SQL Cluster Status Test

This test reports the current status (whether running or not) and uptime of the cluster service. This way, administrators can quickly find out if the cluster service was restarted recently. In addition, the test also indicates whether/not fail-over occurred recently. The IP address of the ‘active’ server in the cluster is also revealed as part of detailed diagnosis.

Note:

This test will report metrics only on Microsoft SQL Server 2008 (and above).

Target of the test : A Microsoft SQL Cluster

Agent deploying the test : A remote agent

Outputs of the test : One set of results for the cluster being monitored

Configurable parameters for the test
  1. Test period - How often should the test be executed
  2. Host - The host for which the test is to be configured.
  3. ssl – If the Microsoft SQL server being monitored is an SSL-enabled server, then set the ssl flag to Yes. If not, then set the ssl flag to No.
  4. instance - In this text box, enter the name of a specific Microsoft SQL instance that is to be monitored. The default value of this parameter is “default”. To monitor a Microsoft SQL instance named “CFS”, enter this as the value of the INSTANCE parameter.
  5. USER – Provide the name of a SQL user with the view server state role.
  6. password - The password of the specified user.
  7. confirm password - Confirm the password by retyping it
  8. domain - By default, none is displayed in the DOMAIN text box. If the ‘SQL server and Windows’ authentication has been enabled for the server being monitored, then the DOMAIN can continue to be none. On the other hand, if ‘Windows only’ authentication has been enabled, then, in the DOMAIN text box, specify the Windows domain in which the managed Microsoft SQL server exists. Also, in such a case, the USER name and PASSWORD that you provide should be that of a user authorized to access the monitored SQL server.
  9. isntlmv2 - In some Windows networks, NTLM (NT LAN Manager) may be enabled. NTLM is a suite of Microsoft security protocols that provides authentication, integrity, and confidentiality to users. NTLM version 2 (“NTLMv2”) was concocted to address the security issues present in NTLM. By default, the isntlmv2 flag is set to No, indicating that NTLMv2 is not enabled by default on the target Microsoft SQL host. Set this flag to Yes if NTLMv2 is enabled on the target host.
  10. ISPASSIVE – If the value chosen is yes, then the Microsoft SQL server under consideration is a passive server in a SQL cluster. No alerts will be generated if the server is not running. Measures will be reported as “Not applicable’ by the agent if the server is not up.
  11. REPORTMANAGERTIME – By default, this flag is set to Yes, indicating that, by default, the detailed diagnosis of this test, if enabled, will report the shutdown and reboot times of the device in the manager’s time zone. If this flag is set to No, then the shutdown and reboot times are shown in the time zone of the system where the agent is running(i.e., the system being managed for agent-based monitoring, and the system on which the remote agent is running - for agentless monitoring).

  12. 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

Is cluster running ?:

Indicates whether/not the cluster is currently running.

 

The values that this measure can report and their corresponding numeric values are listed in the table below:

Measure Value Numeric Value

Yes

 1

No

 0

Note:

By default, the test reports the Measure Values in the table above to indicate whether/not the cluster is running currently. In the graph of this measure however, the same is represented using the numeric equivalents only.

The detailed diagnosis of the Is cluster running? measure reveals the IP address of the currently ‘active’ node in the cluster and the date/time at which the active node was last started.

Has SQL cluster switched?:

Indicates whether/not fail-over occurred in the last measurement period.

Boolean

The values that this measure can report and their corresponding numeric values are listed in the table below:

Measure Value Numeric Value

Yes

 1

No

 0

Note:

By default, the test reports the Measure Values in the table above to indicate whether/not fail-over occurred. In the graph of this measure however, the same is represented using the numeric equivalents only.

Uptime of the SQL cluster:

Indicates the total time the SQL cluster has been up since its last reboot.

Secs

Administrators may wish to be alerted if a cluster has been running without a reboot for a very long period. Setting a threshold for this metric allows administrators to determine such conditions.

SQL cluster uptime since last measure:

Indicates how long the SQL cluster has been up since the last measurement period.

Secs

If the cluster has not been rebooted during the last measurement period and the agent has been running continuously, this value will be equal to the measurement period. If the cluster was rebooted during the last measurement period, this value will be less than the measurement period of the test. For example, if the measurement period is 300 secs, and if the cluster was rebooted 120 secs back, this metric will report a value of 120 seconds.  The accuracy of this metric is dependent on the measurement period – the smaller the measurement period, greater the accuracy.

Has the SQL cluster been restarted?:

Indicates whether the SQL cluster server has been rebooted during the last measurement period or not.

 

The values that this measure can report and their corresponding numeric values are listed in the table below:

Measure Value Numeric Value

Yes

 1

No

 0

Note:

By default, the test reports the Measure Values in the table above to indicate whether/not the cluster was restarted in the last measure period. In the graph of this measure however, the same is represented using the numeric equivalents only.

The detailed diagnosis of the Is cluster running? measure reveals the IP address of the currently ‘active’ node in the cluster and the date/time at which the active node was last started.

Figure 1 : The detailed diagnosis of the Is cluster running? measure of the SQL Cluster Status test