Using the Web-based System Monitor

The Web-based System Monitor is a tool that allows you to monitor the Business Integration Express for Item Sync system from the Web. It allows you to configure how you view the data and also allows you to view historical data in addition to current data. It allows you to start, stop, and pause components.

Different approaches for using the Web-based System Monitor

You can use the Web-based System Monitor by taking either of the following approaches:

Monitors are definitions of the information you want to view. You can either create new monitors using the Monitor Definition Wizard, a tool launched from System Manager, or you can use the default monitors provided with the Monitor Definition Wizard. Views are definitions of the monitor or monitors you want displayed when you monitor the system using the Web-based System Monitor. You can create and configure views from the Web-based System Monitor, or you can use the default views provided with the Web-based System Monitor. Once you have created the monitors and views you need, or decided to use the default monitors and views, you can then monitor the InterChange Server Express system from the Web.

Using default monitors

Several default monitors are provided with the Business Integration Express for Item Sync product. You can either monitor the system using the default monitors, or you can create new monitors. To gain a better understanding of what information is included in each monitor, refer to the following sections:

Table 2 contains a description of the default monitors provided with the Monitor Definition Wizard.

Table 3 contains a description of display options listed inTable 2.


Table 2. Default monitors
Default monitor Definition Display options Available operations when viewing monitor from the Web
System Overview Overview of the current status of all major components of the system: collaborations, connectors, maps, and relationships Table tree (a table with expandable nodes in the first column that display more rows)
  • Start, stop, pause, and shut down a collaboration
  • Start, stop, and pause a connector
  • Start and stop a map
  • Start and stop a relationship

Collaboration Statistics Current status and statistics of all collaborations in the system:
  • Status
  • Start time
  • Total flows
  • Successful flows
  • Failed flows
  • Events in process
  • Queued events
  • Max concurrent events
Table Start, stop, pause, and shut down
Connector Statistics Current status and statistics of all connectors:
  • Status
  • Start time
  • Total up time
  • Business objects received
  • Business objects sent
  • Agent status
Table
  • Start, stop, and pause
  • Restart and Shut down

Map Status Status of all maps Table Start and stop
Relationship Status Status of all relationships Table Start and stop
Server Statistics Current statistics of the server: the number of failed and successful calls, events, and flows Stacked bar None
Database Connections Current status of database connections:
  • Number of free connections
  • Number of active connections
  • Maximum number of connections
  • Peak number of connections
Table None
Message Queues Current status of message queues:
  • Current depth
  • Maximum depth configured
Table None
Business Objects Current statistics of the business objects for a particular connector: business objects sent and business objects received Table None
Connector Subscriptions Current statistics of the subscriptions for a particular connector:
  • Collaboration object
  • Initiator
Table None
Collaboration Events Current statistics of collaboration events, which includes the following information:
  • Events in process
  • Queued events
Bar None
Historical Server Statistics Server statistics for a specific period of time. Statistical information:
  • Successful calls
  • Failed calls
  • Total calls
  • Successful events
  • Failed events
  • Total events
  • Successful flows
  • Failed flows
  • Total flows

Time intervals:

  • Start date
  • End date
Bar None
Historical Server Flows Flow statistics of the server for a specific period of time at certain time intervals. Statistical information:
  • Successful flows
  • Failed flows
  • Total flows

Time intervals:

  • 15 min., 30 min., hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly
  • Start date
  • End date
  • Line
  • Stacked bar
  • Bar

None
Historical Collaboration Flows Stack Flow statistics of a particular collaboration for a specific period of time at certain time intervals. Statistics information:
  • Successful flows
  • Failed flows
  • Total flows

Time intervals:

  • 15 min., 30 min., hourly, 4 hours, 12 hours, daily, weekly, or monthly
  • Start date
  • End date
Stacked bar None
Historical Collaboration Flows Line Flow statistics of a particular collaboration for a specific period of time at certain time intervals. Statistics information:
  • Successful flows
  • Failed flows
  • Total flows

Time intervals:

  • 15 min., 30 min., hourly, 4 hours, 12 hours, daily, weekly, or monthly
  • Start date
  • End date
Line None
Event Rate Current number of processed events per minute Meter None
Flow Control Current state of collaboration objects and connectors under Flow Control:
  • Buffered events
  • Max event capacity
  • Blocked status (does not apply to non-blocking collaboration)
  • Events pending in database (applies only to non-blocking collaborations)
  • Saturated status
Table None
State Change Log Current persisted state changes on a component for a specified time period. State change information:
  • Time stamp
  • State

Time intervals:

  • Start date
  • End date
Table None

Table 3 describes the configurable properties of each display option listed in Table 2..

Table 3. Configurable properties of display options
Display option Build-time configurable properties (using Monitor Definition Wizard) Runtime configurable properties (from Web-based System Monitor)
  • Table
  • Table tree

  • Columns to display
  • Order of columns
  • Number of rows to display

  • Font and color settings of the labels and data
  • Number of rows to display

  • Stacked bar
  • Line
  • Bar

None
  • Font and color settings of the labels and data
  • Show or hide values

Meter Meter threshold Font and color settings of the labels and data

Creating new monitors using the Monitor Definition Wizard

A monitor is a definition of the information you want to view when monitoring the system using the Web-based System Monitor. For example, you might have a monitor called System Overview, which displays status and start time of all system components. You create this monitor using the Monitor Definition Wizard, a tool launched from System Manager.

When you create a monitor, it contains a particular type of system information that can be monitored. Each type of system information has one or more display options available. Each display option has configurable properties. To see what information types and display options are available when creating a new monitor, see Figure 1.

Note:
Before creating new monitors, be sure to look at the existing default monitors in Table 2, to see if the monitor you want to create already exists.

To create a new monitor, follow these steps:

  1. From the System Manager perspective of IBM WebSphere Studio Workbench, right-click the server instance you want to connect to, then click Connect. The Server User ID and Password dialog box appears.
  2. Type the User ID and password for that server, then click OK. The status of the server changes from "unknown" or "disconnected" to "connected."
    Note:
    If the status does not change to "connected," make sure the selected InterChange Server Express server is running.
  3. Right-click the server instance, then select Monitor Definition Wizard. The Monitor Definition Wizard appears. See Figure 1..

    Figure 1. Monitor Definition Wizard, screen for selecting information type and display option


  4. Select the type of information you want in the monitor from the Information Types group box, then select how you want the information displayed from the Displayed Option(s) group box. Each information type has one or more available display options. For a description of the configurable properties of each display option, see Table 3..
    Note:
    When you select an information type from the Information Types group box, only the available display options are enabled in the Display Option(s) group box. The unavailable display options remain grayed out.
  5. Click Next. The Specify Monitor Properties screen appears (see Figure 2).

    Figure 2. Monitor Definition Wizard, Specify Monitor Properties screen


  6. Type a name for the new monitor in the Title field. You can also optionally type a description in the Description field. To make sure you do not use an existing monitor name, click Existing Monitors. This displays a list of the existing monitors.
  7. Depending on what information type and display option you chose in the previous screen, you may or may not have more choices to make in this screen. For example, in Figure 2, you can enter the number of rows to appear, select which attributes to include, and place the chosen attributes in a particular order. These options are available for both Table and Table Tree display options.

    Meter is the other display option that has configurable properties in this screen. If you create a monitor with a meter, the configurable property is "meter threshold."

    For a list of all display option configurable properties, when using either the Monitor Definition Wizard or the Web-based System Monitor, see Table 3..

  8. Depending on which attributes you chose in this screen, either the Next button or the Finish button is enabled.
  9. Click Next or Finish, depending on which button is enabled.

    Figure 3. Monitor Definition Wizard, Specify Attribute Thresholds screen


  10. After specifying any attribute thresholds, click Finish. The following message appears, "The monitor was created successfully. Do you want to create another monitor?" Click Yes or No.

Logging on to the Web-based System Monitor

Once you have either created new monitors or decided to use the default monitors, you are ready to log on to the Web-based System Monitor to monitor the system. Before you can log on to the Web-based System Monitor, you must perform the following tasks:

To log on to the Web-based System Monitor, do the following:

  1. In a Web browser, navigate to the URL that was specified in the DASHBOARD_URL environment variable during installation of the Web-based System Monitor.

    This URL is made up of three elements:

    For instance, if the Web server is named monitorserver, and the root context is specified as ICSMonitor, as specified in the installation instructions, the URL is:

    http://monitorserver/ICSMonitor

    The WebSphere InterChange Server System Monitor login screen appears.

  2. Type the server name, user name, and password for the InterChange Server instance you want to monitor, then click Login. The Web-based System Monitor appears.

Contents of the Web-based System Monitor Web page

The Web-based System Monitor Web page contains the following items:

Using Views

You can either begin monitoring the system using the default views, or you can add, change, or delete views before monitoring the system. The following sections describe how to use existing views or create and configure views from the Web-based System Monitor. A view is a Web page that contains one or more monitors. Several default views are included in the installation of the Web-based System Monitor. You may use these default views or create new views. Before you can create and configure views, you must log on to the Web-based System Monitor. For instructions on logging on to the Web-based System Monitor, see Logging on to the Web-based System Monitor.

This section covers the following topics:

Using default views

Creating new views

Configuring existing views

Configuring existing views

Using default views

The default views that are shipped with the Web-based System Monitor are described in Table 4. The table describes which monitor or monitors are contained in the view, as well as which display option is used. For descriptions of default monitors, see Table 2.

Table 4. Default views
Default view Monitor(s) and display options
System Overview System Overview monitor displayed in a table tree
Connector
  • Business Objects monitor displayed in a table
  • Connector Subscriptions monitor displayed in a table

Collaboration Overview Collaboration Statistics monitor displayed in a table
Collaboration
  • Collaboration Events monitor displayed in bar chart, and
  • Event Rate monitor displayed in a meter

Collaboration History
  • Historical Collaboration Flows monitor displayed in a bar chart
  • Historical Collaboration Flows monitor displayed in a line chart

Connector Overview Connector Statistics monitor displayed in a table
Maps and Relationships
  • Map Status monitor displayed in a table
  • Relationship Status monitor displayed in a table

Server Statistics
  • Historical Server Statistics displayed in a stacked bar chart
  • Database Connections displayed in a table
  • Message Queues displayed in a table

Server History
  • Historical Server Statistics displayed in a bar chart
  • Historical Server Flows displayed in a line chart

Flow Control Flow Control monitor displayed in a table
State Change Log State Change Log monitor displayed in a table

Creating new views

The following instructions describe how to create a new view:

  1. Click Create and Configure Views in the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Create and Configure Views dialog box appears (see Figure 4).

    Figure 4. Web-based System Monitor, Create and Configure Views dialog box


  2. Click the Create New View button. The View Name dialog box appears.
  3. Type a name for the view in the View Name field, then click OK. The new view name appears in the View field of the Create and Configure Views dialog box.
  4. Select one or more monitors from the Select Monitor(s) group box, or choose "Select all" to select all the monitors listed. Your selections appear in the Order Monitors group box.
  5. Use the up and down arrows to the right of the Order Monitors group box to put the monitors in the order you want to view them, from top to bottom.
  6. Click Preview if you want to see a preview of the new view.
  7. Click Save View. A "View was saved successfully" message appears. Also, the new view appears immediately in the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor under Views.

Configuring existing views

The following instructions describe how to make changes to an existing view:

  1. Click Create and Configure Views from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Create and Configure Views dialog box appears (see Figure 4).
  2. Select the view you want to change from the View drop-down menu.
  3. Add monitors to or remove monitors from the view, from the Select Monitors group box. The revised monitors for the view appear in the Order Monitors group box.
  4. Use the up and down arrows to the right of the Order Monitors group box to put the monitors in the order you want to view them, from top to bottom.
  5. Click Preview if you want to see a preview of the new view.
  6. Click Save View. A "View was saved successfully" message appears.

Deleting views

The following instructions describe how to delete a view:

  1. Click Create and Configure Views from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Create and Configure Views dialog box appears (see Figure 4).
  2. Select the view you want to delete from the View drop-down menu.
  3. Click Delete View. A message appears, asking if you are sure you want to delete the view.
  4. Click OK. The view is removed from the Views list in the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor.

Fine-tuning the Web-based System Monitor

You can make adjustments to many of the elements of the Web-based System Monitor, fine-tuning the level of system data you can monitor. These adjustments are described in the following sections:

Setting the default view

Customizing the visual appearance of the monitors

Setting the refresh rate for runtime values being monitored

Setting the frequency for capturing historical data

Resetting runtime statistic values

Capturing state changes

Deleting the state change log

Deleting historical statistics

Setting the default view

The default view is the view you first see when you log on to the Web-based System Monitor. To change the default view, do the following:

  1. Click Create and Configure Views from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Create and Configure Views dialog box appears (see Figure 4).
  2. Select the view you want to be the default view from the View drop-down menu.
  3. Select the Default View check box.
  4. Click Save View. A "View was saved successfully" message appears. The next time you log on to the Web-based System Manager, the view you selected as the default view will be displayed.

Customizing the visual appearance of the monitors

The display options of monitors can be customized by changing the preferences of the display options. To change the appearance of a monitor, do the following:

  1. While viewing a monitor, click the chart icon in the upper right corner. The Preferences dialog box appears for that particular display option in that monitor. Figure 5 is an example of the Table Preferences dialog box.

    Figure 5. Web-based System Monitor, Table Preferences dialog box


  2. From the Preferences dialog box, select the appearance options you want to change. For a list of what appearance options are available with each display option, see the Runtime configurable properties column of Table 3.
  3. Click Preview to see a preview of the changes you made.
  4. Click OK. The changes you made appear in the monitor.
    Note:
    When you change the preferences of a display option, the changes appear in all monitors that use that particular display option.
    Note:
    If you want to return the monitor to its original appearance, open the Preferences dialog box, select Default, then click OK.

Setting the refresh rate for runtime values being monitored

Some monitors display runtime values of a component. For these monitors, you can specify how often you want statistics to be refreshed.

Note:
The refresh rate you set is for the system as a whole, not for individual components.
To set the refresh rate for monitored runtime values, do the following:
  1. Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
  2. Enter a number in the Refresh Rate field to specify the number of seconds you want to set for the refresh rate, then click the Refresh Rate Submit button.

Setting the frequency for capturing historical data

The rate at which historical data is captured is configurable. To set this rate, do the following:

  1. Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
  2. In the "How frequently should historical data be captured?" section, click the "Review all interval settings" link. The Historical Statistics Interval Rates dialog box appears (see Figure 6).

    Figure 6. Web-based System Monitor, Historical Statistics Interval Rates dialog box


  3. Set the interval rates for the server, and for each collaboration object and connector. The interval rates to choose from are as follows:
  4. Click Submit Changes to submit all of the interval rates for all of the components.
Note:
Alternatively, you can set the interval rate for a single component by not selecting the "Review all interval settings" link. Instead, select the component from the Component Type drop-down menu and the interval rate from the Frequency drop-down menu, then click the Submit button in that section.

Resetting runtime statistic values

The runtime statistics are kept in memory from the time the server is started. If the server is running for several days or weeks, these values can become very large. You can reset the value of runtime statistics of a component to "0" by doing the following:

  1. Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
  2. In the "Do you want to reset component statistics?" section, select the component from the Component Type drop-down menu.
  3. Click the Submit.

Capturing state changes

You can capture state changes for each component and send them to a log file. To configure this, do the following:

  1. Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
  2. Under the "Do you want to capture state changes of a particular component?" section, select the component from the Component Type drop-down menu.
    Note:
    If you selected Collaboration or Connector as the component type, you are prompted to select a particular collaboration object or connector.
  3. Select the Capture State Changes check box, then click the Submit button in that section.

Deleting the state change log

As the state change log grows, you may need to delete old data. You can delete the log for a particular time period by doing the following:

  1. Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
  2. Under the "Do you want to delete the state change log for all components?" section, click the calendar icons to enter the start date and end date for the data to be deleted, then click the Delete button in that section.

Deleting historical statistics

As the historical data grows, you may need to delete old data. You can delete historical data for a particular time period by doing the following:

  1. Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
  2. Under the "Do you want to delete the historical statistics for all components?" section, click the calendar icons to enter the start date and end date for the data to be deleted, then click the Delete button in that section.

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