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Accessing an MDM server involves mounting and unmounting operations which we discuss in the following section.

Mounting and unmounting an MDM server

MDM server installations are accessible on the console only after they have been mounted. Multiple servers can be mounted within a single console session. We have a choice of mounting only those servers which need to be accessed. The server may or may not be in a running state when mounted in your console session. No password is required to mount a server in your console session even if it is password protected.

The MDM Console provides the option of saving the list of currently mounted servers to an MDM Console Settings file. We can load this settings file in the console session and automatically get the previously saved server(s) list mounted as a group.

An MDM server can be mounted by multiple MDM Consoles. Once an MDM server is started from any console, it runs on the machine where it is installed and is seen as running by all MDM Consoles that have mounted it.

We can mount an MDM server as follows:

1. Right-click on the root node (SAP MDM Servers) in the hierarchy pane tree and choose Mount MDM Server… from the context menu:

2. Alternatively you many select the root node (SAP MDM Servers) and choose MDM Servers | Mount MDM Server… from the main menu:

3. MDM opens the Mount MDM Server dialog prompting for the MDM Server input as displayed next:

4. In the drop-down list input the region displaying the text Enter or select an MDM Server, type the name of the MDM server (typically the name of the machine on which the server is running) you want mounted or select it from the drop-down list. Alternatively (for non-Windows installations), type the name or IP address of any remote machine into the edit box in the Mount MDM Server dialog.
5. Click on the OK button:

   The drop-down list of MDM Servers shows only those servers that you have previously mounted. If a specific server is not in the list, click on … (Browse) button to open the Select MDM Server dialog (see next) and select the machine on which the MDM Server has been installed from the list of Windows machines visible on the local network.

On successful mounting of the MDM server, you will see a new server node added in the tree structure of the hierarchy pane. Depending on the state of the MDM server, the corresponding icon is displayed in the tree node. The different states and the respective icons of the server node are listed in the following table:

If the MDM server is inaccessible via the console even after the server has been started, you can try unmounting and remounting the MDM server in the console to restore connectivity.

Next we see how to unmount an already mounted MDM server:

1. In the hierarchy tree, right-click on the MDM server that you want to unmount and choose Unmount MDM Server from the context menu. Alternatively, you may unmount the server by first selecting its node in the tree and then clicking on MDM Servers | Unmount MDM Server from the main menu.

   Unmounting an MDM server is also possible by using the MDM Servers pane (top-right) when the root node (SAP MDM Servers) is selected in the hierarchy tree. Then you can right-click on the MDM Server in the objects pane and select Unmount MDM Server from the context menu.

2. The MDM server node disappears from the tree in the hierarchy pane.

   Unmounting a running MDM server while it is still running keeps the MDM repositories mounted and loaded even while the unmounted server remains disconnected from the console session. Unmounting and again re-mounting an MDM server within the same MDM Console session requires the MDM server’s password to be re-entered to perform any server-level operations (like starting and stopping the server).