Overview

The Enterprise Administration Module (EAM) enables you to control and monitor any number of Ignition Gateways from a central Gateway. The EAM takes advantage of the Gateway Network system to seamlessly deliver data between Gateways.

EAM works well in distributed systems and systems with multiple Gateways. EAM is not required for large Ignition systems, but there are several benefits to incorporating the module:

  • Gateway Version Control - Upgrades modules on each controller and agent Gateway to ensure each installation is on the same version. 
  • Project Synchronization - In cases where the same project is used on multiple Gateways, projects can automatically be pushed to select agents. This simplifies how updates are pushed out and eliminates the need to update each project individually.
  • Monitor Agent Health - The controller Gateway monitors Agent health and will trigger alarms when an issue arises. Alarm notifications can also be sent, so you will always know immediately when an issue is detected. 
  • Quick Recovery from System Failures - Hardware failure can cause days of downtime. Agent recovery allows for quick Gateway, license, and module restoration on new hardware to greatly reduce the amount of time the system is down. 










Agents and Controllers

EAM involves coordinating several different Gateways on the same network. Each Gateway is assigned a role of Controller or Agent:

  • Controller - Manages or controls other connected Gateways. The Controller is responsible for assigning tasks as well as monitoring each agent. Only a single Gateway on each Gateway network can be a controller.
  • Agent - Gateway that performs all assigned tasks and reports to the Controller. Multiple Agents can report to one Controller.


Task Management

EAM allows you to schedule common Gateway tasks to execute against remote Agent Gateways. Tasks are requests sent to an Agent by the Controller. These requests cause the Agent to perform some action such as activating a license. Tasks include:


On-Demand or Scheduled

Gateway tasks can be executed immediately, scheduled to run once at a later time, or set up as part of a recurring schedule. The schedules can be freely modified or paused. Scheduled tasks can also execute on-demand, allowing the tasks to be called at will. 




Disaster Recovery and Prevention

Every EAM Agent sends information to the controller about its general health status. Whenever problems occur on an Agent, the controller is notified of the Agent’s status in the form of Agent Events. Problems could include:

  • High CPU usage on the Agent
  • Large numbers of system errors in a short timeframe
  • Unusually high usage of database connections

Loss of connectivity to the Agent also triggers an Agent Event on the controller. Agent Events are recorded in an external database for analysis and reporting later. Agent Events can also be directly configured on the controller to automatically trigger alarms or send alarm notifications.

The Collect Backup Gateway task does more than simply collect a Gateway backup from Agents. Whenever the task runs, the Gateway backup, all installed modules, and the current license are collected from the Agent and stored in the archive system on the controller. This system allows for quick recovery later if an Agent machine catastrophically fails and must be reinstalled.