Guidance for installing Insights on RHEL systems managed by Satellite

1. 1

   Install the Insights RPM and register your system to Red Hat Insights

   There are multiple ways to automate this process. We've provided several options for popular configuration management tools below:

   • Automated Installation:

     Ansible

     Deploying Red Hat Insights using the Ansible Role included with your Smart Management entitlement

     You can automate the installation and registration of hosts with Red Hat Insights using the RedHatInsights.insights-client Ansible role. For more information about adding this role to your Satellite, see Managing Ansible Roles.

     1. Add the RedHatInsights.insights-client role to the hosts. For new hosts, see Section 2.1, Creating a Host in Red Hat Satellite. For existing hosts, see Chapter 8, Using Ansible Roles.
     2. To run the RedHatInsights.insights-client role on your host, navigate to Hosts > All Hosts and click the name of the host that you want to use.
     3. Click the Run Ansible roles button.
     4. See host on the Insights > Overview page of the Satellite web UI

     Puppet

     Deploy Red Hat Insights using Puppet in Satellite

     If you are using Red Hat Satellite’s configuration management provided by Puppet this process can be automated by applying the preinstalled Puppet class access_insights_clients. This class can be imported from the Puppet Master into the appropriate Puppet environment and applied to hosts that you wish to subscribe to Red Hat Insights.

     Download Insights-client puppet module

   • Manual Installation:

     Perform the following steps to install the client on a RHEL system and register the system to Red Hat Insights:

     RHEL 8+

     Register the system to Red Hat Insights.

     
     
     
     
     
     
     ​​[root@server ~]# insights-client --register

     ​​
     Note: For RHEL 8.2, Insights can be enabled at install time. Refer to the release notes for more information.

     
     

     RHEL 7 & 6

     1. Install the client on the RHEL system.
        
        
        
        
        
        
        [root@server ~]# yum install insights-client

     2. Register the system to Red Hat Insights.
        
        
        
        
        
        
        ​​[root@server ~]# insights-client --register

     Note: Red Hat Insights can be used on all Red Hat-supported versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, version 6.4 and later.

2. 2

   View your results

   After registration, the Insights client will initiate its first upload to Red Hat Insights for analysis. You can view your systems and the results of the Red Hat Insights analysis via the Insights tab within Satellite or in the Insights dashboard.

   GO TO INSIGHTS DASHBOARD

Guidance for installing Insights on RHEL systems hosted on a Red Hat Certified Cloud and Service Provider (CCSP)

1. 1

   Deploying Red Hat Insights on existing RHEL systems managed by Red Hat Subscription Management, Satellite, or cloud access
   

   The following guidance is for users who wish to deploy Red Hat Insights on an existing Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) system connected to Red Hat Subscription Management (RHSM), Satellite, or cloud access.
   

   If you wish to deploy Insights on a RHEL system purchased through a public cloud marketplace, do not use this method. See "Deploying Red Hat Insights on existing RHEL systems managed by Red Hat Update Infrastructure (RHUI)" below.
   

   • If using RHSM, register all systems with Red Hat for updates and to resolve software dependencies. Satellite users may skip this step.
     

   [root@server ~]# subscription-manager register --auto-attach

   Note: If the system can not be subscribed to RHSM, basic authentication may be leveraged for usage of the Insights client.
   

   • Install the client package on each system. If you’re using RHEL 8 or above, the Insights client is installed by default.

   [root@server ~]# yum install insights-client

   • Register the system to Insights

   [root@server ~]# insights-client --register

   • After registration, the Red Hat Insights client will initiate its first upload to Insights for analysis. You can view the results for a single system and for your infrastructure of registered systems in the Insights dashboard.
2. 2

   Deploying Red Hat Insights on existing RHEL systems managed by Red Hat Update Infrastructure (RHUI)

   The following guidance is for users who wish to deploy Red Hat Insights on an existing Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) system managed by Red Hat Update Infrastructure (RHUI). This includes on-demand, hourly systems purchased from CCSP marketplace, as well as systems deployed from Red Hat Gold Images in AWS. This procedure involves the following tasks:

   • Install the client on the RHEL system.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     [root@server ~]# yum install insights-client

     Note: Install the client package on each system. If you’re using RHEL 8+, the Insights client is installed by default.

   • Configure basic authentication in /etc/insights-client/insights-client.conf.
     • Modify the auto_config= value to FALSE.
     • Add your Red Hat SSO username to username=
     • Add your Red Hat SSO password to password=
     • Save the configuration.

       Note: To read more about using Red Hat Insights with basic authentication and recommended best practices, visit our documentation.

   • Register the system to Insights.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     ​​[root@server ~]# insights-client --register
                                                                                 

     Note:

     • Red Hat Insights can be used on all Red Hat-supported versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, version 6.4 and later.
     • For RHEL 8.2, Insights can be enabled at install time. Refer to the release notes for more information.

     
     

3. 3

   View your results

   After registration, the Red Hat Insights client will initiate its first upload to Insights for analysis. You can view the results for a single system, and for your infrastructure of registered systems, in the Insights dashboard.

   GO TO INSIGHTS DASHBOARD

1. 1

   Create a Red Hat SSO account

   In order to use Red Hat Insights, you will need to create a Red Hat SSO account if you do not already have one setup. If your organization already has a Red Hat account, you should contact your Organization Administrator to be added to the appropriate account.

   CREATE A RED HAT ACCOUNT

2. 2

   Establish your Account

   Once an account has been created, the account must be initialized for use with Red Hat Insights. Please visit and complete the Red Hat Insights evaluation form. 

   The initialization of this account may take a couple of minutes or up to an hour before systems can be registered for use. If any errors occur during registration of the Insights client, or usage of cloud.redhat.com redirects to the evaluation form, please attempt again at a later time as account initialization may still be in progress.

   Note: This form refers to this process as an “evaluation” as this step is needed to initialize the new account. Red Hat Insights is included as part of Red Hat Enterprise Linux for use and will continue to be free to use after this evaluation expires.

3. 3

   Verify access to cloud.redhat.com

   To ensure your account has been set up correctly, log into the Red Hat Insights console. 

   Note: If the account is still initializing after filling out the Red Hat Insights evaluation form outlined in the previous step, you may be redirected to the evaluation form; revisit cloud.redhat.com/insights later to verify the account has been established.

4. 4

   Proceed with installation of the Red Hat Insights client

   • Red Hat Insights via a Public Cloud Provider installation instructions
   • Red Hat Insights Direct installation instructions
   • Red Hat Insights via Satellite installation instructions

1. 1

   Activating data collection

   Automated Activation

   As an administrator, first log into your Red Hat Ansible Tower webUI and click on the Settings button in the left menu. Next, click on the System button. 

   There are three settings you need to set here:

   1. GATHER DATA FOR AUTOMATION ANALYTICS must be set to ON
   2. RED HAT CUSTOMER USERNAME is your cloud.redhat.com username
   3. RED HAT CUSTOMER PASSWORD is your cloud.redhat.com password for your respective username

   Finally, click the SAVE button. Once you do, Red Hat Ansible Tower will sync to cloud.redhat.com up to four times a day.

   Manual Activation

   If it is desired to sync to cloud.redhat.com right away and register a system, this can be done manually on the Red Hat Ansible Tower command line.  This will allow you to verify quickly that everything is setup correctly.

   Login as the awx user or an administrative user on the control node and run the following command:

   $ sudo awx-manage gather_analytics --ship

   This command will provide output similar to the following:

   [student1@ansible ~]$ sudo awx-manage gather_analytics --ship
   /tmp/4457cd25-4722-4b62-9ae6-ce8068026bbc_2019-10-28-155420+0000.tar.gz
   shipping analytics file: /tmp/4457cd25-4722-4b62-9ae6-ce8068026bbc_2019-10-28-155420+0000.tar.gz
   
   

2. 2

   View your results

   Upon activation, the last four weeks of activity will be uploaded. You can view the results for a single system, and for your infrastructure of registered systems, in the Insights dashboard.

   Note: If this is a newly registered system, there may not be much activity present until it’s at least a few days old.

   Go to Insights Dashboard