Intro to Admin Essentials

Admin Essentials is used to view, configure and modify all admin level properties across Itential Platform. The various features in Admin Essentials are controlled by authorization settings. Therefore, some users will not have access to all the features referenced herein; however, an administrator can give user access to the features as necessary.

Navigating the UI

The main elements of Admin Essentials are referenced in the table below.

Figure 1: Admin Essentials in Platform 6

 

Users Permissions

The following outlines the permissions that must be applied to a user account to gain access to the Icon Bar, Menus in the sidebar, the Create dialog, and Import dialog.

Icon Bar

Menus

The following outlines the permissions that must be applied to a user account to gain access to the Menus in the sidebar.

Create Dialog

The Create icon will open a dialog with choices for creating a new item in a collection. The choices that appear are based on user permissions as defined in the table below.

Figure 2: Create Icon

Figure 3: Create Dialog

Import

The Import icon will open up a dialog with choices for uploading a new item to a collection. The Import dialog accepts a JSON file. The choices that appear are based on user permissions as defined in the table below.

Figure 4: Import Icon

Figure 5: Import Dialog

Viewing Collections

The Collection dialog displays all of the items in a collection as cards with services information relevant to the collection item displayed within the card.

Figure 6: Collection Dialog

Current Operations

The Quick Start card on the Admin Essentials homepage contains a link to Current Operations, where users can see all running jobs and tasks through the Active Jobs and Running Tasks dialog views, respectively. Please note that available views, features, and interactions in the Current Operations interface can be limited based on user permissions.

Active Jobs

From the Active Jobs view on the Current Operations page, you can see all active running jobs. When this view of the page is open, the page refreshes automatically every 60 seconds.

Figure 7: Active Jobs

If there are running tasks in a job, a Tasks button will appear in the card footer of the job. Clicking this button switches the user to the Task view.

Figure 8: Tasks Button

Running Tasks

The Running Tasks tab shows all running tasks in a table view. Clicking a job name link under the Job column will open the Job Details page. When tasks are suspended (via the Task Worker Switch), a warning banner will display that lets the user know how many tasks are currently running.

Figure 9: Running Tasks View

Figure 10: Suspended Task Banner

Usage Statistics

Usage Statistics on the main Admin Essentials page are snapshot measurements of Itential Platform service-related items only.

• Itential does NOT measure Redis, Rabbit, Mongo, Python, NSO, or other node server processes.
• Itential also does NOT measure load averages, i.e., the amount of traffic to your CPU over the past 1min, 5min, and 15min.
• The measurement you see in Admin Essentials is a snapshot view, not real-time, and only Itential Platform/Pronghorn related.

For insight into what is consuming CPU resources, navigate to the Applications or Adapters tab under Profiles to get a more granular snapshot view. Itential also recommends utilizing system level tools like top to give you more detailed analysis, as described in the next section.

Figure 11: Admin Essentials Usage Statistics: CPU [Example: Legacy Platform Version]

Using Top Command to Analyze Activity & Performance

To help identify processes that are consuming a lot of resources, use the top (table of processes) command to show running processes in the Platform, including CPU and memory usage.

Prerequisites

• A system running Linux.
• Access to a terminal window.
• Administrator sudo privileges.

1. Type top on the command line to get information on processes, running tasks, memory, and CPU.
2. Type O to enable filter mode.
3. Type COMMAND=Pronghorn to only display Itential Pronghorn processes.
4. Press q to quit the terminal window.

As you can see, multiple processors spread across multiple processes (i.e., apps, adapters, etc) within the Itential system, can yield a percentage that equals or exceeds 100%, as shown in the example below. Hence, having too many processes or apps running at once can strain CPU resources.

Figure 12: Top Command Running Processes [Example: Legacy Platform Version]

 

Figure 13: Core CPU Usage [Example: Legacy Platform Version]

 

Figure 14: Itential Platform CPU Usage [Example: Legacy Platform Version]

Using the BTOP Command

For a more detailed view into system resources, and as an alternative to the standard top command, use btop to show usage for processor, memory, disks, network, and processes. From the btop interface, you can also sort and filter by different metrics, and send signals to processes (e.g., SIGTERM, SIGKILL, SIGINT).

1. Open a terminal window.
2. Type btop on the command line and press Enter.
   1. Note: Since btop is not included with many of the standard RHEL builds, you may have to install it.
3. Use the up/down arrow keys to navigate through processes.
4. Press Enter on a selected process to show detailed information.
5. Type f to filter and then type Pronghorn to only display Itential Platform/Pronghorn processes.

Figure 15: BTOP Command Processes [Example: Legacy Platform Version]

Device Counts

Platform 6 includes the ability to capture the number of “devices” (adapter endpoints) connected to the platform. This new functionality is orchestrated through the getDeviceCount() API, with access to device count information available through a downloadable CSV file. The CSV file, in turn, provides you with a historical device count record that is specific to each adapter endpoint, along with a date/timestamp that is reflective of when the polling was done.

Assigning Device Count Role Permissions

Role-based access for device count data is set through Admin Essentials. To utilize this feature you:

• Must have assigned permissions to read/write roles on user and group entities.
• Must have assigned permissions to perform the download.

1. Login to Itential Platform as an administrator (a user with the pronghorn.admin Role).
2. Navigate to Admin Essentials → Authorization.
3. Select the Users from the sidenav menu.
4. Locate admin@pronghorn role under the Users tab and click the pencil icon to open the Edit User dialog.
5. Select the admin checkbox next to the DeviceCounts source to add the role.
6. Click Save to finalize your changes.

Figure 16: Device Count Role Permission

Figure 17: Device Count Role Permission Enabled

Downloading Device Count Data

To download historical device count data in Admin Essentials:

1. Navigate to the Device Counts card in the top row of the UI.
   • Last Count indicates when device count data was last collected (polled).
   • Endpoints indicate the total count of devices in the polled data.
   • By default, device count data automatically updates at least once per 24-hour interval.
2. Click the Download Device Count History link. A copy of a CSV-formatted file is downloaded to your system.
3. Go to the location where the CSV file is saved.
4. Open the CSV file in your spreadsheet application of choice (e.g., Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets, Smartsheet, etc). In our example, Microsoft Excel is used.

Figure 18: Device Counts

Device Count CSV File

Device Count information (headers) may look like this in the CSV file:

<serverId>,<adapter-name>,<date>,<time>,<count>

The items in the CSV file and what they represent are referenced below.

Figure 19: Device Count Data CSV File

Each row of information is specific to an adapter, and the date/time is reflective of when the polling was run.

You can sort/filter device count data by timestamp, from oldest to newest. You can also sort device count data by dates, i.e., before X date and/or after X date.

Device Count Polling Interval

From the active profile of Admin Essentials, you can configure the Device Count Polling Interval to set how often Itential Platform polls for a device count.

1. Navigate to Admin Essentials → Profiles → Configure (tab).
2. Go to Edit Profile Properties and select systemProps to display the System Properties.
3. Set the Device Count Polling Interval to designate the frequency of device polling within a 24-hour period. The default polling interval is set to 1 day (once every 24-hours). The maximum polling period is 168 hours (every 7 days).

Figure 20: Device Count Polling Interval

Message Banners in Itential Platform

Beginning with the 2023.2 release version, Itential Platform now supports custom message banners. This is a system-wide banner message that displays on specified pages within the Itential application. The banner feature can be useful in situations where you need to alert users about upcoming maintenance release windows, software version upgrades, scheduled downtime, or have users acknowledge an announcement before they can proceed to use the system. It’s important to note that only a single global banner is supported and users can dismiss the banner, when enabled in the admin settings.

What Message Banners Look Like

Banners are apparent from the background color and where they display. Below, you can see an example of a banner that is placed on the home page (at the top) after the initial user login. Admins can set the background color, font type and size. Font color, however, is auto-adjusted to contrast with the background color to maintain visual accessibility.

Figure 21: Example Message Banner

Creating a Message Banner

As an admin, you can enable and customize the global message banner using the following steps:

1. Log in to your Itential Platform instance and navigate to the Admin Essentials application.
2. Click the Manage Banner button (upper-right corner). The "Create Custom Banner" dialog to create a new banner displays.
3. Toggle the Show Banner switch to display your banner.
4. Use the time controls to enter your desired run dates for the banner. You can enter the date directly or use the calendar icon for selection.
   • "Start Date/Time" of when the banner should first appear.
   • "End Date/Time" of when the banner should no longer appear.
5. Use the style control to set a background color for the banner. You can enter the Hex Color Value directly to change the background color. Default color is "Blue" (Hex #007DBC).
6. Use Image Upload to embed an image (i.e., custom logo) that displays in the banner. To fit within the banner, the image file ('ICO', 'PNG', 'JPG', 'SVG') is resized to 36x36 pixels.
7. Enter your message text for the banner in the Message Editor. A preview of the message appears in a text box below the editor. Further information on the Message Editor is presented in the next section.
8. Select the “Home Page” or "All Pages" option to specify where the banners displays.
9. Slide the toggle switch to the right to allow a user to dismiss the banner. Slide the toggle to the left if you want the banner to remain.
10. Click Save to finalize your changes. The banner should now appear on the specified IP pages with your message details.
11. Click the exit button (X) in the upper-right to close the dialog.

Figure 22: Custom Banner Controls

Message Banner Editor

The Message Editor is a WYSIWYG editor in that what you see when you write a message will look the same as it will appear on a displayed page. The WYSIWYG editor uses Rich Text formatting and includes a formatting toolbar that is similar to toolbars in word-processing applications.

Below, there are five categories of options (from left to right) in the toolbar:

1. Text Formatting
2. Paragraph Formatting
3. Insert URL Link
4. Font Style
5. Font Type

Figure 23: Message Banner Toolbar

Text Formatting

Three text formatting options are available.

• Bold (B): To bold the text.
• Italic (I): To italicize the text.
• Underline (U): To underline the text.

Paragraph Formatting

Two paragraph formatting options are available.

• Unordered list: Make a list denoted with the bullet (•) symbol.
• Ordered list: Make a numbered list for each item.

Insert Hyperlink

You can insert an absolute URL to generate a hyperlink to additional information, such as a reference article, product documentation, technical announcements or release notes.

Text Style

Three text style options are available:

• Heading (First level)
• Subheading (Second level)
• Normal text

Figure 24: Message Banner Font Style

Font Size

Four font sizes (weights) are available to set the appearance of the text:

• Small
• Medium
• Large
• Huge

Figure 25: Message Banner Font Type

Troubleshooting Message Banners

If you do not see your banner appear, check your permissions. In some instances, you might need to adjust the permissions on the banner-schema Customization API routes.

Tags

The Tags application from the Quick Start area of Admin Essentials is designed to make workflows, forms, and other items search enabled. You can create or edit tags, as well as add tags to a specific collection

The Tags interface is intuitively simple to navigate:

1. Click Tags from the Quick Start area of the Admin Essentials welcome page to open the application. The Tags dialog will open and display a list of items in table view.
2. Click the plus sign "+" icon located in the upper-right corner to create a new tag.
3. Use the search bar to locate a tag from the collection list. Enter one or
   more characters in the search bar. The characters should correspond to
   the tag name. A filtered list of results will return.
4. Click the menu button (stacked dots) at the end of each row to display the menu to update or delete a tag.
5. Use the Sort feature to display tag names in ascending or descending order.
6. Once all actions are complete, click Close at the bottom to close the dialog.

Figure 26: Admin Essentials Quick Start

Figure 27: Tags Dialog

Figure 28: Sort Tags

Creating, Editing & Deleting Tags

To create a new tag:

1. Click the plus sign "+" icon in the upper-right corner of the Tags dialog.
2. Provide a unique tag name and a brief description.
3. Click the Create button to save your inputs. A pop-up message displays in the upper-right corner of the screen to indicate the new tag was successfully created.

Figure 29: Create New Tag

To edit a tag:

1. Click the menu button to the right of a chosen tag and click the pencil icon.
2. Provide the desired edits to the tag (i.e., name, description).
3. Click the Update button to retain your changes. The Tags table immediately refreshes to reflect the edits that were made.

Figure 30: Update Tag

To delete a tag:

1. Click the menu button to the right of a chosen tag and click the trashcan icon. A confirmation prompt displays.
2. Click Delete to confirm the deletion. A success notification displays to indicate the tag was deleted.

Figure 31: Delete Tag

Adding Tags to Collections

Currently, you can add tags to the following collections.

To add a tag to a Workflow, Template, or Golden Config:

1. Create a new workflow, template, or golden config, and save.
2. Alternatively, you can edit an existing workflow, template, or golden config.
3. Click the menu (stacked dots) icon in the upper-right of the canvas and click View Metadata to open the Settings dialog.
4. Search for the desired tag name that was created.
5. Add the tag and click Save to update.

Shown below is an example of adding tags to a Golden Config, which is similar to how you would add tags to a template or workflow.

Figure 32: Add Tag to Golden Config