The many faces of the Microsoft Monitoring Agent

Summary: Learn how the Microsoft Monitoring Agent is the one agent on your servers for all your hybrid cloud monitoring and management needs.

Hello, this is Graham Davies, a Microsoft Premier Field Engineer, and today I want to talk about a challenge we all face with multiple management and monitoring solutions. That is the number of agents that each of these applications require.

So, I have some great news for anyone who's looking to take advantage of System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) and the Operations Management Suite (OMS) for hybrid monitoring and management solution. Don’t be confused if you read about the OMS agent, the SCOM agent, or even the Log Analytics agent. The great news is there is only one agent—it is the Microsoft Monitoring Agent. And that means that you need just one agent on your servers for all your hybrid cloud monitoring and management needs.

Even better, when you decide to use Azure Automation for on-premises automation and install a hybrid runbook worker then, once again, it is the Microsoft Monitoring Agent that is being deployed.

Let’s start off with a customer who has SCOM 2012 R2 deployed. The version of the Microsoft Monitoring Agent that SCOM 2012 R2 uses is 7.1.10184.0. You can see the version in the SCOM console under Administration > Device Management > Agent Managed:

Screenshot of the version of the Monitoring Agent for SCOM 2012 R2 in the SCOM console.

It's also in Control Panel > Microsoft Monitoring Agent:

Screenshot of the version of the Monitoring Agent for SCOM 2012 R2 in the Control Panel.

Now, if we connect the server to OMS through the SCOM console, this does not update the Microsoft Monitoring Agent version that is displayed in the SCOM console - 7.1.10184.0.

However, one limitation of linking a server to OMS through SCOM is that currently the server can only connect to one OMS workspace. If you want to multi-home the server to multiple OMS workspaces, you need to install an updated version of the Microsoft Monitoring Agent as detailed in the blog post at OMS Log Analytics Agent multi-homing support. You then directly connect the Microsoft Monitoring Agent to OMS.

After you do this, you’ll see the version change in the SCOM console.

Screenshot of the updated version of the Monitoring Agent in the SCOM console.

You’ll also see the Microsoft Monitoring Agent Properties dialog box in Control Panel update to include new tabs. For example, I have just done this for DC-01 below.

Screenshot of the updated tabs in the Microsoft Monitoring Agent Properties dialog box in Control Panel. Screenshot of values in the Properties tab of the Microsoft Monitoring Agent Properties dialog box in Control Panel.

To complete the “migration” of the server from SCOM managed to direct attached, we still need to remove the server from SCOM. To do this, go to Administration > Operations Management Suite > Managed Computers > Add a Computer / Group.

Screenshot of Managed Computers pane and the Add a Computer / Group option.

Select the computer that we have just upgraded the Microsoft Monitoring Agent on, and then click Remove.

Screenshot of a selected computer and the option to remove option.

Add then, we need to add the OMS Workspace ID and on-boarding key details in Control Panel > Microsoft Monitoring Agent > Azure Log Analytics (OMS) tab.

Screenshot of Add a Log Analytics Workspace dialog box.

 

Screenshot of the Azure Log Analytics (OMS) tab and a warning message.

 

Screenshot of the Azure Log Analytics (OMS) tab and an added Log Analytics workspace.

Note: The version of the Microsoft Monitoring Agent from OMS today is 8.0.10900.0 although incremental changes could happen at any time.

One reason for this post is that I’m frequently  asked if the SCOM agent and the OMS agent can co-exist. Well, the great news is that they are one and the same thing! You can get all the benefits of SCOM + OMS with a single unified agent.

Graham Davies
Senior Premier Field Engineer