Job Management Partner 1/Software Distribution Description and Planning Guide

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6.5.4 Automatic updating of the client connection destination

If you distribute information to clients in order to determine connection destinations, JP1/Software Distribution uses the IP address of each client PC to determine and automatically set the appropriate higher system to which the client will be connected. Because the connection destination is updated automatically when a client's IP address changes, this feature is useful when a client PC is moved. This subsection describes automatic updating of the connection destinations of clients.

JP1/Software Distribution Client (client) supports this facility.

Organization of this subsection
(1) Setting and updating the higher system automatically
(2) Creating an information file for higher connection destinations (dmhost.txt)

(1) Setting and updating the higher system automatically

Before you can set or update automatically the higher systems to which clients will be connected, you must create an information file for higher connection destinations (dmhost.txt) and distribute it to the clients. After distribution to the clients, connection destinations are reset automatically at specific times.

(a) Creating dmhost.txt

dmhost.txt is used to determine the higher system to which a client will be connected. The file defines the higher systems corresponding to ranges of IP addresses of client PCs. For example, dmhost.txt could be set up to define the connection destination of client PCs with IP addresses in the range from 172.16.22.1 to 172.16.22.255 as the New York branch PC, and the connection destination of client PCs with IP addresses in the range from 172.17.22.1 to 172.17.22.255 as the Detroit branch PC. For details about creating dmhost.txt, see (2) Creating an information file for higher connection destinations (dmhost.txt)

(b) Distributing dmhost.txt

Once you have created dmhost.txt, you must save it to the following directory of each client PC:

JP1/Software-Distribution-installation-directory\MASTER\DB

You can distribute dmhost.txt to a large number of clients in the batch mode by using the Install package job. To do this, package and distribute dmhost.txt using the following settings:

Installation target directory settings on the System Conditions page
Drive: None
Directory: %NETMDMP%\MASTER\DB

If a client is not connected to a JP1/Software Distribution system, you can manually store dmhost.txt.

(c) Timing for changing the connection destination

After storing dmhost.txt in the client PC, either execute polling or restart the OS of the client PC. The higher system to which the client will connect will be set on the basis of the contents of this file.

The following are the three types of polling that automatically change a client's connection destination:

Even after these settings have been configured, the connection target is reset if you execute polling or restart the OS after either of the following:

If you move a client PC and change its IP address, its connection destination is changed to the appropriate higher system simply by executing polling or restarting the OS. The end user need not be aware of the change in the connection destination.

When the connection destination of a client is set or changed automatically on the basis of dmhost.txt, the change is logged into the installation-folder\LOG\USER.LOG file. For details about the log information, see 6.4.1 Checking log files in the manual Administrator's Guide Volume 2.

If you use dmhost.txt to automatically set the connection destination, and then manually change the connection destination from the client setup, the manually set connection destination remains in effect even after polling or OS restart.

(d) Relationship between automatic updating of connection destination and other facilities

Because automatic updating of the connection destination from dmhost.txt cannot be used with some JP1/Software Distribution facilities, note the following:

(2) Creating an information file for higher connection destinations (dmhost.txt)

The information file for higher connection destinations is a text file with the name dmhost.txt. This section explains how to create this file.

(a) Format of dmhost.txt

Each line of dmhost.txt consists of a range of IP addresses of client PCs and information about the corresponding connection destination. Each line can consist of a maximum of 255 characters. Use the comma (,) as the delimiter between items. To add a comment line, begin the line with a semicolon (;).

The file format is as follows:

Format
lowest-IP-address,highest-IP-address,connection-destination,product-type-of-the-connection-destination,multicast-address-of-the-connection-destination

Description
lowest-IP-address (required)
Specify the lowest IP address in the range of client IP addresses. Specify the numbers in the format xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx.
highest-IP-address (required)
Specify the highest IP address in the range of client IP addresses. Specify the numbers in the format xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx.
connection-destination (required)
Specify the host name or IP address of the connection destination. Specify the host name if the connection destination node identification key is set to host names, or the IP address if it is set to IP addresses. A host name must not exceed 64 bytes of alphanumeric characters. If you specify an IP address, specify the numbers in the format xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx.
product-type-of-the-connection-destination (required)
Specify netmdm if the connection destination is JP1/Software Distribution Manager, or netmdmw if the connection destination is JP1/Software Distribution Client (relay system).
multicast-address-of-the-connection-destination (optional)
If you wish to distribute jobs to clients using multicast distribution, specify the multicast address that will be set as the connection destination. Specify the multicast address as numbers in the format xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx. You can use the following range of addresses for multicast addresses: 224.0.1.0 to 239.255.255.255.

Notes

(b) Example of creating dmhost.txt

The following shows an example of creating dmhost.txt.

Figure 6-19 Example of creating dmhost.txt

[Figure]

Line 2 of the file contains the IP address range 172.17.13.1 to 172.17.13.250. For a client whose IP address is 172.17.13.6, the higher system is therefore changed automatically to dmman01.

If the range from 0.0.0.0 to 255.255.255.254, which includes the range of all IP addresses, is defined on the last line of dmhost.txt, the higher system at the connection destination is changed to dmman02 for a client that had no corresponding IP address.

(c) Notes on when the information file for higher connection destinations has been distributed

If you change the IP address of a connection destination host after the information file for higher connection destinations has been distributed to the clients and automatic updating of their connection destinations has been performed, first delete from the clients the information file for higher connection destinations that you had been using. The change in the IP address will then act as a trigger to activate the facility for automatic updating of the connection destination.