IBM CSM to IBM Systems Director Transformation Guide

20 IBM CSM to IBM Systems Director Transformation Guide

IBM Systems Director with Storage Control and VMControl plug-ins provides a single

management console for managing servers, storage systems and Fibre Channel switches.

In conjunction with VMControl, there is support for capabilities such as:

򐂰 Storage provisioning for image creation, deployment and cloning

򐂰 Ability to manage storage system pool lifecycle

򐂰 Taking group actions across pool and policy-based storage placement

򐂰 Cloning actions within the pool

Storage Control unifies the management of physical and virtual server and storage resources

for integrated end-to-end lifecycle management, including: configuration, discovery, health,

capacity, inventory, provisioning, topology, updates, alerts, and retirement.

2.6.3 Command line

This section provides information on the command line interface.

Command line interface

Although IBM Systems Director's web interface is really powerful and can be used to perform

most of the tasks, sometimes it is desirable to have a tool that can help you to automate some

tasks or processes with the help of scripts.

For these types of activities, System Director comes with a powerful command line interface.

IBM System Director has two categories of commands based on the purpose of the

command, as follows:

Single-purpose commands

These commands can perform only one function, as opposed to the smcli command that can

perform many functions.

Examples of functions that can be accomplished by this type of command would be:

򐂰 Initialize IBM Systems Director's database connection: cfgdbcmd

򐂰 CIM event management: cimsubscribe

򐂰 Reset the IBM Systems Director Server database: smreset

򐂰 Backup/restore the Systems Director's persistent data (file system data and database):

smsave/smrestore

򐂰 Start, stop or get the status of IBM Systems Director Server: smstart/smstop/smstatus.

Server-based command-line interface (smcli)

The smcli tool is an alternative way to interact with the IBM Systems Director Server. It is

installed by default on the IBM Systems Director Server and must be run as a user with

smadmin or smmgr group authority (or equivalent administratively-defined group). You can

run smcli commands locally from the management server or remotely by accessing the

management server using a remote-access utility, such as Secure Shell (SSH) or Telnet.

Commands in the smcli tool are grouped by function and each function includes sub

functions. Examples of command functions are: virtualization commands, storage

commands, security commands, discovery commands, resource and process monitor

commands, remote access commands and many others.

For an example of the commands in the smcli, see Example 2-1 on page 21. Note that the

commands available will vary depending on authority and plug-ins that are installed.