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.
You can use the Web-based System Monitor by taking either of the
following approaches:
- Use the default monitors and default views
provided with the product to monitor the system.
- Create new monitors and views before monitoring
the system.
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.
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:
|
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
|
|
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 intervals:
|
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) |
|
- 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
|
|
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 |
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:
- 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.
- 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.
- 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

- 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.
- Click Next. The Specify Monitor Properties screen appears (see
Figure 2).
Figure 2.
Monitor Definition Wizard, Specify Monitor Properties
screen

- 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.
- 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..
- Depending on which attributes you chose in this screen, either
the Next button or the Finish button is enabled.
- If the Finish button is enabled, then the attributes you chose
cannot contain thresholds.
- If the Next button is enabled, then the attributes you chose
can contain thresholds.
- Click Next or Finish, depending on which button is enabled.
- When you click Finish, the following message appears, "The
monitor was created successfully. Do you want to create another
monitor?" Click Yes or No.
- When you click Next, the Specify Attribute Thresholds screen
appears. For an example of a Specify Attribute Thresholds screen,
see Figure 9 on page 24. In the Specify Attribute Thresholds
screen, you can optionally type a numeric value in the threshold
field for each attribute.
- Note:
- During runtime, if the value of an attribute exceeds the value
of the threshold set for that attribute, the cell that contains the
attribute value appears highlighted when it is displayed in the
table.
Figure 3.
Monitor Definition Wizard, Specify Attribute Thresholds
screen

- 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.
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:
- Start InterChange Server Express (ICS) on the machine being
monitored.
- Make sure the Web-based System Monitor and the application
server are installed.
- Start the application server.
- Obtain the username and password necessary for logging on to
the Web-based System Monitor. The username and password are the
same as those used when logging on to ICS.
To log on to the Web-based System Monitor, do the following:
- 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:
- The URL prefix http://
- The base URL of your Web server
- The value specified for the context root of the installed
application, as specified during the installation of the Web-based
System Monitor. This value must be ICSMonitor.
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
On OS/400, this URL should be the HTTP port you specified for
Web-based System Monitor during installation; for example, if you
specified port 10010 for the HTTP port during installation, then
the URL would be http://myiSeriesHost:10010/ICSMonitor
The InterChange Server Express System Monitor login screen
appears.
- 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.
The Web-based System Monitor Web page contains the following
items:
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
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 |
The following instructions describe how to create a new
view:
- 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

- Click the Create New View button. The View Name dialog box
appears.
- 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.
- 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.
- 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.
- Click Preview if you want to see a preview of the new
view.
- 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.
The following instructions describe how to make changes to an
existing view:
- 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).
- Select the view you want to change from the View drop-down
menu.
- 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.
- 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.
- Click Preview if you want to see a preview of the new
view.
- Click Save View. A "View was saved successfully" message
appears.
The following instructions describe how to delete a view:
- 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).
- Select the view you want to delete from the View drop-down
menu.
- Click Delete View. A message appears, asking if you are sure
you want to delete the view.
- Click OK. The view is removed from the Views list in the left
frame of 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
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:
- 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).
- Select the view you want to be the default view from the View
drop-down menu.
- Select the Default View check box.
- 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.
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:
- 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

- 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.
- Click Preview to see a preview of the changes you made.
- 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.
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:
- Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System
Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
- 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.
The rate at which historical data is captured is configurable.
To set this rate, do the following:
- Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System
Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
- 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

- Set the interval rates for the server, and for each
collaboration object and connector. The interval rates to choose
from are as follows:
- NONE
- 15 minutes
- 30 minutes
- 1 hour
- 4 hours
- 12 hours
- 24 hours
- 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.
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:
- Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System
Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
- In the "Do you want to reset component statistics?" section,
select the component from the Component Type drop-down menu.
- If you select Server, then runtime statistics for all
components are reset.
- If you select Collaboration or Connector, then select the
component from the Component drop-down list. Only statistics for
that component are reset.
- Click the Submit.
You can capture state changes for each component and send them
to a log file. To configure this, do the following:
- Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System
Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
- 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.
- Select the Capture State Changes check box, then click the
Submit button in that section.
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:
- Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System
Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
- 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.
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:
- Click Set Options from the left frame of the Web-based System
Monitor. The Set Options dialog box appears.
- 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.
