Agentless monitoring in Operations Manager

System Center Operations Manager can gather performance and availability data on a computer that doesn't have an agent installed by using a proxy agent that's installed on another computer. Use agentless monitoring of computers when it's impossible or undesirable to install an agent on a computer.

An agentless-managed computer is a Windows-based computer that you discover by using the Operations console. You assign a management server or agent-managed computer to provide remote (proxy) agent functionality for the computers.

Operations Manager manages agentless-managed computers as if an agent is installed on them. Not all management packs work in the agentless mode. For more information, see the documentation for the management packs you're running.

For information about configuring an agent-managed computer as a proxy for agentless-managed computers, see How to configure a proxy for agentless monitoring.

To change an agentless-managed computer to an agent-managed computer, follow these steps:

1. Delete the agentless-managed computer from the management group by right-clicking the computer in Agentless Managed in the Administration workspace and then selecting Delete.

2. Deploy the agent to the computer. For more information, first review the planning guidance Operations Manager agents.

Agentless monitoring compared to Agentless Exception Monitoring

Agentless monitoring provides monitoring of computers without agents by using a proxy agent and applying those management packs that support agentless monitoring. Agentless Exception Monitoring (AEM) redirects hardware, operating system, and application crash information to Operations Manager, which can aggregate, view, and report on error reports that are sent by the Windows Error Reporting service. For information on AEM, see Client monitoring using Agentless Exception Monitoring in Operations Manager.

You can monitor a computer without an agent by using either agentless monitoring, AEM, or both.

Configure Windows-based computers for agentless management

1. Sign in to the Operations console with an account that's a member of the Operations Manager Administrators role for the management group.

2. Select Administration.

3. At the bottom of the navigation pane, select Discovery Wizard.

4. On the Discovery Type page, select Windows computers.

5. On the Auto or Advanced? page, complete the following steps:

   1. Select either Automatic computer discovery or Advanced discovery. Automatic computer discovery scans for Windows-based computers in the domain. Advanced discovery allows you to specify criteria for the computers that the wizard returns, such as computer names starting with WKS. If you select Automatic computer discovery, select Next, and then go to step 7. If you select Advanced discovery, continue with the following steps.

   2. In the Computer and Device Classes list, select Servers and Clients, Servers Only, or Clients Only.

   3. In the Management Server list, select the management server or gateway server to discover the computers.

   4. If you selected Servers and Clients, you can select the Verify discovered computers can be contacted checkbox. This selection is likely to increase the success rate of agent deployment, but discovery can take longer.

   Note

   If the Active Directory catalog doesn't contain the NetBIOS names for computers in a domain, select Verify discovered computers can be contacted. Otherwise, the Browse, or Type In option fails to find computers. This condition affects computers in the same domain as the management server, in another domain with a full trust relationship, and in untrusted domains by using a gateway server.

   5. Select Next.

   Note

   The wizard can return approximately 4,000 computers if you select Verify discovered computers can be contacted, and it can return 10,000 computers if you don't select this option. Automatic computer discovery verifies that discovered computers can be contacted. A computer that the management group already manages isn't returned.

6. On the Discovery Method page, you can locate the computers that you want to manage by either scanning or browsing Active Directory Domain Services or entering the computer names.

   If you want to scan, complete the following steps:

   1. If it isn't already selected, select Scan Active Directory, and select Configure.

   2. In the Find Computers dialog, enter the criteria that you want to use for discovering computers, and select OK.

   3. In the Domain list, select the domain of the computers that you want to discover.

   If you want to browse Active Directory Domain Services or enter the computer names, complete the following steps:

   • Select Browse for, or type-in computer names, select Browse, specify the names of the computers that you want to manage, and select OK.

   • In the Browse for, or type-in computer names box, enter the computer names, separated by a semicolon, comma, or a new line. You can use NetBIOS computer names or fully qualified domain names (FQDNs).

7. Select Next, and on the Administrator Account page, complete one of the following steps:

   • Select Use selected Management Server Action Account if it isn't already selected.

   • Select Other user account, enter the User name and Password, and then select the Domain from the list. If the user name isn't a domain account, select This is a local computer account, not a domain account.

     Important

     The account must have administrative privileges on the targeted computers. If you select This is a local computer account, not a domain account, the management server action account is used to perform discovery.

8. Select Discover to display the Discovery Progress page. The time it takes discovery to finish depends on many factors, such as the criteria you specified and the configuration of the environment.

   Note

   Computers that are already managed by the management group won't be returned by the wizard.

9. On the Select Objects to Manage page, complete the following steps:

   1. Select the computers that you want to be agent-managed computers.

   2. In the Management Mode list, select Agentless and select Next.

   3. Select Change, select the proxy agent that you want to use, select OK, and then select Next.

10. On the Summary page, enter the following information:

    1. Leave the Agent installation directory set to the default of %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft Monitoring Agent or enter an installation path.

    Important

    If you specify a different Agent installation directory, the root of the path must exist on the targeted computer or the agent installation fails. The installation process creates subdirectories, such as \Agent, if they don't exist.

    2. Leave Agent Action Account set to the default, Local System, or select Other and enter the User name, Password, and Domain. The Agent Action Account is the default account that the agent uses to perform actions.

    3. Select Finish.

11. In the Agent Management Task Status dialog, the Status for each selected computer changes from Queued to Success. The computers are ready to be managed.

    Note

    If the task fails for a computer, select the targeted computer. The Task Output text box displays the reason for the failure.

12. Select Close. The computers appear in the Administration workspace under Agentless Managed.

Configure a proxy for agentless monitoring

When you set up agentless monitoring of a computer, select a proxy for each agentless-managed computer. By configuring an agent as a proxy agent, you enable it to submit data on behalf of another source. A management group can serve as a proxy, but this role takes up system resources. Use an agent-managed computer as a proxy agent.

You might also configure a computer to act as a proxy to support specific features of a management pack. For example, the Active Directory Management Pack requires enabling domain controllers to act as proxy agents.

Both the agentless-managed system and its proxy need access to the managing server through any firewalls. For more information about interacting with firewalls, see Configuring a firewall for Operations Manager.

1. In the Administration workspace, select Agent Managed, right-click the computer, and select Properties.

2. In the Agent Properties dialog, select the Security tab.

3. On the Security tab, select Allow this agent to act as a proxy and discover managed objects on other computers, and select OK.

Configure a management server as a proxy for agentless-managed computers

1. In the Administration workspace, select Management Servers, right-click the management server, and select Properties.

2. In the Management Server Properties dialog, select the Security tab.

3. On the Security tab, select Allow this server to act as a proxy and discover managed objects on other computers, and select OK.

Change the proxy agent for agentless-managed computers

1. Sign in to the computer by using an account that's a member of the Operations Manager Administrators role for the management group.

2. In the Operations console, select Administration.

3. Select Agentless Managed.

4. In the Agentless Managed pane, select the agentless-managed computers for which you want to change the proxy agent. Right-click them, and then select Change Proxy Agent.

5. In the Change Proxy Agent dialog, select the computer you want to be the new proxy agent, and select OK.

Next steps

You enable monitoring of applications, features, and services by importing management packs. For an explanation of what management packs do and how to import and manage them, see What is an Operations Manager management pack.