, the list is processed from top to bottom. For each line the matrix has the following structure:

JDisc type JDisc operating system Objekt title transform FQDN Addition Port filter Object-type Location Actions
Device type from JDisc which is to be considered during import

The list is read out from the specified JDisc instance and kept in the buffer.
Operating systems which already have been inventoried by JDisc.

Often the device type isn't sufficient for an assignment to an object type, therefore you can enter the operating system as an option.

You can enter wildcards (*) in this field.
Converts the object title.

"As is" Unchanged: The object name is not changed

"Uppercase" letters: The complete object name is changed to upper case.

"Lowercase" letters: The entire object name is changed to lower case.
Appends an FQDN addition to the object title. Which network ports do you want to import?

Normal import: All physical and logical ports are imported.

No import: In the text field you can enter port names which shall be ignored.
The field can be used with wildcards (*). (Example: Port name: Loopback → Ports with the name Loopback are not imported)

Logical port/ Physical port/ FC-port: Only ports which are named in the text field are imported.

You can combine the criteria so that only certain physical and certain logical ports are considered.
Imported devices are assigned to this object type.

If you don't select an object type, devices of this type will be ignored.
Objects which meet the criteria mentioned here are allocated to a certain location during import. This is carried out with the Location category. Add a new assignment, duplicate an existing assignment or delete an assignment.

Additional Options#

Option Description
Select categories Which categories do you want to fill during import? Only supported categories are listed.
Import network interfaces as You can map inventoried network interfaces in different categories.
Include software Do you want to import inventoried software as object type Applications?
Include software licences Do you want to import inventoried licences as object type Licences?
Import system services Do you want to import inventoried Services as object type System Services?
Import cloud subscriptions Do you want to import inventoried Cloud data?
Import connection endpoints The connections are not imported into the cabling, but into the category "Connection endpoints". This allows to distinguish between manual cabling and automatic cabling by JDisc.
Use simple database modelling? Should the new or the old database logic be used?
Include layer 3 nets Do you want to import inventoried IP nets as object type Layer 3 nets?
Keep IP address types Should IPv4 addresses, IPv6 addresses, loopback addresses, virtual addresses be imported?
Import type for DHCP IP addresses Should addresses assigned via DHCP be overwritten?
Include VLans Do you want to import inventoried VLans as object type Layer 2 nets?
Include clusters Do you want to import (virtualization) environments as object type Cluster?
Include Blade/Chassis connections during import
Do you want to include objects of the type Blade Server to objects of the type Blade Chassis during import?
Object type of the assigned modules within a blade/chassis unit When a blade chassis or switch chassis was inventoried, you can allocate the modules to a certain object type during import.
Update the object type of the assigned modules Should the object types of the assigned modules of a blade/chassis device be updated?
Import custom attributes When you maintain customized attributes (Custom Attributes) in JDisc Discovery, you can import these in i-doit. After import, they are displayed in the JDisc Custom Attributescategory.
Consider default templates from object types (only for newly created objects) When a new object is created, it is possible to consider templates automatically. The template selection is carried out in the object type configuration.
Change CMDB-status of objects to Already existing objects can receive a certain CMDB status during updating. If you don't want to change the CMDB-Status, select the option Keep CMDB-Status.
Software filter You can either enter a white list or a black list of software applications which you want to import (Whitelist) or don't want to import (Blacklist). You can enter wildcards (*) in this field. The list of titles is separated by commas.
Use filter as regular expression Should the object types of the assigned modules of a blade/chassis device be updated?
Use OS family (if available) instead of OS version as object title For software import, use the software family as object title instead of the software version. E.g. instead of "Windows Server 2008 Standard" only "Windows" with "Server 2008 Standard" as variant.
Object matching profile Which strategy do you want to use to update objects which are already documented in i-doit with an import?
Update objecttype When the device already exists as an object in i-doit, you can determine whether the object type is to be updated with help of the assignment (see above) or not.
Update object title Should the object title be updated by the import?

Import of Data via the Web GUI#

The import of data contents from JDisc is carried out via Extras → CMDB → Import → JDisc.

jdisc-discovery-import

Before you execute the import process, you have to define the import parameters.

Because it is possible to apply more than one JDisc server, you have to select the JDisc server in the first step. The profile which you defined beforehand can be also selected to influence the imported contents and their use. In addition, you can set the import mode. The Append import mode creates all found objects without checking whether these already exist. The Update import mode creates only objects which can not be found in the i-doit database. Categories of already existing objects are complemented (if necessary) with new data. The Overwrite import mode is, in principle, like the Update mode but with the difference that list categories are emptied first and are then recreated.

Import Mode Description
Append The import mode Append will create all found objects without checking if they already exist.
Only create newly scanned devices The Only create newly scanned devices Mode creates only objects that do not exist in i-doit.
Overwrite The Overwrite import mode behaves exactly like the "Update" mode with the difference that list categories are first emptied and then newly created.
Overwrite (New inventory) With the addition (New inventory) fixed i-doit-to-jdisc-device links are discarded and the object associations are recalculated.
Update The import mode Update will only create objects that could not be found in i-doit. Categories of already existing objects will be supplemented with new data (if necessary).
Update (New inventory) With the addition (New inventory) fixed i-doit-to-jdisc-device links are discarded and the object associations are recalculated.

With the logging function you can influence the extent of the written log. A more extensive logging increases the import duration.

When you carried out the settings completely, you can activate the import with Start the import. Please, consider that the duration of the import process depends both on the size of the JDisc database and the utilized hardware.

When the import process is completed, a summary is displayed in the Result section.

You can find the logs which are generated during import in the i-doit directory called log/.

Import via JDisc Discovery category#

You can update individual objects using the JDisc Discovery category. Here it is possible to scan the device using a specific identification (host address, FQDN and serial number). JDisc Profile

You can add the category via the object type configuration of the object type.

Import via i-doit Console#

Importing data from JDisc to i-doit is not only possible manually via the user interface. It can also be executed via the i-doit Console and thus automated. How the corresponding call is generated can be found in the corresponding article with an example for the import-jdisc option.

For the import, the ID of the desired profile can be specified. The ID can be found in the list of profiles:

jdisc-discovery-id

Also the ID of the JDisc server to be used can be specified. This can be found in the configuration:

jdisc-discovery-server

A jdisc.ini might look like this more information about .ini files can be found here.

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[commandArguments]
[commandOptions]
user=admin
password=admin
tenantId=6
profile=1
group=
mode=1
server=2
overwriteHost
detailedLogging=3
regenerateSearchIndex
[additional]

If we assume that the jdisc.ini is located in the i-doit root directory, then the import is called with the ldap.ini from the i-doit root directory like this:

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sudo -u www-data php console.php import-jdisc -c jdisc.ini