APM Insight Troubleshooting - FAQs

APM Insight Troubleshooting - FAQs

Monitor Addition -  FAQs

1. How to add an APM Insight Monitor?

After you deploy the APM Insight agent in your Application Server with suitable Applications Manager credentials in the apminsight.conf file, APM Insight monitors will automatically be added when the application server starts. To know more, refer here.

2. I have added APM Insight Agent in my Application Server with the correct credentials in apminsight.conf file, but still I don't see any APM Insight monitors getting added in Applications Manager?

  1. Check if you have restarted /started the application server in which you have deployed the agent.
  2. If you have restarted/started the Application Server and it is still it not getting added, check the communication between APM Insight Agent and Applications Manager.
  3. Specify the proxy server configuration if there is a proxy server between APM Insight agent and Applications Manager server. 
  4. To check if there is a proxy, open a browser in the APM Insight Agent machine and  try connect to http://apm.host:apm.port or https://apm.host:apm.sslport. It should display the login page of Applications Manager. Check with your network administrators if you are not able to see the login page, it may be because the port has to be opened in firewall. 
  5. Check whether any proxy server is configured in the browser and specify those values in the apminsight.conf file.

3. Can I group more than one instance under an Application Name. If yes, how?

Yes. You can group more than one instance under a Application Name. To do this, while deploying the agent in the application sever, specify the same application name for the "application.name" key.

4. After deleting an APM Insight monitor on the Applications Manager side, why is it not being re-monitored even after restarting the agent?

Check the apminsight.info/.net.info/.json or instance.out file for the agent.state/state key. If the value for the key is Deleted/900, delete that file and restart the agent and then check again.

5. How to monitor the performance of my application cluster? Is it possible to have aggregated performance data of my application cluster?

You can install the APM agent on each application server and specify the same application name in the configurations to group all server instances under one application in APM web client.  Basically each app server must have its own agent jar/thread process and conf files. All agents can have same name and these will be grouped in the APM tab. Please note that both aggregated data and individual app server data can be viewed separately.

6. What is the Firewall requirement between APM Insight agents and Applications Manager?

All APM Insight agents communicate with AppManager server through the configured HTTP/HTTPS port(default - 9090/8443). All the communication from the agents is one way. Hence, Applications Manager installed machine host and port should be open for APM Insight agent installed machine to push the tracked metrics.

7. Which agents have backward compatibility support in latest Application Manager?

  1. Java Agent (v2.3 and below)
  2. DotNet Agent (v2.5.4 and below)
  3. Ruby Agent (v1.1. and below)

8. Where can I find the log paths for APM Insight agents?

The log paths for APM Insight agents vary depending on the type of agent being used. To find the log path for your specific agent, refer here.

9. How can I verify the authenticity of APM Insight agents? 

You can verify the authenticity of APM Insight agents by validating their checksum. After downloading the agent, download the corresponding checksum file and run the checksum command for the downloaded agent files on the respective platforms (Windows/Linux). If the checksum values match, it is safe to proceed with the installation. Refer here to know more.

10. What should I do if APM Insight Agent is not sending any data to Applications Manager?

Ensure that the communication between Applications Manager server and agent server via HTTP/HTTPS is allowed in the firewall. To check the same, open a browser in the APM Insight Agent machine and try connect to http(s)://apm.host:apm.port/. It should display the login page of Applications Manager. Refer here for further analysis.

Data Collection - FAQs

1. After APM Insight monitors gets added, why is the Availability and Health status not getting updated?

 APM Insight Availability and Health attributes will only be updated one minute after monitor addition.

2. Will Availability and Health attributes will be updated in every one minute interval?

No, by default it will be updated after five minutes. Only for the very first time (after monitor addition), it will be updated after one minute. 

3. Can I change the default attribute update interval from 5 minutes to my own interval?

Yes. You can change the update time to your convenient value. To do this go to Applications Manager home > working > apminsight >conf > apminsight.properties file and enter the interval time (in minutes) for the attribute.update.timeinterval key.

4. Availability of APM Insight Monitor shows Up, But I still can't see any data. Why?

One Possible reason could be that no web transactions might have taken place in your Application Server.

5. No data is shown in Application Manger though web transactions are taking place in the Application server (where the agent is deployed). Why?

 After every one minute, agent will push the metric data to the Applications Manager. So you can see the data after one minute (network traffic delay excluded). If you don't see the data even after one minute, it might be due to a network problem and you might have to pay attention and tend to the same.

6. Availability of APM Insight Monitor shows down. What does it mean?

It means either your application server is down or the communication between the agent & application server is not good.

7. Can I view the trace of a web transaction that consumes more response time?

Yes. All slow web transaction traces will be available under the APM Insight Traces tab. Refer here to troubleshoot.

8. What is the maximum history of metric data that I can view?

By default APM Insight Data Retention Period for raw performance data is 10 days. You can increase it up to 60 days by changing values in APM Insight Data retention period. Admin Tab -> Server settings -> General settings -> APM Insight Data Retention Period (days)

9. Why don't I see any traces of a web transaction which I thought were very slow?

You might have disabled trace collection in your agent. Enable trace collection by setting the value of transaction.trace.enabled key as 'True'. Alternatively, you can select 'Enable transaction tracing' option in Your application → Action → Edit → APM Insight Agent Configuration Profile → Edit
Note: Also, a web transaction is considered to be a slow transaction based on the set threshold value of the transaction.trace.threshold key . (specified in seconds)

10. Why don't I don't see any metrics under database tab ?

You might have disabled SQL Query listening in your Agent. Enable `Capture database SQL queries` config from Edit APM Insight agent configuration profile. Refer here to know more.

11. Where can I see the list of all web transactions sorted by its average response time? 

You can see it under APM → Your APM application/instance → Transactions tab by sorting the slowest average response time.

12. Will I be able to view all the APM Insight graphs, charts if my browser doesn't have flash installed?

Yes. You can view all the graphs even if your browser doesn't have flash installed. In such a case, graph will be rendered as java script.

13. Can the database operation performed under the background transaction be tracked?

Yes, It can be tracked.

14. What is the unique transaction threshold for each application and what should a user do if this limit is surpassed?

APM Insight has a unique transaction threshold of 350 per application. Once this limit is reached, we will not store any new transactions for the given application. To overcome this, users can use transaction grouping feature. If an application has already reached this limit, user has to create new APM Insight instance with a different name. Refer here to know more.
Note: These limits are applicable at APM Insight application level and not at instance level.

15. How can I fix "Limit reached" error in APM Insight Monitor?

Limits can be increased by configuring them from Admin tab -> Performance Polling -> APM Insight -> Data Collection Limits. Refer here to know more.

General - FAQs

1. Can I configure thresholds & alarms to the Apdex, response time metric that I have received?

Yes, you can configure custom threshold values just like how you would configure thresholds for other Applications Manager monitors. Refer here to know more.

2. What is un-instrumented block of code in APM Insight?

By default, APM Insight agent monitors the known frameworks and libraries in your application code. However, there may be certain methods which may not be instrumented by the agent. This kind of code is classified as 'un-instrumented block of code'. Refer here for more details.

3. What are the uses of App Parameters?

App Parameters is a helpful feature that monitors important metrics in your application. With App Parameters, you can monitor the:
  1. Size, numeric value, or frequency of a variable. 
  2. Size or frequency of an operation in an application.
  3. A web request involves an API call, a database (DB) operation, and a cache hit; a single request can invoke multiple resources, and multiple users can invoke multiple requests at once. In these instances, you can figure out how often the API was called, as well as the number of times the DB operation took place during a particular time interval.

4. Can I rename the Application Name created in Applications Manager?

No. Application name cannot be renamed.

5. Can I compare metrics across all/selective instances?

No.

6. Can I move an instance under one application to another application?

No but you can re-create it under the new application by specifying the same application name for the "application.name" key and restart the agent. Existing instance will be retained with older which always be down due to instance movement from agent side and it can be removed.

7. How can I temporarily stop the APM Insight metric collection?

Metric Collection can be stopped by (APM → Your application → Action → Suspend) Suspending/Unmanaging the APM Insight Monitor.

8. What is default and allowed range of APM Insight Data retention period?

Refer here for further details.

9. How to ignore Exception from Tracking?

You can exclude specific exceptions from being tracked by APM Insight agent. 
For instance, exceptions that are thrown as part of the normal application process need not be tracked and can be excluded from being monitored. This feature is available in Java and .NET agents. 
To exclude exceptions : Log into your AppManager > APM > Your application > Actions > Edit > Click on Edit APM Agent Configuration profile -  Scroll down to 'Basic configuration profiles' and mention the list of exceptions to be excluded.
Note: You can provide exact exception FQCN (Fully Qualified Class Name) or any valid regex pattern. Multiple values can be comma separated.
If a transaction is running in a separate thread that is not in the request thread, it will be tracked as a Background Transaction.

11. What does Errors(%) mean? 

It represents the proportion of errors in relation to the total number of requests made within a specific period at the APM Insight application/transaction level. Refer here to know more.

12. What does Exceptions(Fatal, Warning) mean? 

 It represents the number of exceptions that occurred within a specific period at the APM Insight application/transaction level. Refer here to know more.

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