Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA ENCYCLOPEDIA Monitoring Secrets for SAP ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... ...................................................................... © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA Contents Argent Monitor For SAP Overview 3 Introduction 3 What to Monitor? 4 Availability Monitoring 5 SAP System TCP Port Listeners 7 Third-Party Applications 7 Server Hardware 7 Service and Process Monitoring 8 CCMS Monitoring 9 SAP CCMS Monitor Templates Monitor Set 14 Performance Overview Monitor 15 Operating System Monitor 17 Database Monitor 19 Security Monitor 20 Transactional RFC and Queued RFC 22 Appendix A – TCP/IP Ports Used by SAP Applications 24 Appendix B – Defining CCMS Communication Users 31 Procedure 31 © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA Argent Monitor For SAP Overview Internet Communication Manager (ICM) Handles communication between the SAP Application Server Introduction and the outside world via HTTP, HTTPS and SMTP protocols. Argent XT is a comprehensive monitoring and alerting solution that Central Services can SAP applications are based on the SAP NetWeaver application and Comprises message and enqueue services. There are separate integration platform. SAP enterprise applications can be deployed in a central services for the ABAP and Java stack (image above two or three-tier architecture. The three-tier client/server architecture shows two message servers, while the second enqueue server generally consists of a presentation layer, an application layer, and for the ABAP stack is not shown). a database layer. The SAP application layer contains the following components: Dispatcher Accepts requests from the ICM or external SAP clients and Central services - which include messaging (manages client con- places them into a queue from which it distributes requests to nections and communications) and enqueue (SAP lock management) other SAP processes to execute application logic. services. What are a System, an Instance and all that? Application services - that process online and batch workloads, which A SAP Application Server system consists of one or more can be further categorized into the following types: instances. An instance is a “server” in the sense that a user can connect to every instance individually. An instance typically • ABAP: processes workloads based on an SAP proprietary consists of many running operating system processes that are programming language. connected by shared memory, TCP/IP connections on the local • Java: processes Java based workloads. host and other means. All instances belonging to the same • ABAP + Java: processes both ABAP and Java based workloads. system are connected to the same RDBMS. A system has a three-letter name, the system identifier (SID). The specific SAP product determines the type of application service required (ABAP, Java or both). Instances of a system do not have to be configured identically; instead, different instances may offer different services. Some Client Client (SAP GUI) (SAP GUI) services are unique in a system, i.e. only one instance is con- figured to offer these services (e.g. Enqueue, Message Server). A system may have an instance called “central instance”, Task wser) Request Dispatcher HaWndolrekrG PartoecwAeasBysAePs MSeesrsvaegre ADBBAP which offers many of these unique services. Client (Web Bro Internet Rffooerrq AJuB2eEAsEPt ICM J2EEDispatcher ABFAaJPsPCtr SREooJecnF2reCgEvsiEensrees MESneeqsrusveaeugree JD2EBE EciIMnfa vdmUelliSercoydaTr e t iineh nt sashttvhtaaaeennn dc ncoeiuefn fm heenar euiesnrmn iscattb a aInenln ursvc mat(eNal ubbri.seeb I)rrni. ne bsTsvtehtiNaatewrtl lesieen ddaes rnbtoea yn 0l ul Ia0ntsth suiaoetanNn lsdl ryad o9mepr9fa eaN,r uthtN lhoto etfsio s tts ,h 0ote-h0 eP. yo rt Server SDM J2EE Engine Central numbers to ensure that there is no conflict between instances. Services An instance uses a number of TCP and UDP ports for internal The above image illustrates the architecture of the SAP NetWeaver communication. These ports are usually not configurable and application server which includes both the ABAP and Java stack. Note not relevant for the “outside world”. They are interesting only in that the two stacks can be installed separately or together. the rare case when a conflict with other software on the same host occurs. The InstNr for an instance can be chosen freely. Different instances belonging to the same system can have different InstNrs. The InstNr is chosen during the installation. © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 3 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA What to Monitor? Network and System Monitoring • How is the network performance impacting the overall SAP defines the following areas as Key Performance Indicators for SAP service performance? Monitoring: • Are the servers properly sized in terms of CPU, memory, Availability disk activity, etc.? Heartbeat of a Technical Component. • Are there any critical alerts in the system event logs? Performance Web Application Server Monitoring Average General Response time. • How many sessions are currently being handled by the Response times of particularly important subcomponents or actions. SAP web/application server, and are there sufficient processes configured to handle the load? Utilization Capacity • Is the workload properly balanced across SAP web Hardware – CPU, I/O, Memory and Operating System. application server instances? Application – Memory and Processes. • What is the processing time of critical transactions on the server? Processing Queues. • Were there any errors while connecting to the R/3 server? Exceptions • Is the application server’s memory adequately sized? Is the free memory too low? Short Dumps. SAP R/3 Server Monitoring Security Unauthorised Access. • Are the buffers of the SAP R/3 server sized appropriately? • Are there unusually high swap ins/outs? Configuring thresholds for these KPI’s strongly depends on the busi- • How many requests are queued waiting for free ness needs and on the IT scenarios. CCMS monitoring counters are worker processes or data locks? configured with a default threshold, which can act as a good starting point. For instance, CPU utilization turns red at 98% CPU rate. • Are there sufficient dialog processes configured to handle incoming user requests? To find an appropriate threshold, store a performance counter for • Are there any ABAP dumps happening, indicating errors in some weeks, and analyze the average afterwards. The average pro- the R/3 system? vides an overview of the IT behavior. Finally, set the threshold 10-20% above or below the average, which indicates a clear deviation. SAP R/3 Database Monitoring The following statements provide insights into the key and critical • Is the SAP R/3 database accessible? monitoring and performance in an SAP system: • How are the critical cache hit ratios of the database server? SAP Service Monitoring • Are any of the database table spaces reaching capacity? • Is the SAP service working well? What are the response times? Is any step slowing down the entire service interaction? The remainder of this document will cover how to use some of • Are the critical application processes running? What is these key performance indicators and ways of addressing the their resource usage? above questions. © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 4 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA Availability Monitoring Let’s take a look at some of the things that might affect the availability of the R/3 system on UNIX and Windows Operating Systems. • UNIX OS Availability via SSH Logon Test • Windows OS Availability via NetRemoteTOD API These rules are provided via the Argent Guardian as shown below. SAP System R/3 System Logon Test The availability of the SAP R/3 system is a pre-requisite for using the SAP system for data processing. Suffice to say, that to establish connection to the SAP system, the system must be up and running. A simple way to ascertain this is to try and log on to the SAP system. This Rule is part of the Argent Monitor for SAP and provides a syn- thetic user logon test that can be performed from any Argent Remote Monitoring engine installed on a Windows server – e.g. from a remote location © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 5 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA Each SAP server is defined in the Argent Master Catalog with the fol- lowing instance detail as shown below. Application Server Enter the address/name of the SAP server to monitor. Router String (Optional) If the connection is being made through a router, enter a router ad- dress string; find the router address using the SAP Logon tool from the SAP Client software. Open the Logon console, select the server to monitor and then select Properties to view the router address; otherwise leave it blank. System Number Enter the System number for the SAP server. A default system number of 00 is typically used. Client Number Enter the Client to use for connecting to SAP. A default client of 800 is typically used. Logon Enter the Username required to connect to the SAP server. This user must have authorization to access CCMS metrics. © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 6 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA Password Enter the Password required to connect to the SAP server. System Name System Name functional reference. SAP System TCP Port Listeners Utilise a Scan Specific Port Test to check SAP Dispatcher or any other SAP Application Listeners. See Appendix A for other TCP Ports used by SAP Applications. Third-Party Applications Apart from potential problems within the R/3 environment there are numerous dependencies from multiple systems to ensure maximum performance of the network, hardware and operating system, data- base (s) and applications. Numerous other applications with interfaces to R/3, for example mes- saging systems such as Microsoft Exchange or Lotus Notes or Internet Server such as Microsoft IIS, can impair performance and availability of the systems. Even failure of automated backup solutions such as Legato’s NetWorker, Computer Associates’ ARCserve IT or Veritas’ Backup Exec may cause adverse effects on the SAP R/3 system. These systems should be monitored using standard best practice, which are the monitoring of Availability, services, processes and critical performance metrics within these applications. SAP Web Portals can be monitored by using the Argent Defender to simulate users’ transactions and to alert on any http based errors. Server Hardware The hardware components which run the SAP R/3 system must be monitored. Some events such a fan failure or physical disk errors often result in unplanned system failures. It is essential to monitor hardware health to ensure availability of the SAP R/3 system. Hardware can be achieved by using the vendor supplied hardware monitoring agents (such as HP SIM Agents, Dell OpenManage Agents or IBM Director Agents) to forward SNMP Traps to the Argent Console. © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 7 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA Service and Process Monitoring The services or processes of the SAP R/3 system are a pre-requisite for the SAP system for data processing. Suffice to say that to establish connection to the SAP system, the system must be up and running. Some of the processes that might affect the availability of the R/3 sys- tem on UNIX and Windows operating systems will now be examined. • Windows Services that run SAP systems Any windows service can be monitored and alerted if it has an issue. • UNIX Daemons / processes that run SAP Systems Any shell script can be used to monitor the underlying Operating System metrics such as Disk, CPU, Memory, Daemons and Processes. R/3’s critical processes There are quite a few areas that might impair availability and perfor- mance of the SAP R/3 system. The most critical components whose availability should be monitored are R/3 Message Service and R/3 Dispatcher Service. • A message service failure, the system cannot respond to enquiries. • A dispatcher service failure, at least one application server will no longer be available. © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 8 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA CCMS Monitoring Transaction RZ20 allows monitoring of all systems in the SAP system landscape. Using transaction RZ20, all defined alerts can be moni- tored. Furthermore, the CCMS monitor provides a current status view and open alert view which displays recent reporting data and history information respectively. Monitor - Collection of MTE (Monitor Tree Elements), assembled in a hierarchy MTE Monitor Tree Elements are knots in the monitor tree. There are three different kinds: monitor attributes, monitor objects and monitor collec- tions. Monitor Objects Represent objects which can be monitored. They can be database table-spaces, hard disks or SAP System components. © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 9 Monitoring Secrets for SAP ENCYCLOPEDIA Monitor Attributes These are the basic elements in the monitor tree. They describe the status of the monitor objects. Four different kinds exist: Performance, Status, Protocol and Text. Argent’s CCMS Rules use the SAP BAPI interface, opening up a wealth of SAP metrics. Using an installed SAP GUI on the Argent MAIN Engine or an Argent Remote Monitoring, the information necessary to build customized Argent monitoring Rules can be found. Example To monitor the CPU Usage of the SAP instance, use the SAP GUI to determine the System Name, Counter Name, Object Name, and MTE Name needed. In the SAP GUI, log onto the target system and expand the Tools folder under SAP Menu. Then expand CCMS, and Control/ Monitoring. © ArgSoft Intellectual Property Holdings, Limited. 1991 - 2010 10