Download Foglight Cartridge for SQLServer Release Notes

Release Notes
Foglight® Cartridge for SQLServer™
version 3.2.3
Foglight Management Server 4.2
April 2005
© Copyright Quest Software, Inc. 2005. All rights reserved.
TOPICS
What’s New in This Release
Supported Platforms
Installation Instructions
Known Issues with the SQLServer Agent
About Quest Software, Inc.
What’s New in This Release
Renamed Tables (Collections)
The following tables were renamed to accommodate changed functionality. Any references in the Online
help and User Guide to the old table names actually apply to the new table names.
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Blocking_323 (was Blocking)
Database_323 (was Database)
Errorlog_323 (was Errorlog)
File_323 (was File)
Filegroup_323 (was Filegroup)
General_323 (was General)
Jobs_323 (was Jobs)
TopUsers_323 (was TopUsers)
Issues and Enhancements Addressed
Below is a list of the significant issues and enhancements that have been addressed in the Foglight
Cartridge for SQLServer v3.2.3 release. This is not an all-inclusive list. A comprehensive list of CRs
addressed can be obtained from Quest Support.
CR #
CASE
#
DESCRIPTION
Support Issues
83231
n/a
Itanium & SQL Server 64bit support
This Foglight agent can monitor SQL Server 64-bit databases running on
Windows Itanium platforms.
1
92685
n/a
Provide Yukon support
This release has been tested against SQLServer version 2005 beta 2. Further
development in a future release will take advantage of new SQLServer 2005
features.
Improved File Related Collections
The File, Filegroup, Database, and General collections, have been improved, optimized and
rationalized. New DBStatus collection provided.
65320
217108
Database:DataMB value incorrect
The Database collection and other related collections have all been
rationalized to return AllocSize and AllocUsed for both data and transaction
log files.
87870
266741
Transaction Log Space rule is not considering AutoGrow flag
New rule PotentialGrowthMB runs off the Filegroup collection. It correctly
takes into account the AutoGrow flag.
87324
&
105457
268777
Error in Database collection for db names containing period
characters
The Database collection and other related collections now handle database
names containing period, space, and other uncommon characters.
97793
293229
Spurious ’_Total’ database showing transaction log > 100%
The SQLPercentLogUsed rule (introduced in v3.2.2.6) has been deprecated. It
is replaced by the Filegroup:SQLPotentialGrowthMB rule.
98343
n/a
File:FileID column is not wide enough
FileID is now 64 bytes. FilegroupName is now 32 bytes.
70583
231194
Handle “suspect” databases better
Databases that are in “suspect’” mode (or in other broken states) are now
skipped by the Database, File, Filegroup and General collections. The new
DBStatus collection will report such databases as being inaccessible.
103315
n/a
Filegroup collection has strange ordering of filegroups
The rows of the Filegroup collection are now ordered by FilegroupID.
89981
n/a
Provide wildcard capability in DB Exclusion List
The Database Exclusion List can now contain wildcards (as per
TRANSACT-SQL LIKE clause) so that it is easier to exclude large numbers of
databases.
Improved ErrorLog collection
The Errorlog collection has been improved and optimized.
2
96783
n/a
Errorlog collection: problem if FGL server & monitored servers on
different time
The ErrorLog collection now correctly collects all the error log entries since the
last collection.
86410
266826
SQL Server log monitoring did not catch a fatal event
The ErrorLog collection now correctly collects all the error log entries since the
last collection.
80147
243109
ErrorLog collection should not use error time stamp as a subject field
The ErrorLog collection no longer produces repetitious alerts for repeating
error log events.
Improved Jobs collection
The Jobs collection has been improved and optimized.
91136
278600
SQLLastRunOutcome rule is firing incorrectly in some cases
The Jobs collection now compares (LastRunTime + LastRunDuration) >
LastCollectedTime to correctly determine if the failed job has been reported
before, and the column ’Failed’ is set appropriately.
91250
278499
Jobs rule firing twice for failed jobs randomly
The Jobs collection has been improved.
94070
285650
Long running SQL Server jobs do not give alerts
A new rule has been added to detect long running jobs
Other new and improved collections
82271
257730
Need to collect additional performance counter data
New collection MMPerfInfo for Memory Manager performance counters.
89611
276042
Gather SQL Statements for blocking locks
The Blocking collection has been reworked and optimized, and now collects
the SQLStatement for all blocking locks.
44748
n/a
TableSize collection is regularly returning some null column values
The TableSize collection has been reworked and optimized, and no longer
reports spurious or duplicate rows.
97164
n/a
TableSize collection: reporting zero for RowCount against non-empty
tables
The TableSize collection has been reworked and optimized, and now correctly
reports the RowCount for all tables.
100063
302977
Response collection fails when more than 4096 rows are returned by
the user-specified SQL command
The Response collection now ignores the number of rows returned from the
SQL command (contained in the SQLStatement ASP), and correctly returns
the time taken by the SQL command.
86596
267726
SQL Server Transaction Log growing too large.
The Blocking collection has been reworked and optimizes and now does not
cause the Work Database transaction log to grow.
Miscellaneous changes
38677
Database collection either returning no rowset or failing with a
deadlock
A problem was seen where the Database collection will either return no
rowset or else fail with a deadlock, when a database restore is in progress.
This problem is related to databases acting as publishers in a SQLServer
Replication setup.
63425
&
81688
207816
Purge day in ASPs are not being used
This issue has been partially fixed. Table-level purging is now functioning but
may not work exactly in accordance with the purge overrides. It is possible for
collections not referenced in the current collection override to use a purge
period of one of the collections within that override.
74483
239060
Need to be able to specify agent work database log and data locations
Two new ASPs have been provided to specify the work database file locations:
WorkDatabase Data Location
WorkDatabase Log Location
3
83229
n/a
Create collection category ASP tables (collection templates)
Three predefined data collection models have been provided.
83232
n/a
Allow disabling of CollectionStatus collection
A new (hidden) ASP ReportCollectionStatus has a boolean default 1. If not set
then the agent does not populate the CollectionStatus (pseudo) collection.
80171
n/a
V4 installations have wrong BufferCacheHitRatio critical threshold
SQLBufferCacheHitRatioCritical threshold value changed to 85.
82789
n/a
Some rules do not have email actions associated with their critical
alerts
All critical alerts now have email actions.
100194
n/a
SQLServerRunning rule reports SQLServer is down
The documentation for the Availability table and the SQLServerRunning rule
has been updated. (See also Known Issues)
n/a
Online help updates
The online help has been updated to cover all of the issues and enhancements
listed above, and to include:
• revised cluster handling topic
• revised managing data topic
• revised tables (collection) topics
• revised debugging and troubleshooting topic
• new investigations topics
• new collection models topic.
Supported Platforms
The Windows and SQLServer versions listed below are those that are recognized and supported for this
agent.
Supported Windows OS versions
•
•
•
•
•
Windows
Windows
Windows
Windows
Windows
NT (Service Pack 6)
2000 (Service Pack 2)
XP
2003
2003 Itanium
Supported SQLServer versions
•
•
•
•
SQLServer
SQLServer
SQLServer
SQLServer
7
2000
2000 64 Bit
2005 beta 2
Installation Instructions
The installation process is common for all Foglight agent cartridges, and is described in the Foglight
Installation Guide delivered with the Foglight 4.x Server. For additional specific installation instructions
relating to this cartridge, see below.
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Known Issues with the SQLServer Agent
CR#
CASE
#
DESCRIPTION
21630
n/a
Incorrect up/down status on Active/Active SQL7 cluster
The agent is not showing the correct up/down status on Active/Active cluster.
This applies very rarely to SQL7 clusters only.
36459
77400
16062
8
Some records have “O” for CPU
n/a
Trace Collection seeing duplicate rows
TopUsers collection - The CPU value (CPU cycles used) is reported as zero for
some processes that have non-zero MemUsage & Physical IO.
Occasionally, trace rows (for Quest or system-categorized events) are duplicated
so there is a row in the Trace collection for the event, immediately followed by
an identical row for the same event.
83547
n/a
ErrorLog collection does not work on remote instances
The ErrorLog collection does not work when monitoring a remote instance.
64382
&
83216
n/a
100194
n/a
ErrorLog collection may have an access violation
You may experience an EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION when the ErrorLog
collection is run on a Microsoft® SQL Server™ 2000 database on a
multiprocessor computer. This is a known Microsoft bug #471055 relating to the
use of the BULK INSERT Transact-SQL statement which this collection needs to
invoke. There is a workaround that involves modifying the registry which is
described in detail in Microsoft's KB article 839405.
SQLServerRunning rule fires if any member of the cluster resource
group is down
In a clustered setup, if any one member of the cluster resource group is down
then the SQLServerRunning rule will fire. The SQLServer itself may be up, but
the cluster resource group is reported as 'partially online' by Windows Cluster
API. The rule behavior is correct as-designed, but not intuitive.
n/a
n/a
Collections affected if master.dbo.sysperfinfo table is faulty
During the System collection (performed at agent startup), the
master.dbo.sysperfinfo table is checked and if found to be faulty, a warning is
sent to the agent log. The following collections are affected:
AMPerfInfo
BMPerfInfo
DBPerfInfo
MMPerfInfo
LockRate
Memory
Statistic
For more information refer to the SQLServer Performance Counters section in
the Debugging and Troubleshooting topic in the online help.
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About Quest Software, Inc.
Quest Software, Inc. delivers innovative products that help organizations get more performance and
productivity from their applications, databases and infrastructure. Through a deep expertise in IT
operations and a continued focus on what works best, Quest helps more than 18,000 customers
worldwide meet higher expectations for enterprise IT. Quest Software, headquartered in Irvine, Calif.,
can be found in offices around the globe and at www.quest.com.
Contacting Customer Support
Quest Software’s world-class support team is dedicated to ensuring successful product installation and
use for all Quest Software solutions.
SupportLink: www.quest.com/support
Email: [email protected]
You can use SupportLink to do the following:
•
Create, update, or view support requests
•
Search the knowledge base
•
Access FAQs
•
Download patches
Contacting Quest Software
Phone: 949.754.8000 (United States and Canada)
Email: [email protected]
Mail: Quest Software, Inc.
World Headquarters
8001 Irvine Center Drive
Irvine, CA 92618
USA
Web site: www.quest.com
Please refer to our Web site for regional and international office information.
©Copyright Quest® Software, Inc. 2003-2005. All rights reserved
This document contains proprietary information, which is protected by copyright. The software described in this
document is furnished under a software license or nondisclosure agreement. This software may be used or copied
only in accordance with the terms of the applicable agreement. No part of this document may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording for any
purpose other than the purchaser's personal use without the written permission of Quest Software, Inc.
Warranty
The information contained in this document is subject to change without notice. Quest Software makes no warranty
of any kind with respect to this information. QUEST SOFTWARE SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIMS THE IMPLIED WARRANTY
OF THE MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Quest Software shall not be liable for any
direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, or other damage alleged in connection with the furnishing or use of this
information.
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Trademarks
Foglight® is a registered trademark of Quest Software, Inc.
Foglight software includes 1996 Expect© software (freeware). Expect and its documentation are copyrights and
trademarks of Don Libes, Associates.
Foglight support of SSL includes code copyright 1997 Eric Young ([email protected]). All rights reserved.
Portions of the code in this package were distributed by Carnegie Mellon University. 1989, 1991, 1992, Carnegie
Mellon University. All rights reserved.
Portions of this product were obtained from the ucd-snmp package written by Wes Hardaker at the University of
California, Davis copyright © 1996, 1998-2000. Copyright © 2001-2002, Networks Associates Technology, Inc. All
rights reserved. Portions of this code are also copyright © 2001-2002, Cambridge Broadband Ltd. All rights reserved.
Portions of this software are derived from the RSA Data Security, Inc. MD5 Message-Digest Algorithm.
Foglight software includes Info-ZIP. Info-ZIP is provided “as is” without warranty of any kind, express or implied. In
no event shall Info-ZIP or it's contributors be held liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, special or consequential
damages arising out of the use of or inability to use this software.
All other trademarks and registered trademarks used in this document are property of their respective owners.
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