McAfee EPOCDE-AA-BA Product Guide - Page 102

10 Setting up Agent Handlers Handler groups and priority When an agent handler is uninstalled it is not displayed in this chart. If an agent handler assignment rule exclusively assigns agents to an agent handler and if the particular agent handler is uninstalled, then it is displayed in the chart as Uninstalled agent handler along with the number of agents still trying to contact this. If the Agent Handlers are not installed correctly, then the Uninstalled Agent Handler message is displayed which indicates that the handler cannot communicate with few agents. Click on the list to view the agents which cannot communicate with the handler. Multiple Agent Handlers You can have more than one Agent Handler in you network. You might have a large number of managed systems spread across multiple geographic areas or political boundaries. Whatever the case, you can add an organization to your managed systems by assigning distinct groups to different handlers. Handler groups and priority When using multiple Agent Handlers in your network, you can group and prioritize them to help ensure network connectivity. Configure your handler groups to meet the specific needs of your environment. For example, you might choose to create a group of handlers in which the handlers are dispersed over a wide geographic area. With handlers dispersed, you can configure the handler priority so that agents first communicate to the handler nearest them. However, if the system in that handler area fails, the next priority handler takes over to ensure that agents can communicate. Handler groups With multiple Agent Handlers in your network, you can create handler groups. You can also apply priority to handlers in a group. Handler priority tells the agents which handler to communicate with first. If the handler with the highest priority is unavailable, the agent falls back to the next handler in the list. This priority information is contained in the repository list (sitelist.xml file) in each agent. When you change handler assignments, this file is updated as part of the agent-server commutation process. Once the assignments are received, the agent waits until the next regularly scheduled communication to implement them. You can perform an immediate agent wake-up call to update the agent immediately. Grouping handlers and assigning priority is customizable, so you can meet the needs of your specific environment. Two common scenarios for grouping handlers are: • Using multiple handlers for load balancing You might have a large number of managed systems in your network, for which you want to distribute the workload of agent-server communications and policy enforcement. You can configure the handler list so that agents randomly pick the handler communicate with. • Setting up a fallback plan to ensure agent-server communication You might have systems distributed over a wide geographic area. By assigning a priority to each handler dispersed throughout this area, you can specify which handler the agents communicate with, and in what order. This can help ensure that managed systems on your network stay up-to-date by creating a fallback agent communication, much the same as fallback repositories ensure that new updates are available to your agents. If the handler with the highest priority is unavailable, the agent will fall back to the handler with the next highest priority. In addition to assigning handler priority within a group of handlers, you can also set handler assignment priority across several groups of handlers. This adds an additional layer of redundancy to your environment to further ensure that your agents can always receive the information they need. 102 McAfee® ePolicy Orchestrator® 4.6.0 Software Product Guide