Recently I delivered a SAS Talks session: SAS 9.4: What’s New for SAS® Administrators .  We had a large group attend and subsequently had a wonderful flood of questions that we couldn’t always keep up with.  So I wanted to follow up with some of the popular questions:

Q: Is SAS Environment Manager part of a 9.4 deployment or is it a separate package as an add-on?

SAS Environment Manager is delivered as part of SAS Integration Technologies and is available on all platforms supported by SAS 9.4 except for z/OS. 

Q: How is SAS Environment Manager different from APM?

SAS Environment Manager does not replace the SAS Audit, Performance and Measurement package at this time. APM focuses on audit and ARM records while SAS Environment Manager focuses on availability, and system and process measures and metrics. Our plan is to more closely integrate these during the SAS 9.4 lifecycle with the first step being the APM Environment Manager plugin, which allows you to monitor your APM jobs and access APM reports from the SAS Environment Manager interface.  The plug-in is now available via the support.sas.com Downloads & Hotfixes site.

Q: Will there be documentation for SAS Environment Manager plugins?

Plugins and the rest of the architecture are covered in the documentation available on support.sas.com.  The SAS Environment Manager focus area documents many of the delivered plugins as well as the plugins that are available for download. 

Q: Would a clustered SAS metadata environment cost more than one that is not clustered?

No.  All customers who license products or solutions built on the SAS Intelligence Platform (i.e., SAS Integration Technologies) are provided with a limited-use license that allows the SAS Metadata Server to be deployed either on the same machine as other SAS processing or on a machine dedicated to the metadata server. This license includes the ability to run a metadata server cluster on a set of machines not licensed for other types of SAS processing.

Q: Can Metadata Server Clustering be bypassed when a SAS 9.3 environment is upgraded to SAS 9.4?

Certainly.  You can configure your new SAS 9.4 system with a single metadata server then decide at any time later to convert to a clustered system. To add cluster nodes, you go to the machine that is to host the second node, and run the SAS Deployment Wizard from the same SAS Software Depot that was used to configure the original system. Choose the original plan file and the Metadata Server Node step. Configure the node as you would for a new cluster configuration. You will be prompted for a connection to the first node. You must also enter the backup location and the service logon identity (if applicable). The new node will be synchronized with the original node. Repeat this process for the third node. 

You can get more detail on metadata server clustering via this SAS Global Forum paper.

Q: Does SAS Environment Manager replace RTM in a grid environment?

We recognize SAS Environment Manager and SAS Grid Manager’s Platform RTM for SAS have common elements. We see them as complimentary technologies and are planning an integration of the two in a future release of SAS Environment Manager.

Q: Can SAS Environment Manager monitor any other resources other than SAS deployed?    

SAS Environment Manager is delivered with and designed to support a SAS deployment.  Components that are not shipped with SAS but are part of your SAS deployment can be monitored, but note that third-party plugins not delivered by SAS are not supported by SAS Technical Support.  SAS Environment Manager is not licensed to monitor components or systems outside of SAS deployment.