Document Overview

These release notes have been updated for the following xMatters Integration Agent release: 

Release version: integrationagent-5.1.8.2

Revision: r87511 
(AIX version revision number: r87518 )

Download: (Contact Customer Support for access to this version)

Release Date:  June 15, 2017 (AIX version re-released: August 25, 2017)

NOTE: This document is subject to change after the initial release of this product. If you would like to be alerted when the document is modified, click Follow above. 

Release Overview

This is a cumulative release of the xMatters Integration Agent, incorporating all updates and patches for the Integration Agent version 5.x, (all releases from 5.0.1 through 5.1.8.2).

NOTE: This version of the xMatters Integration Agent consolidates and replaces the 5.0 Integration Agent for premises deployments, and the 5.5.x version previously used for xMatters On-Demand. The 5.1.8 version of the Integration Agent can now be used for xMatters 5.0 and 5.1 deployments, and for xMatters On-Demand.

Important notice about event throttling

If you are a premises customer, and have configured event throttling, this patch will cause the feature to become unresponsive.

To implement rate-limiting, you can modify IAConfig.xml and change the <apxml-exchange>::<size> and <apxml-exchange>::<interval> values. The <size> setting determines the maximum number of messages sent by the integration agent to xMatters in a single request. The <interval> setting determines how many seconds pass between requests. To set up a rate limit of max events per minute, the <size> and <interval> values should be modified so that:

<max events per minute> = (60 / <interval>) * <size>

Note: <interval> and <size> must be integer values.

Changes to patch contents

Previous patches introduced some changes to the installation procedures and addressed a known issue. If you are upgrading from a version prior to patch 007, it is highly recommended that you review the previous patch notes before proceeding. 

Updates and Features

This release of the Integration Agent includes the following updates: 

5.1.8.2 update

Updated JRE for AIX

The 5.1.8.2 version of the Integration Agent for AIX was re-released on August 25, 2017 to include an update to the included JRE for AIX installations that is required to support versions of TLS higher than v1.0. (For more information about why this patch is necessary, refer to the end-of-life notice for TLS v1.0 support.)

The new functionality also reserves an additional number (the number 8) for the wrapper.java.additional properties in the wrapper.conf file. For more information, refer to the "Post-installation tasks" section in the Installation chapter of the Integration Agent guide.

Note: Due to the difference in the included JRE, the AIX version of the 5.1.8.2 release has a different revision number: r87518 - make sure that this is the version number returned after upgrading your Integration Agents on AIX.
(xMatters internal reference: INTA-5121)

XMIO.js update

This release includes an update to XMIO.js that allows it to handle secure NTLM proxy domains.
(xMatters internal reference: INTA-4896)

Library updates

To improve system security, a number of the Integration Agent's libraries have been upgraded.
(xMatters internal reference: HOTH-5959)

5.1.8.1 update

Fix to quiet/busy mode switch

The 5.1 patch 8.1 release includes a fix for an issue that was affecting the Integration Agent's ability to properly switch between quiet and busy modes. A defect was identified in the code responsible for detecting and counting empty responses that was preventing the Integration Agent from resetting the count after a non-empty response. This issue has been addressed.

5.1.8 updates

Java Runtime Environment upgrade to version 8

To improve system security and performance, the Integration Agent's JRE has been upgraded to Java 8 on all platforms.
(xMatters internal reference: INTA-3743)

XMIO.js enhancements

This patch includes enhancements to XMIO.js that support HTTP DELETE and PATCH methods and custom headers, and allow it to use proxy information configured in the IAConfig.xml file.
(xMatters internal reference: INTA-3744, INTA-3568) 

Installing

For detailed system requirements, and installation instructions for new deployments, refer to the xMatters 5.x Documentation. The following instructions explain how to apply this update as a patch to an existing deployment.

Configuration file changes

The following files have been modified in this or other recent releases of the Integration Agent, and older versions of these files are incompatible with the current release:

File	Incompatible Versions
IAConfig.xml	5.1.2 and older
deduplicator-filter.xml	5.1.2 and older
mule-config.xml	5.1.6 and older
spring-config.xml	5.1.6 and older
wrapper.conf	5.1.2 and older

If you are upgrading from an older Integration Agent and have customized or modified these files, your changes must be manually migrated into the new files.

Files included with this release:

integrationagent-5.1.8.2-<platform>.[zip | tgz]

Because the xMatters Integration Agent does not include an installer, patching an existing Integration Agent installation requires only that you extract the latest version of the Integration Agent archive onto your server, and then migrate selected files from your existing deployment. This ensures that you will have a working Integration Agent to fall back on if you encounter complications while configuring the new version.

NOTE: This release of the Integration Agent includes changes to the mule.sh file. If you have modified this file, you will need to merge your changes with the file included in the patch.

To patch the Integration Agent:

1. Extract the new Integration Agent folder from the archive to the root of your xMatters installation.
   • The result will be a new folder (typically c:\xmatters\integrationagent-5.1.8.2 or /opt/xmatters/integrationsagent-5.1.8.2, referred to in these release notes as <IAHOME>).
   • We will refer to the base folder of your old integration as <Old-IA>.
2. Navigate to the new <IAHOME>/conf directory, and backup the following files:
   • Copy IAConfig.xml to IAConfig.xml.orig.
   • Copy deduplicator-filter.xml to deduplicator-filter.xml.orig.
3. Open the above-named files with a text editor, and then copy any custom settings from the files in <IA-Old>/conf.

• If you have customized any other files in your old integration agent's conf folder, merge the customizations over in the same way.
• If you are not using the sample communication plan or sample integrated properties, comment out the references in the IAConfig.xml file (the paths including sample-relevance-engine.xml and sample-integrated-properties.xml).

Copy .wspasswd from <Old-IA>/conf.

Navigate to <IAHOME>/integrationservices and copy your integrations from <Old-IA>/integrationservices.

If you have made any changes to the default files in the /integrationservices folder (e.g., <IAHOME>/integrationservices/ping/ping.js), back up the new files before merging your modifications to them.

Stop any running Integration Agent processes or services.

Navigate to <IAHOME>/bin and start the Integration Agent (start_console.bat or ./start_console.sh).

Verify that the Integration Agent starts successfully.

• The following message should appear: "Successfully completed Integration Agent bootstrap process. Integration Agent is running."

NOTE: If you have an existing integration that relies on a specific version of the IAUtils package, the Integration Agent may not start properly. For more information, refer to Integration Agent utilities.

Integration Agent utilities

The Integration Agent Utilities bundle (IAUtils) is a collection of scripts and binary code that provides required functionality for many integrations. The bundle is distributed separately from the main Integration Agent installer, but must be installed at the same time. If the IAUtils package is not present when the Integration Agent is started, the start up may fail.

Note: Prior to the Integration Agent version 5.1.2 release, the installer included the IAUtils package. The utilities were removed from the installer because some versions of integrations required a specific version of IAUtils, and upgrading or reinstalling the Integration Agent would overwrite the required version and cause the integration to stop working.

Downloading the IAUtils

You can download the IAUtils package (integrationagent-utils.jar) from the same Integration Agent page.

Note: If you are using an integration that requires a specific version of the IAUtils, follow the instructions in the integration guide for that integration.

To install the IAUtils, extract the integrationagent-utils.zip archive file to <IAHOME>, and allow the extracted lib and integrationservices folders to merge with the ones created by the Integration Agent installer.

For more information about the IAUtils, refer to the "Installation" chapter of the Integration Agent Guide.

Verifying the Integration Agent version

After patching and starting the Integration Agent:

1. Navigate to <IAHOME>/bin and run the following command:

• On Windows:

  iadmin get-status

• On Linux:

  ./iadmin.sh get-status

For all versions except AIX, the following output should be displayed:

Version: 5.1.8.2 r87511

For AIX versions, the following output should be displayed:

Version: 5.1.8.2 r87518

Repeat the above steps for each Integration Agent in your deployment. 

If the Integration Agent does not work as expected, you can revert to the previous version until the problem has been resolved. For help, contact xMatters Customer Support.

Appendix: Known Issues

Base64 exception

The Integration Agent will not start if an integration script is loaded that uses the Base64 function imported from Apache. For more information and solution details, see "Integration Agent will not start due to Base64 exception". 

Windows installation paths

On Windows systems, the dynamic compilation feature of the Integration Agent will fail if the path contains spaces. If you use or are planning to use this feature, ensure that the integration agent is installed in a path that contains no spaces.

(xMatters Reference: BUG-5168) 

Reloading integration service via iadmin reload command causes all web service endpoints to fail

After a single integration service is reloaded by running the iadmin reload command, all web service endpoints for all integration services (not just the service being reloaded) may stop working. This affects the functionality of mobile access requests, direct external service requests, and custom web service requests to all integration services. NOTE:  issuing a subsequent  iadmin reload all restores the web service endpoints.

(xMatters Reference: BUG-2206) 

Messages may continue to be processed after the inbound queues are purged

The iadmin purge command deletes all messages from the inbound/outbound queues of the specific (or all) integration services.  Messages that are "in-process" during the purge (e.g., delayed after a retriable exception or actively being processed by input/response action scripting), may remain in the inbound queues and continue to be (re)processed.  To work around this issue, either stop the integration agent or suspend the integration service prior to the purge, followed by a restart/resume.

(xMatters Reference:  BUG-2180) 

Messages may be reprocessed after an integration service is suspended and resumed

Messages that are actively being processed by input/response action scripting during an iadmin suspend are allowed to complete without interruption.  However, when a suspended integration service is resumed (either after an iadmin resume command or restart), messages that were being processed during the suspension may be reprocessed.  Integrations are designed to handle reprocessing, but this may result in redundant updates (depending on the integration).

(xMatters Reference: BUG-2181) 

iadmin purge may periodically fail if the Integration Agent is not running

The iadmin purge command sometimes fails to work when the Integration Agent is not running. This failure is indicated by an entry similar to the following in AlarmPointIAdmin.txt>:

2012-08-09 10:00:46,502 [main] DEBUG - The command could not be executed because of the following problem:

java.lang.NullPointerException

at org.apache.activemq.broker.jmx.BrokerView.getQueues(BrokerView.java:185)

NOTE: re-issuing the iadmin purge command often succeeds, as the failure cause is transient.

(xMatters Reference: BUG-2205) 

Although APClient.bin reports non-connection related network errors, it does not write the failed submissions to the recovery log.

(xMatters Reference: BUG-2263, BUG-2264) 

Enabling password-authentication prevents event injections for all Integration Services using APClient.bin.

Setting the parameter in the IAConfig.xml file to "true" will prevent any event injections for all Integration Services using APClient.bin. Note that password-authentication is typically not enabled out-of-the-box for integrations, so the impact of this issue should be very limited.

(xMatters Reference: BUG-1122)