End to end monitoring?

[Anon Anon]

We are using CA APM but I wonder if it is possible to do end to end monitoing with it.

Sometimes our customers complain that the performance is poor.

But we can only see what is going on at the Application Server layer.

Is it possible to see the whole chain of operation from the user's perspective?

I want to see how much it takes to complete a request when the user clicks a button on his web browser.

[Gary Sun]

Hi,

I think CEM and BRTM can do E2E monitoring, especially CEM.

It monitors user transaction(http/https) and to see how long each transaction take and what error(http code 401 or 404) it met.

You can identify total transaction time(E2E), server time(application server) and others(network etc.).

 

If a given transaction violated the threshold, 10 sec for example, CEM triggers Introscope transaction trace to record the called stack of this transaction.

You can find detail of called stack of given transaction. It's very good to deep dive the problem with code or application server.

Speak of the E2E monitoring for network part....

[Hallett German]

Hi:

So APM CE/Introscope (with Introscope transaction tracing enabled on agent), ADA/MTP (for the networking piece) should help. I believe from your previous note that CEM is not enabled.

 

>Sometimes our customers complain that the performance is poor

So you need to see the scope of the issue (one user, one subnet, most users), see if there are patterns such as the time of day/during end of month etc.. See if the issue is due to the time of the initial response or there after.So knowing the scope and if there are patterns will help move this along.

 

Thanks

Hal  German

APM Support

[Hallett German]

Dear Hanger18:

Please let us know if you need further assistance or the answer provided is sufficient.

 

Thanks

Hal German

APM Support

[Anon Anon]

The current installation only shows what's happening at the server side.

I want to trace every hop from the user's browser up to the datebase queries.

Does CA APM do it or should I use a different product?

Which component of CA APM should I purchase?

[reian06]

Hangar18,

 

BRTM will get the End - User covered and our MAA solution even mobile devices. With this you have linked the application across all layers with the Browser. As Hal described, in case there is an additional requirement for the network between the browser and the server we also have CEM and the network piece (ADA/MTP)

[Billy Cole]

I have fought with the definition of "End-To-End" monitoring within our shop for several years.  While CEM/APM provides quite a bit of coverage, the lack of detailed out of the box system monitoring (infrastructure) is far lacking. 

 

We have implemented quite a few of the field epagent Perl scripts to provide a bit more coverage and we are looking at Unified Infrastructure Management (UIM formally NimSoft) to try to provide more DB2, MS SQL Server and infrastructure monitoring.

 

With the APM, the coverage will depend on your implementation since there are several SOA interfaces that are not covered, such as IIOP, or ESB using IBM IIB (broker) communicating with CICS on IBM mainframe/COBOL.

 

CEM is only really helpful if the business and application development chip in with the definition of the business services and business transactions. In my experience without direct involvement from business and application development, using CEM is very difficult to form actionable and realistic information.

 

With the concept of End-To-End monitoring there is also the thoughts of real time (real user experience monitoring RUE) and also synthetic monitoring (typically called the 3 AM monitoring). 

 

The CEM/APM solution does rather well with real-time monitoring from network entry to application host (J2EE application server) but without the next jump from application server to server/database, doing root cause becomes hunt and peck.  The browser real time monitoring solution might give you from the end user browser to your network.

 

For the 3 AM solution, the CA solution is the Cloud monitor service, but if you are in a shop that will not permit use of cloud services, then you will need a different solution/software.  We are using HP Sitescope to provide some coverage to our entry URLs with a SiteScope server being hosted on a DSL line, but that solution has it's issues also.

 

With the end-to-end monitoring, there is quite a bit of department monitoring solutions (Splunk, VEEM, NetQos, Qpasa, various IBM tools, home-brew scripts, What's up Gold, Google Tools, Urchin, Run of the mill Windows server tools) that will also cause the old argument "But X says this and CEM/APM/UIM does not, so I'm not going to look at CEM/APM/UIM" 

 

So, if you are going down the End-to-End monitoring path, get solid requirements(definition), buy-in and support at the highest point within your company and backing from all the numerous layers that has responsibility to provide quality service/application/data to the customer/end user/people who give you money to do a job.

 

Once you have backing, and you decided to use CA software, have a standing order with CA Professional services to get feet on the ground to support, customize, configure, trouble-shoot, implement, design, train users.  The CA APM/CEM/UIM and various other CA products are complex and the complexity will grow depending on your implementation.  Make sure that the solution/business/application/service architects at your company not only supports your End-To-End monitoring effort but are 100% engaged with their past, current and future application/service designs so that your choice in End-To-End monitoring can support and monitor their decisions.

 

Please do not fool yourself thinking that a few people will be able to install, configure, train, help do root cause analysis after a few CA APM/CEM courses.  Doing so will reduce your return-on-investment and your adoption rate will be slow and painful and depending on your total support for End-To-End monitoring may end up with a gutted budget, then abandonment.

 

 

Do hope this helps,

Billy

[Anon Anon]

Very nice write-up Billy, sums up years of experience of what I noticed at a bunch of customers, don’t disagree with any single thing in your post!

[Hallett German]

Thanks for Sharing Billy!

 

>CEM is only really helpful if the business and application development chip in with the definition of the business services and business transactions. In my experience without direct involvement from business and >application development, using CEM is very difficult to form actionable and realistic information.

 

This would be an interesting topic for my next Tech Tip. How can monitor applications using CEM without support of the application/network team. I've had some good success in doing this . I promise to write up in the next two weeks. Please on the look up and add your observations when published

 

Hal German