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Table of Contents
Introduction _________________________________________________________ 5 Database Administrator Tasks __________________________________________ 5 PATROL for Database Management______________________________________ 5
Enterprise Database Monitoring ______________________________________________ 5 Heterogeneous Database Monitoring__________________________________________ 5 Historical Data Collection ___________________________________________________ 6 Event Data ________________________________________________________________ 9 Monitoring Blackout________________________________________________________ 9 SQL Statement Capture _____________________________________________________ 9 User Monitoring __________________________________________________________ 10 Reports _________________________________________________________________ 11 Extensibility______________________________________________________________ 11
Customize View _________________________________________________________________________11 Corrective Actions________________________________________________________________________12 Notification _____________________________________________________________________________12 Log Filter Customization ___________________________________________________________________12
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Introduction
Database administrators (DBAs) are responsible for keeping relational databases available at peak performance. Database availability is very critical in todays business world most businesses operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year through telephone operators and the Internet. If your applications database is down, your customer may go elsewhere. This lost revenue is difficult to calculate, but must be avoided. DBAs perform tasks to verify that databases are available. They typically work in a reactive, fire-fighting mode, attempting to stay ahead of the tidal wave.
These tasks are executed daily if not several times per day. The tasks can be done manually by logging into the database or by viewing operating system files. Most DBAs use scripts. Scripts usually send an email with the results of whether the task failed or succeeded. If successful jobs do not send an email, then you run the risk of thinking that the job completed when it may not have executed due to system problems. Reviewing the email results can be very time consuming. Failed jobs usually have subject lines or rules set up to be easily identified but must be reviewed and repaired before the job can be executed successfully. DBAs can manage a few database servers with manual methods and scripts, but increasing the number of database servers increases the need for more DBAs or better methods.
PATROL monitors the critical components for each database type, watching for conditions that will affect the availability of the database. PATROL identifies conditions such as tablespaces or databases running out of space, long running transactions, increased response time, increased CPU utilization, and many others. The DBA can be notified when resources are running low and prevent a total depletion of resources. An example of this is a large power company that is replacing their scripts with PATROL to monitor their critical applications on Oracle, DB2 UDB, and Microsoft SQL Server. Their environment was becoming too large to maintain scripts and manually process problems. PATROL was programmed to automatically open trouble tickets in Remedy, replacing another manual process by the operators.
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The Oracle parameter indicates that a tablespace cannot extend its database file. The annotated data point contains the details on the tablespace and why it cannot extend.
Historical information can assist the DBA in analyzing problems when he is not able to view the problem directly or when problems occur outside of business hours. PATROL can be used to correlate the data from different parameters in a multi-line graph. You can view related data from the same server or view the same parameter from different database servers. The figures below show an example of two parameters from the same Oracle instance and an example with the same parameter from four Sybase instances.
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This graph shows the amount of memory usage for multiple Sybase ASE servers. This allows the DBA to compare how the ASE servers are consuming memory.
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Event Data
PATROL also generates and maintains a history of events that occur on the Agent. An event is defined as a change in the environment. Events are used to trigger warnings and alerts or just to provide information. Event data is viewed through the PATROL Event Manager Browser. The Event Manager Browser allows you to filter events based on things such as type, status, host and origin. Once an event is highlighted, you can view the details, add comments, view expert advice and bring up a web page. The DBA can then use the Event Manager Browser to see what events occurred on a database instance during a suspect time period. The figure below shows the events for all the agents being monitored from one PATROL Console.
A DBA returns from lunch with voice mail from a user who could not log into the database server. Typically, the DBA could not do anything. PATROL allows the DBA to look at a list of events and see that there were no database errors, but there were network connection failures at 12:51pm. The network errors were preventing the user from connecting to the database.
Monitoring Blackout
PATROL has the ability to set up alarm blackout periods during times of hardware or software maintenance. This prevents the database administrator from being contacted on erroneous alarms. These blackouts can also be used by the DBA to set up blackouts during backups or special batch jobs.
SQL-Explorer for Oracle displays the queries captured by SQL Viewer in PATROL for Oracle. SQL-Explorer allows you to tune the captured SQL statements.
PATROL offers SQL Snapshot or SQL Viewer for all the supported database types and offers both for some databases.
User Monitoring
PATROL for database management comes with the ability to monitor users. Monitoring for problem user situations is enabled by default. These situations include users that run long transactions, hold locks too long, blocks other users or users that consume too many database resources. These conditions cause other users on the database to question the availability of the database even though it is running.
PATROL for Oracle monitors for problem users and alerts if a user blocks another process, uses too much CPU, is idle, or has a runaway query.
In addition to monitoring for problem users, PATROL can monitor specific user processes that the DBA chooses. Different statistics are monitored for the selected users based on the type of database. An example of this is a large bank that uses PATROL to track users and collects historical information on their system and user CPU time to be used later for capacity planning.
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Reports
PATROL can generate reports on various elements of the monitored database environment. Reports vary by type of database, but typically include information on instance configuration, space management, users, logs or jobs. Below is an example of some of the reports available for Oracle.
Agent Query creates reports by constructing SQL statements to query PATROL on the status of objects in the PATROL environment. Reports can be generated based on monitored computers, applications, instances or even specific parameters. PATROL provides queries, called Quick Query, to generate simple reports on selectable criteria. An example would be a report on all instances in alarm state. PATROL data can be extracted and loaded into a database for customized reports, can be loaded into Microsoft Office products, or can be collected into a database for Service Reporting. Service Reporting is an integrated reporting tool that combines data collection, data storage, and data retrieval with a powerful report creation, customization, and viewing facility. Service Reporting provides a visual presentation of systems management data being collected by PATROL. An example is a large insurance company that feeds the data from PATROL into Excel for daily outage reports for the DBAs manager. This lets the manager know how well the group is meeting their service level requirements.
Extensibility
PATROL contains parameters and reports to monitor the most common features of a database server. PATROL can be extended to add a DBAs favorite reports and scripts through menu commands and parameters. This provides a centralized repository for all tasks and their results run on the database. One utility company modified a parameter in PATROL for Oracle and created a menu command for the DBA to run when users complain about the performance of the Oracle database. The menu command generates a report of the top ten users and their amount of logical reads, physicals reads, and CPU consumption. All it took was a simple modification to a provided parameter.
Customize View
The PATROL Console is your personal view of the environment you wish to monitor. Custom folders or containers can be created to organize the agents or database instances in a logical view that makes sense to your business. The PATROL Console allows you to load only the components that you want to monitor although the PATROL Agent is monitoring additional components monitored by other consoles.
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Notification
PATROL can be customized to provide notification of warnings and alarms. Notification is set up through recovery actions or state change actions. Recovery actions are initiated by the PATROL Agent and state change actions are initiated by the PATROL Console. Which one to use is determined by the software needed for notification. Recovery actions that send email or pages must have the appropriate software or modem or have access from each PATROL Agent. State change actions need the appropriate software or modem on a monitoring console. PATROL does not require a console to be attached for the Agents to monitor but state change actions do require a console. Additional notification rules can be established by installing PATROL Operations Manager, another product included with the PATROL base product.
Summary
PATROL for database management can provide DBAs with a better method of managing database servers. PATROL assists the DBA by monitoring and managing enterprise, heterogeneous environments from one console, tracking historical data and events and capturing SQL statements. The DBA can be assured that his environment is being proactively monitored while he attends to his other administrator duties.
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