When using multiple Agent Handlers in your network, group and prioritize them to help ensure network connectivity.
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 communication 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 many 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 uses 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 redundancy to your environment to further ensure that your agents can always receive the information they need.
Sitelist files
The agent uses the sitelist.xml files to decide which handler to communicate with. Each time handler assignments and priorities are updated, these files are updated on the managed system. Once these files are updated, the agent implements the new assignment or priority on the next scheduled agent-server communication.