IBM Z HMC OS Message Forwarder

The IBM Z HMC OS Message Forwarder connects to the console of operating systems running in LPARs on Z systems and forwards the messages written by the operating systems in the LPARs to remote syslog servers.

The Z systems can be in classic or DPM operational mode.

The forwarder attempts to stay up as much as possible, for example it performs automatic session renewals with the HMC if the logon session expires, and it survives HMC reboots and automatically resumes forwarding again once the HMC come back up, without loosing or duplicating any messages.

Documentation

• Documentation
• Change log

Supported environments

• Operating systems: Linux, macOS, Windows
• Python versions: 3.9 and higher
• HMC versions: 2.11.1 and higher

Quickstart

• If not yet available, install the "pipx" command as described in https://pipx.pypa.io/stable/installation/.

• Without having any virtual Python environment active, install the log forwarder as follows:

  $ pipx install zhmc-os-forwarder
  

  That makes the zhmc_os_forwarder command available in the PATH, without having to activate any virtual Python environment.

• Provide a config file for use by the forwarder.

  The config file tells the forwarder which HMC to use, and for which CPCs and LPARs it should forward to which syslog servers.

  Download the Example forwarder config file and edit that copy according to your needs.

  For details, see Forwarder config file.

• Run the forwarder as follows:

  $ zhmc_os_forwarder -c config.yaml
  zhmc_os_forwarder version: 0.2.0
  zhmcclient version: 1.10.0
  Verbosity level: 0
  Opening session with HMC 10.11.12.13 (user: johndoe@us.ibm.com, certificate validation: False)
  Forwarder is up and running (Press Ctrl-C to shut down)
  

Limitations

At this point, the forwarder has several limitations. All of them are intended to be resolved in future releases.

• The forwarder does not recover from HMC restart or connection loss
• Restarting the forwarder will send again all OS messages the HMC has buffered
• New and deleted LPARs in DPM mode are not automatically detected.

Reporting issues

If you encounter a problem, please report it as an issue on GitHub.

License

This package is licensed under the Apache 2.0 License.