Encrypted Passwords with NetApp's Virtualization data collector tool

[ajkremer]

Greets all,

I will be using the NetApp DataCollection tool   https://fieldportal.netapp.com/viewcontent.asp?qv=1&uid=7131&docid=5265    at a customer site for the first time. In order to make adding hosts easy, one can create a CSV file with IP address, username and password. There is a check box for encrypted passwords in the tool itself, but no documentation that I can find as to how to encrypt them. I've found a few blog posts on the collection tool, but again, no specic directions on the encrypted password portion.  So, given that, I'm hoping someone knows the answers to the following:

·         Is an administrator password required, or will non admin account work for the candidate hosts (the ones having their counters collected)

·         Are the passwords sent in the clear from the gathering server to the other hosts if the “host file encrypted” box is unchecked?

·         How does one go about encrypting a password for the CSV file, and does this affect whether or not the passwords are sent in the clear?

Thanks very very much

[scottgelb]

From the readme file "If the "Host File Encrypted" checkbox is selected, the password from the imported CSV file is encrypted."  There isn't a way to encrypt the password in the csv file, but you can delete it after importing the csv file.

The user must have credentials to gather statistics...The csv documentation says "user has permission to access host information".  Also, test wmi connectivity using "Check Host Status".

The tool works great...I used it using an admin account. It supports up to 100 hosts so if more than that, run the tool again or on a different host and total the output after running the analyzer.  The host that runs the tool needs to stay logged in and running for the duration of the collection.