Web-based System Manager is a client-server application that gives the user a powerful interface to manage UNIX systems. Web-based System Manager uses its graphical interface to enable the user to access and manage multiple remote machines. This interface shows a Console Window containing two primary panels. The panel on the left displays the machines that the user can manage from the Console Window. This panel is referred to as the Navigation Area. The panel on the right (the Contents Area) displays results based on the item selected in the Navigation Area. You select the machine to perform management operations from the Navigation Area. As you navigate to the desired operation in the Navigation Area, the Contents Area is updated to show the allowable choices.
The following sequence of steps provides an example of how Web-based System Manager is used to modify the properties of a user:
/usr/websm/bin/websm
The Contents Area will have the following categories:
The client portion of the Web-based System Manager application runs on the managing machine. In the above example, it was not stated if the user being modified was a user on the machine running Web-based System Manager (the client) or on a managed machine (a server). To modify a user on a managed machine, select a machine from the Navigation Area. If this machine has not already been accessed, a dialog asking for your Host name, User name and Password appears. Use this dialog to log in to the managed machine. After you have logged in to a machine, you can perform operations from the Web-based System Manager console on another managed machine and return to the machine (by selecting it from the Navigation Area) without logging in again.
You will want to maintain a Web-based System Manager home machine. This home machine should be used as the managing machine even if you start Web-based System Manager from a machine other than the home machine. This is because the initial appearance of the console window is derived from a file on the managing machine. This enables you to start Web-based System Manager at a colleague's desk, specify a personal home machine as the managing machine, and thus create a console window with your saved preferences. For more information about saving preferences, see Preference Files.
The most important portion of your saved preferences may be the machine Management Environment. The Management Environment is a powerful mechanism for defining and accessing the set of machines for which you are responsible. When you select a machine in the Management Environment, a Web-based System Manager server is started on the selected machine. This server provides the client (and indirectly the console window) with remote managed objects. The client portion of the application presents these remote managed objects through windows and other standard graphical user interface (GUI) elements. By working with these GUI elements, the client side of the application can display information about objects on the remote managed machine, as well as allow you to update this information.
After a machine in the Management Environment is active (this occurs through selecting a machine in the Management Environment and logging in to the machine), you can switch from managing one machine to managing another with a few mouse clicks.
The result is you can manage a large number of machines through one powerful interface.