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Procedure documentationConfiguring an Interface and Connection Monitoring Scenario

 

A guided procedure helps you to set up an Interface and Connection Monitoring scenario. This chapter gives an overview of the process.

Depending on the interface type, you can monitor different metrics, and have to specify parameters.

Prerequisites

  • You have configuration authorization for Interface and Connection Monitoring.

    To create a configuration user, or assign the required roles to an existing user, do the following:

    1. In the SAP Solution Manager Configuration work center, choose the Basic Configuration scenario.

    2. Choose the Create Configuration User step.

    3. Under Users, select the user for the Interface and Connection Monitoring scenario and perform the required steps.

  • You have identified the components and systems whose interfaces you want to monitor.

  • For the technical systems to be included in the scenario, you have executed the following SAP Solution Manager configuration scenarios:

    • Managed system configuration

    • System monitoring setup

  • To monitor a cloud service such as Dell Boomi, SAP Cloud for Customer, or SAP SuccessFactors, you have to integrate the cloud service with SAP Solution Manager. For more information, see Integrating Cloud Services for Exception Monitoring.

Procedure

To configure Interface and Connection Monitoring, perform the following activities.

Starting the guided procedure

  1. In the SAP Solution Manager Configuration work center, choose Technical Monitoring.

  2. In the Integration Monitoring scenario, choose Interface Channels.

Creating an Interface and Connection Monitoring Scenario

An interface channel bundles a set of interfaces of a specific type, between two technical systems. For each interface, you define a source and a target. Interface channels can be reused in different scenarios. Interface channel attributes tag an interface channel.

  1. In the Define Scope step, define all technical systems that are either the source or target system of an interface channel in your scenario.

    Example Example

    • Specify two ABAP systems (technical system type ABAP).

    • Specify an ABAP backend system (technical system type ABAP) to which a cloud service is connected.

      For unspecified managed objects (cloud service or mobile devices, for example), only specify the on-premise backend system.

    End of the example.

  2. To monitor the availability or performance of Web service interfaces, in the Preparation sub-step of the Monitoring & Alerting step, perform one or both of the following activities:

    • Availability: Create End User Experience Monitoring (EEMon) scripts to be executed automatically, every minute.

      Note Note

      Monitoring for interfaces of type RFC is available by default.

      End of the note.

      For more information, see Creating an EEMon Script for SOAP Requests.

    • Performance: Activate Web service monitoring.

      If required, you can configure Web service monitoring to drill down to the users calling Web services. To minimize the impact on the performance, this option is disabled by default.

  3. Optional: To allow filtering in the Interface and Connection Monitoring UI, and identify scenarios and interface channels, in the Preparation sub-step of the Monitoring & Alerting step, assign one or more attributes to the scenario.

    Create attributes according to your business requirements, for example business area, business scenario, company, region. You can reuse attributes in various Interface and Connection Monitoring scenarios, by assigning them to an Interface and Connection Monitoring scenario and the interfaces, in a scenario.

  4. In the Configuration sub-step of the Monitoring & Alerting step, create an interface channel:

    1. In the General Data step, define the interface type and specify the monitoring template.

      Monitoring templates specify, for example, the cloud service type.

    2. In the Type-Dependent Data step, do the following:

      1. Define the source system (of outgoing messages) and the target system (of incoming messages) of the interface channel. You can specify the source or target system type in the following ways:

        • If both source and target systems are managed systems which are registered in the LMDB, select the technical system or host.

        • If the source or target system is not registered in the LMDB, select Unspecified Managed Object. Use this option to monitor the following interfaces, for example:

          • Cloud services

          • Third-party systems

          • SAP NetWeaver Gateway services (to monitor, for example, mobile devices such as smart-phones)

          • Instances of a web service (to monitor, for example, how often a web service was called, from where, and by which source systems)

          The data is collected in the managed system. The corresponding non-LMDB object is displayed in the Interface Channel Topology chart of the monitoring UI.

        Note Note

        In general, you can configure systems either as source (outgoing messages) or target (incoming messages).

        Exceptions:

        • File monitoring: In case of (S)FTP-based cloud services, for example, the source must be the on-premise backend system and the target the cloud service.

        • In case of SAP NetWeaver Gateway services, the source must be the unspecified managed object, and the target the on-premise backend system.

        End of the note.

      2. To represent the unspecified managed object in the monitoring UI, in the Source or Target field, depending on whether the communication is incoming (target) or outgoing (source), enter an alias, or select an existing alias.

    3. Depending on whether you create the channel to monitor incoming or outgoing communication, specify the measuring point.

      In some cases, the measuring point is predefined.

    4. Under Details of interface channel, on the Interfaces tab page, define the interfaces in the interface channel.

      Depending on the interface type, specify, for example, the following parameters, describing the objects to be monitored or the names of the objects displayed in the monitoring UI. The details to be specified depend on the modelling of the data. Ask the person responsible for the application or service.

      • RFC: the RFC destination and the RFC-enabled function module.

      • Web service: the Web service and Web service method.

      • Cloud service: Enter the following data

        • Dell Boomi

          • Atom name

          • Execution type

          • Process name

          • Account ID: specify, for example, the test or production service

        • HCI

          • Endpoint ID created when setting up the connection to the cloud service

            For more information, see Creating the Prerequisites to Monitor Cloud Services.

          • iFlow name, sender, receiver

          • HCI cluster and tenant ID: Specify, for example, the test or production service.

            This data is displayed in the monitoring UI.

        • C4C

          • Service Interface Name: To find the outbound or inbound service interface name, do the following:

            1. In the Root Cause Analysis work center, choose Exception Management.

            2. On the Monitoring tab page, select the SAP C4C Application Error or SAP C4C System Error category.

              In the Instance Group table, the outbound or inbound service interface names are displayed in the Subcategory column.

            3. To copy the service interface name, select the entry and choose Detail.

            4. Choose the Collection Context parameter.

              The Inbound/OutboundServiceInterfaceName parameter value is displayed in the Context Value column.

          • Main URL: Specify, for example, the test or production service.

        • Success Factors

          • Endpoint ID created when setting up the connection to the cloud service

            For more information, see Creating the Prerequisites to Monitor Cloud Services.

          • Specify the host, folder (/usr/ftp/incoming, for example), and a file name pattern (*.csv, for example).

          • Optional: In the Group Variants columns select whether you want to check a file exists (True) or not (False).

      • SAP NetWeaver Gateway service: the Gateway service, operation entity type, and user

      • SAP NetWeaver Process Integration: the sending and receiving PI systems for which you want to monitor the message flow.

      • HTTP: the HTTP method (optional, GET, POST, for example) and the URL path (/sap/bc/webdynpro/sap/<Web Dynpro application name>)

      • SAP Public Cloud Communications: the iFlow name, and the sending and receiving systems

      • IDoc: the business partner, message type, and monitoring time frame of an IDoc interface. You can specify a dynamic time frame for data collection.

        Specify one or more of the following key performance indicators (KPI) to be monitored in the specified time frame, for each IDoc interface:

        • Average time to process IDocs: The average time taken to process an IDoc in a system allows you to detect irregularities.

        • Current number of IDocs: The number of IDocs which are currently being processed allows you to estimate the system load.

        • Current number of erroneous IDocs: Identify errors and resolve them.

        To configure at least one key performance indicator (Current number of erroneous IDocs, for example), assign a status code (an error code, for example). The status codes depend on the configuration of your IDoc system (transaction WE47). If you have, for example, maintained multiple error codes, add a line for each error code monitored, or define a range.

        For more information about the placeholders available, see Specifying a Dynamic Time Frame.

      • BDoc and CRM Middleware: the business partner number and port, message type, and monitoring time frame of a BDoc interface

      • Workflow: the task/workflow, status, agent assigned, maximum age and total/delta mode.

        • To select items without restriction of age at each execution, if the maximum age parameter is not, leave the Total/Delta Mode field empty. The default value TOTAL is used.

        • To select only items that were added between the last and the current execution, enter DELTA.

      • File system: You specify the host, folder (/usr/ftp/incoming, for example), and a file name pattern (*.log, for example).

    5. Optional (and depending on the communication type, iDOC, for example): Choose the Show Expert Fields link, to verify the following in the Message Direction column:

      • For the channel where the system is the target, the value is INCOMING.

      • For the channel where the system is the source, the value is OUTGOING.

    6. On the Metrics Configuration tab page, do the following:

      1. Select or deselect the metrics to monitor.

        Recommend metrics are enabled by default.

      2. Configure the metric-specific parameters as required.

        Example Example

        • To monitor the availability of the interface channel, specify the EEMon script that you have defined.

        • To monitor application log entries for exceptions for the Interface, specify the object/sub-object.

        End of the example.

        Note Note

        Configuring interface channels to monitor cloud services

        If the Metric description states that “the exceptions are retrieved via the central Exception Management in SAP Solution Manager”, Exception Management must be configured for the cloud service. It is not required for all metrics. But since you cannot check whether the prerequisite is met, configure Exception Management, by default. For more information, see Creating the Prerequisites to Monitor Cloud Services.

        End of the note.

    7. On the Attributes tab page, select an attribute to filter for an interface channel, and assign a value. For example the attribute Region with the value EMEA.

Activating an Interface and Connection Monitoring Scenario

In the Activation sub-step of the Monitoring & Alerting step, maintain notification/incident settings for specific alerts and thresholds for the metrics of an interface channel.

To display a metric in the Interface and Connection Monitoring dashboard, select the Reporting checkbox. For more Information, see Displaying an Interface and Connection Monitoring Scenario.

Assigning Authorizations

To allow an existing user to monitor the scenario, assign the required roles.

  1. Choose the Standard Users step.

  2. Under Users, select a template user (level 1 or level 2) according to the required display user authorization.

    For more information, see the documentation of the template users, and the SAP Solution Manager Security Guide.

  3. Perform the required steps.