AIX System Monitor

Load averages are a simple measure of the number of processes that are ready to run but required to wait for access to the CPU. A load average of more than two on a system with a single CPU, for example, would indicate that the system is unable to keep up with the processes that are being submitted.

Load average represents the load averages over 1, 5, and 15-minute intervals prior to a server's transmission. The load averages are multiplied by 10 to represent the value in decimal format.

An alert is sent when the trigger value for the condition is breached.

Adding AIX System rule criteria

  1. From the AIX system in the Systems panel of Central Configuration Manager, select AIX System Monitor and click Add Rule.
  2. From the Add Rule Detail dialog, click Criteria. Click Add Criteria to open the System Criteria dialog.

There are three pages to complete when adding AIX System rule criteria.

Category section

The fields in this section are used to determine the unit of measure.

Measure

Select the unit of measure against which to test the load average.

  • Load Average Over Past 1 Minute
  • Load Average Over Past 5 Minutes
  • Load Average Over Past 15 Minutes
  • System Up Time: The Load Average is taken against the time that the system has been running.

Trigger section

Sets the trigger value for this criteria.

Trigger Value

From the drop-down list select the comparator and enter the trigger value against which the criteria is set.

For System Up Time rules, specify a trigger value for Seconds, Minutes or Hours.

Criteria Alert Details section

Fields in this section define alert settings that override the settings made on the Alert page at Rule level. This provides a criteria specific alert message to be generated.

Override Rule Default

Click Override Rule Default to specify that the entries on this page override the default Alert page settings at Rule level. From the drop-down menu, select the alert warning level.

Alert Text

Enter the actual text of the alert or use the available Substitution Variables to construct the message text of the alert.

TIP: When Substitution Variables are used, click to display a list of textual and numeric parameters that can be used to amend the actual Substitution Variable value.
Alert Example

Displays an example of how the Alert Text will read using the selected Substitution Variables and user-entered text.

SLA Statistic section

Fields in this section are used to indicate that the criteria for this rule are used to determine performance against Service Level Agreements (SLA).

SLA Statistic

Click the SLA Statistic field so that it is enabled. The SLA flag is measured against the specific criteria defined for this rule.

TIP: If multiple SLA flags are being set for different criteria and/or monitors, we recommend that a Send Enterprise Console alert action is created to determine which of the SLA criteria has failed.
NOTE: SLA Statistic checking is not affected by the suspension of the rule, (SLA data is still gathered even if the rule is suspended) but is dependent on the time period when the rule is active (SLA data is not gathered outside the times when the rule is active).

 

We recommend that when creating SLA flags within rules, that all SLA criteria are kept together in the same rule that use the ‘Perform Actions For Each Criteria That Triggers option, otherwise SLA failures may or may not be indicated correctly.

 

System performance against the specified SLA flags can then be viewed on the SLA Statistics report (automatically included as a Report Template within Advanced Reporting Suite) for this system.

Testing

When the required criteria has been entered, click Test to assess the validity of the data, and if necessary make any changes prior to putting the rule ‘Live’.

Click OK to define and confirm the entered parameters as criteria for this rule.

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