Control-M/Agent and remote hosts

Although Control-M/Server is responsible for job scheduling and processing, it does not have to limit the activity to the computer on which it resides. It can schedule jobs on other computers that comes under its control. Control-M/Agents are commonly used to place computers under the control of a Control-M/Server. Control‑M/Agents submit jobs, perform requests from each Control‑M/Server and perform post-processing analysis of completed jobs.

As an alternative to having a dedicated Control-M/Agent installed on each computer under the control of a Control-M/Server, Control-M/Server can submit jobs to agentless computers known as remote hosts. A remote host enables you to run jobs on a computer without having to install and update a Control-M/Agent, as well as less management.

The main advantages of Control-M/Agents over remote hosts are that agents support counters and multiple types of shouts:

• Control-M/Agents can utilize features that require a Control-M counter. If you need any of these features, you should choose a Control-M/Agent over a remote host. For example, Control-M/Agents can use the File Watching feature, run jobs using Control-M/Agent utilities, and run jobs requiring Application plug ins for Control-M/Agent.
• Control-M/Agents support many types of shouts. (Remote host support is limited to e-mail shouts and Control-M/Server shouts.)

The Control-M/Agent manages the following job handling requests:

• Instructions to submit a job on the Agent computer
• Requests for information about jobs on the Agent computer that have been submitted, are currently executing, or have recently been completed
• Requests to view or edit job script statements
• Requests to view job output or job documentation
• Requests to stop jobs that are currently executing
• Group a number of Control-M/Agents together into a host group to balance processing load