Exchange Email Traffic Test

Periodic workload monitoring is imperative to evaluate the processing ability of the Exchange 2010 server and to proactively detect potential overload conditions. By continuously monitoring the email traffic to and from the Exchange server, this test turns a spotlight on the workload of the Exchange server, helps detect overload conditions, and also points you to the source of the overload – mails sent/received by users in the intranet? Or mail traffic over the internet?

Target of the test : A server configured with the Mailbox server role

Agent deploying the test : An internal agent

Outputs of the test : One set of results for the Mailbox server being monitored.

Configurable parameters for the test
Parameters	Description
Test Period	How often should the test be executed.
Host	Indicates the IP address of the Mailbox server.
Port	The port number of the Mailbox server. By default, this is 6001.
XchgeXtensionShellPath	The Exchange Management Shell is a command-line management interface, built on Windows PowerShell which enables you to administer every part of Microsoft Exchange. This test uses the Exchange management shell to run scripts and collect the desired performance metrics from the Exchange server. By default, the test auto-discovers the location of the Exchange management shell and thus, automatically loads the Exchange management shell snap-in (exshell.psc1) for script execution. This is why, the XchgeXtensionShellPath is set to none by default.
DD Frequency	Refers to the frequency with which detailed diagnosis measures are to be generated for this test. The default is 1:1. This indicates that, by default, detailed measures will be generated every time this test runs, and also every time the test detects a problem. You can modify this frequency, if you so desire. Also, if you intend to disable the detailed diagnosis capability for this test, you can do so by specifying none against DD frequency.
Detailed Diagnosis	To make diagnosis more efficient and accurate, the eG Enterprise embeds an optional detailed diagnostic capability. With this capability, the eG agents can be configured to run detailed, more elaborate tests as and when specific problems are detected. To enable the detailed diagnosis capability of this test for a particular server, choose the On option. To disable the capability, click on the Off option. The option to selectively enable/disable the detailed diagnosis capability will be available only if the following conditions are fulfilled: The eG manager license should allow the detailed diagnosis capability Both the normal and abnormal frequencies configured for the detailed diagnosis measures should not be 0.

Measurements made by the test
Measurement	Description	Measurement Unit	Interpretation
Internal mails received	Indicates the number of mails received by the Exchange server from the intranet.	Number	In the event of an overload, you can compare the value of this measure with the value of the Internal mails sent, External mails received, and External mails sent measures to determine what could have contributed to the overload – is it because of incoming or outgoing mail traffic? Is it because of the exchange of mails over the intranet or the internet? To know the email IDs that received the emails, the number of emails that each ID received, and the total size of the emails to an ID, use the detailed diagnosis of this test.
Internal mails received size	Indicates the total size of the mails received by the Exchange server from the intranet.	KB
Internal mails sent	Indicates the number of mails sent by the Exchange server to the intranet.	Number	In the event of an overload, you can compare the value of this measure with the value of the Internal mails received, External mails received, and External mails sent measures to determine what could have contributed to the overload – is it because of incoming or outgoing mail traffic? Is it because of the exchange of mails over the intranet or the internet? To know the email IDs that sent the emails, the number of emails that each ID sent, and the total size of the emails from an ID, use the detailed diagnosis of this test.
Internal mail sent size	Indicates the total size of the mails sent by the Exchange server to the intranet.	KB
External mails received	Indicates the number of mails received by the Exchange server from the internet.	Number	In the event of an overload, you can compare the value of this measure with the value of the Internal mails received, Internal mails sent, and External mails sent measures to determine what could have contributed to the overload – is it because of incoming or outgoing mail traffic? Is it because of the exchange of mails over the intranet or the internet? To know the email IDs that received the emails, the number of emails that each ID received, and the total size of the emails to an ID, use the detailed diagnosis of this test.
External mail received size	Indicates the total size of the mails received by the Exchange server from the internet.	KB
External mails sent	Indicates the number of mails sent by the Exchange server to the internet.	Number	In the event of an overload, you can compare the value of this measure with the value of the Internal mails sent, Internal mails sent, and External mails received measures to determine what could have contributed to the overload – is it because of incoming or outgoing mail traffic? Is it because of the exchange of mails over the intranet or the internet? To know the email IDs that sent the emails, the number of emails that each ID sent, and the total size of the emails from an ID, use the detailed diagnosis of this test.
External mail sent size	Indicates the total size of mails sent by the Exchange server to the internet.	KB

Use the detailed diagnosis of the Internal mails received measure to know the internal email IDs that received the emails, the number of emails that each ID received, and the total size of the emails received by an ID. This way, you can quickly identify the email ID that received the maximum number of emails and that which received mails of the maximum size.

DDexchemailtraffic-internalmailsrecd

Figure 1 : The detailed diagnosis of the Internal mails received measure

Use the detailed diagnosis of the Internal mails sent measure to know the internal email IDs that sent the emails, the number of emails that were sent from each ID, and the total size of the emails sent from an ID. This way, you can quickly identify the email ID that sent the maximum number of emails and that which sent mails of the maximum size.

DDexchemailtraffic-internalmailssent

Figure 2 : The detailed diagnosis of the Internal mails sent measure