Understanding the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor Interface

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor Tool Bar

The Uptime Infrastructure Monitor tool bar provides quick access to the following:

Dashboards

This panel contains various dashboards that present the status of your resources from various perspectives. For example, the Global Scan dashboard presents a comprehensive view of your infrastructure, and allows you to drill down by system group, system, or alert status. Default dashboards include the following:

  • Global Scan
  • Resource Scan
  • SLAs
  • Applications
  • Network
  • All Elements
  • All Services
  • Custom Example
  • Map

Administrators and users can also create custom dashboards, built from component widgets, that provide a specific view not provided out of the box.

For more information about using the Dashboards panel, see Overseeing Your Infrastructure.

My Portal

By default, when users log into Uptime Infrastructure Monitor, the first view they are presented with is the My Portal panel. The My Portal panel gives quick access to basic Uptime Infrastructure Monitor functions and to saved reports. The My Portal panel is divided into the following sections:

  • Assistance
  • My Preferences
  • Latest Uptime Articles
  • Uptime Information
  • My Alerts
  • Saved Reports

For more information about using the My Portal panel, see My Portal.

Infrastructure

The Infrastructure panel provides an inventory of your resources. You can view information about systems and their monitoring status. From the Infrastructure panel, you can add and view:

  • Systems
  • Groups
  • Applications
  • Service Level Agreements
  • Views

For more information about using the Infrastructure panel, see Managing Your Infrastructure.

Services

The Services panel enables you to manage and configure services, which are provided by an application to perform a specific task. Uptime Infrastructure Monitor monitors both services and applications to ensure that performance and availability are maintained.

In the Services panel, you can manage and configure the following:

  • service instances and service groups
  • Alert Profiles and Action Profiles
  • host checks
  • topological dependencies
  • scheduled maintenance

For more information about using the Services panel, see Using Service Monitors.

Users

The Users panel enables you manage all users, user groups, Notification Groups and their associated permissions. You can view, create, edit, and delete the following:

  • users
  • user groups
  • notification groups
  • user roles

For more information about using the Users panel, see User Management.

Reports

The Reports panel enables you to manage and create detailed, custom reports on the performance and availability of the resources in your enterprise.

Using the Reports panel, you can:

  • generate a report and schedule when you want it to be generated
  • select how and where you would like the report delivered

For more information about using the Reports panel, see Using Reports.

Config

The Config panel enables you to configure the following:

  • Uptime Infrastructure Monitor license information and the license key
  • archive policies
  • mail servers
  • Monitoring Periods
  • remote reporting instances
  • user authentication

You can also generate problem reports and edit some Uptime Infrastructure Monitor system configuration options from the Config panel. For more information about using the Config panel, see Configuring and Managing Uptime Infrastructure Monitor.

As you enter text in the Search Uptime field, Uptime Infrastructure Monitor configuration actions, as well as the display names of Elements, are displayed.

For example, initially entering the string “serv” displays the Add Service Monitor and Add Service Group commands. The string could also display Element names such as "QA Server 1" and "Active Directory". In the latter example, the match would occur if the Element’s host name were "AD-Server".

For all Elements, the string entered is compared with the Element’s host name, display name, architecture, and custom fields.

System List

The system list (Syslist) is a popup window that contains the following information:

  • the display names in Uptime Infrastructure Monitor and the host names of systems in your environment, arranged in alphabetical order
  • the name of the group to which, if any, the system belongs

You access the system list by clicking the Syslist icon in the top-right corner of the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor Web interface. The Syslist is also a tool for quick navigation within the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor Web interface. Each display name is a hyperlink. Click a display name to view the information about the system in the System Information subpanel.

Understanding Reports and Graphs

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor includes a powerful set of reporting and graphing tools that enable you to visualize performance data. You can use the reports and graphs as the starting point when analyzing problems in your environment.

For more information, see Understanding Reports Options and Using Graphs.

Understanding Reports

Reports enable you to visually analyze how individual critical resources-- such as memory, CPU, and disk resources--are consumed over a specific period of time.

For detailed information about reports, see Using Reports.

If you need to regularly run certain reports, you can save them to the My Portal panel. See Scheduling Reports for more information.

Understanding Graphs

You can graph performance information when you need to view the most common or pertinent performance information for servers in your environment. For example, you can use a graph to determine CPU usage or the available capacity on a file system. Graphs give you a fine level of performance detail.

You can view graphs using the Java graphing tool on any platform (e.g., in Firefox, running on Linux). For more information about graphing, see Using Graphs.

Understanding Agents

Agents are small applications that are installed on the systems that you are monitoring. Agents do the following:

  • collect information from a remote server
  • send the collected service data to the Monitoring Station

Certain Uptime Infrastructure Monitor monitors poll the agents for data at a frequency that you can configure. The data collector component of the Monitoring Station then stores the results in the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor DataStore for use in a report or graph.

Agents enable you to collect very detailed information about a system, such as information about processes and low-level system statistics. The level of granularity of the information collected by agents is greater than that of the information collected by agentless monitors.

Each Uptime Infrastructure Monitor agent is configured by default to collect and return performance information for every Uptime Infrastructure Monitor agent service monitor. You do not need to configure the agent to collect information for a service.

On Windows, an agent is installed with the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor Monitoring Station. However, you need to deploy the agent on the systems you are monitoring. On other operating systems, you must download the agent from the IDERA Web site and manually install it.

Understanding Major and Minor Versions

When you install Uptime Infrastructure Monitor, you install a Monitoring Station and one or more Uptime Infrastructure Monitor agents. You could have different versions of Monitoring Stations and agents. For example, you could have different platforms and different Uptime Infrastructure Monitor agent versions running on each system.

  • Major version

Regardless of operating system platform, the major version is the number to the left of the decimal. In the diagram above the major number of the Windows agent is 3; the major number of the UNIX agent is 3; the major number of the LINUX agent is 4.0.

  • Minor version

Minor version numbers follow the major version number. These numbers are used to distinguish each minor version of a major version.

On UNIX and Linux, the minor version is the first number to the right of the decimal. In the diagram above, the minor version number of the UNIX agent is 8 and the minor version number of the Linux agent is 0.

On Windows, the minor version is the last set of numbers in the complete version. In the diagram above, the minor version number of the Windows agent is 1061.

For major version 4 and later for Windows, the minor version number is the number immediately after the decimal that follows the major number. For example, for Windows agent version 4.0, the minor number is 0.

Understanding the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor DataStore

The DataStore is a database in which Uptime Infrastructure Monitor stores different types of information:

  • configuration information for Uptime Infrastructure Monitor
  • configuration and system information for the hosts that you are monitoring
  • the performance data gathered by monitors, which is used for generating graphs and reports
  • user information, including user names and passwords (encrypted if it is sensitive information)
  • the settings for service monitors, Alert and Action Profiles, scheduled maintenance, and host checks
  • reports that Monitoring Station users have saved, and are scheduled to run at specific intervals.

Like any other database, the DataStore consists of a number of tables. Data that you enter and save, or which Uptime Infrastructure Monitor collects from hosts, is written to specific tables in the DataStore.

Access to the DataStore is determined by one of the three installed user accounts: root, uptime, and reports. Each account gives users varying levels of access to the contents of the DataStore. For more information about these accounts, see the Uptime Knowledge Base article “Securing MySQL Database and Adding Users.”

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor can also use either an Oracle or MS SQL Server database as its DataStore.

Connecting to the DataStore Using ODBC

You can extract data from the DataStore for use in custom reporting or data warehousing by connecting to the DataStore using an ODBC connection. Once the connection is established, you can import the contents of the DataStore into such tools as MySQL Query Browser, Microsoft Excel and Crystal Reports.

Before you can connect to the DataStore using ODBC, the client system that is accessing the database must have the MySQL ODBC driver installed. The ODBC driver enables the client system to communicate with the DataStore.

For detailed information on installing and configuring the MySQL ODBC driver, see the Uptime Knowledge Base article “Connecting to the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor DataStore via ODBC.”

Understanding Service Monitors

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor service monitors ensure the performance and availability of services in your environment. Using service monitors, you can ensure that the systems in your environment - including databases, mail servers, networking protocols, and file systems - are operating as required. Uptime Infrastructure Monitor also captures performance metrics collected from hardware profiles of physical systems in your environment and can present this data in a graph.

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor can track the performance of services using over 30 monitors. As well, Uptime Infrastructure Monitor enables you to configure custom monitors that you can use to extend your service monitoring capability.

For detailed information on service monitors, see Using Service Monitors.

Understanding Database Monitors

There are two types of monitors for MySQL, Oracle, and SQL Server databases:

  • Basic Checks

These monitors determine whether the database is running and listening on the expected port. You can also run queries against the databases using scripts.

  • Advanced Metrics

These monitors collect detailed information about database processes, which you can later use for reporting and graphing.

Understanding Agentless Monitors Using Net-SNMP

Net-SNMP suite of command line and graphical applications that interact with SNMP agents that are installed on hosts. Net-SNMP presents a set of SNMP MIBs (Management Information Base, which is a listing that defines variables needed by the SNMP protocol to monitor and control network equipment). The MIBs are used to collect system performance information for use by the Uptime Infrastructure Monitor Monitoring Station.

The Net-SNMP monitor uses the HOST-RESOURCES MIB to collect the following data:

  • Configuration
    • System name.
    • Number of CPUs.
    • The size of the system memory.
    • The network interfaces on the system, as well as their MTU, speed, and physical address.

    The HOST-RESOURCES MIB can collect other configuration data, but the Monitoring Station does not use this information.

  • Performance Data
    • CPU
      • CPU user time
      • CPU system time
      • CPU wait I/O time
    • Memory
      • the amount of free memory
      • the amount of free swap space
    • Processes
      • the name of a process
      • the ID of a process (PID)
      • the amount of memory used by a process
      • process run time (in centi-seconds on the CPU)
      • the number of running processes
    • Network
      • the name of the network interface
      • the number of kilobytes flowing into the interface per second
      • the number of kilobytes flowing out of the interface per second
      • the number of inbound errors
      • the number of outbound errors
    • File System
      • the name of the file system
      • the size of the file system
      • the amount of the file system that is used
    • User
      • the number of users who are logged into the system

For more information on SNMP and Net-SNMP, see SNMP-Based Systems .

Understanding Services

Services are specific tasks, or sets of tasks, performed by an application in your environment. For example, network services such as FTP or TCP transmit data in a network. Database services, such as Oracle, SQL Server, MySQL, or Sybase store and retrieve data in a database. Uptime Infrastructure Monitor service monitors continually check the condition of services to ensure that they are providing the functions required to support your business.

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor service monitors use a common template to ensure that the configuration of service monitors is the same across all monitors. For more information on services, see Using Service Monitors.

Understanding Service Groups

Service groups are service monitor templates that enable you to simultaneously apply a common service check to one or more hosts. Defining and using service groups greatly simplifies the task of initially setting up and maintaining common service checks that you wish to perform across many hosts in an identical manner.

For example, you can create a service group called CPU Performance Check that is associated with 50 different servers. You can apply a common performance monitor check to 50 servers.

With service groups, you save time by not having to manually re-create an individual service monitor with the exact same service check and Alert Profile for each server you want to monitor. There is no practical limit to the number or complexity of your service groups and the underlying service monitors associated with them.

Service groups can be created for both physical infrastructure assets that are monitored by Uptime Infrastructure Monitor, as well as virtual assets managed by VMware vSphere. Although they are functionally identical, vSphere service groups are automatically applied to newfound ESX hosts, VMs, and other VMware vCenter objects that are discovered through the vSync process.

See VMware vSphere Monitoring Concepts for information on vSync, and Service Groups for information on creating service groups.

 

Understanding the Status of Services

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor monitors can return the following statuses for a service:

  • 0 - OK

The services are functioning properly.

  • 1 - Warning

There is a potential problem with one of more of the services.

  • 2 - Critical

There is a critical problem with one or more services.

  • 3 - Unknown

This status is returned when:

  • The host on which the service sits is offline.
  • The host on which the service sits is in a scheduled maintenance or downtime period.
  • The Monitoring Station could not execute the service monitor.

Each status reflects the state of the service that is assigned to the system that you are currently viewing. Uptime Infrastructure Monitor picks up these error codes and triggers an alert or an action. If a service is in a warning or critical state, you can acknowledge an alert so that Uptime Infrastructure Monitor does not generate subsequent notifications.

The status of the services associated with a system are displayed on the Global Scan dashboard.

The figures in each column on the Global Scan dashboard indicate the number of services for that particular machine that are in each state. Click a number to view the System Status screen for a particular system. See Viewing the Status of a System for more information.

Understanding Dates and Times

When you are configuring graphs or reports, you must specify a range of dates and times over which the graph or report charts information. Uptime Infrastructure Monitor only collects information for the periods that you specify.

You specify data and time ranges in the Date Range area of the Reports and Graphing subpanels.

To set dates and times for a graph or report, do one the following:

  • Click the Specific Date and Time option. Then, in the Date Range area, select the start date and time of the report by:
    • entering the start and end times (HH:MM:SS) in the From and To text boxes
    • entering the start and end dates (YYYY-MM-DD) in the  From and To text boxes

    You can also click the calendar icon to select dates.

  • Click the Last option, then do the following:
    • select a number from 1 to 10 from the first dropdown list
    • select Days, Weeks, or Months from the second dropdown list

The end date for any of these options is the current date and time. For example, if you select 1 and Days, then the graph or report covers the 24-hour period from the previous day until the date and time on which you created the report.

  • Click the Quick Date option, and then select one of the following options from the dropdown list:
    • Today
    • Yesterday
    • This Week
    • Last Week (Sun-Sat)
    • This Month
    • Last Month

    The This Month option collects information from the first day of the current month to the day on which the report or graph is  generated. The Last Month option collects information from the beginning to the end of the previous month.

Understanding Retained Data

Uptime Infrastructure Monitor enables you to save some or all of the metrics that its monitors collect to the DataStore. You can use the retained data to generate a Service Metrics report (see Service Monitor Metrics Report) or a Service Metrics graph.

The data that you can retain varies from monitor to monitor. For example, with the Windows Service Check monitor you can save the Service Status and Response Time metrics. With the Exchange monitor you can save all Web Mail and SMTP metrics.

You can save data to the DataStore by clicking the Save for Graphing checkbox on a monitor template.

 

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