Network Traffic - OS Test

This is an internal test that monitors the incoming and outgoing traffic through each Windows desktop of an Oracle VirtualBox.

Target of the test : An Oracle VirtualBox

Agent deploying the test : An internal/remote agent

Outputs of the test : One set of results for every Windows_virtual_guest:network_interface combination or Windows_VM_guest_user:network_interface combination.

Configurable parameters for the test
Parameter Description

Test period

How often should the test be executed

Host

The host for which the test is to be configured.

Port

The port number at which the specified Host listens to.

Oracle Hypervisor
User

Specify the name of the user who has the right to access the VirtualBox via SSH.

Oracle Hypervisor Password

Provide the password of the oracle hypervisor user.

Confirm Password

Confirm the password by retyping it here.

Sudocmd

This test executes certain privileged VDA (Virtual Desktop Access) commands to pull out the desired metrics from the VirtualBox. To enable the test to run these commands, you first need to install a sudo package on the VirtualBox host. The procedure for installing this package is detailed in Pre-requisites for Auto-Discovering VMs and Obtaining their Outside View. Once the package is installed, you need to specify the full path to the install directory of the sudo package in the Sudocmd text box.

Ignore VMs Inside View

Administrators of some high security virtualized environments might not have permissions to internally monitor one/more VMs. The eG agent can be configured to not obtain the 'inside view' of such ‘inaccessible’ VMs using the Ignore VMs Inside View parameter. Against this parameter, you can provide a comma-separated list of VM names, or VM name patterns, for which the inside view need not be obtained. For instance, your Ignore VMs Inside View specification can be: *xp,*lin*,win*,vista. Here, the * (asterisk) is used to denote leading and trailing spaces (as the case may be). By default, this parameter is set to none indicating that the eG agent obtains the inside view of all VMs on an Oracle VirtualBox host by default.

Note:

While performing VM discovery, the eG agent will not discover the operating system of the VMs configured in the Ignore VMs Inside View text box.

Exclude VMs

Administrators of some virtualized environments may not want to monitor some of their less-critical VMs - for instance, VM templates - both from 'outside' and from 'inside'. The eG agent in this case can be configured to completely exclude such VMs from its monitoring purview. To achieve this, provide a comma-separated list of VMs to be excluded from monitoring in the Exclude VMs text box. Instead of VMs, VM name patterns can also be provided here in a comma-separated list. For example, your Exclude VMs specification can be: *xp,*lin*,win*,vista. Here, the * (asterisk) is used to denote leading and trailing spaces (as the case may be). By default, this parameter is set to none indicating that the eG agent obtains the inside and outside views of all VMs on a virtual host by default. By providing a comma-separated list of VMs/VM name patterns in the Exclude VMs text box, you can make sure the eG agent stops collecting 'inside' and 'outside' view metrics for a configured set of VMs.

Ignore WINNT

By default, the eG agent does not support the inside view for VMs executing on Windows NT operating systems. Accordingly, the Ignore WINNT flag is set to Yes by default.

Inside View Using

By default, this test obtains the “inside view” of VMs using the eG VM Agent. Accordingly, the Inside view using flag is set to eG VM Agent by default. The eG VM Agent is a piece of software, which should be installed on every VM on a hypervisor. Every time the eG agent runs this test, it uses the eG VM Agent to pull relevant 'inside view' metrics from each VM. Once the metrics are collected, the eG agent then communicates with each VM agent and pulls these metrics, without requiring administrator privileges. Refer to Configuring the Remote Agent to Obtain the Inside View of VMs for more details on the eG VM Agent.

Domain, Admin User, and Admin Password, and Confirm Password

By default, these parameters are set to none. This is because, by default, the eG agent collects 'inside view' metrics using the eG VM agent on each VM. Domain administrator privileges need not be granted to the eG agent if it uses this default approach to obtain the 'inside view' of Windows VMs.

Report By User

While monitoring a VirtualBox, the Report By User flag is set to Yes by default, indicating that by default, the guest operating systems on the VirtualBox are identified using the login of the user who is accessing the guest OS. In other words, this test will, by default, report measures for every username_on_virtualmachinename. If this flag is set to No, then the guests will be identified using the host name of the guest OS. In this case, the test will report measures for every virtualmachinename.

Report Powered OS

This flag becomes relevant only if the Report By User flag is set to ‘Yes’.

If the Report Powered OS flag is set to Yes (which is the default setting), then this test will report measures for even those VMs that do not have any users logged in currently. Such guests will be identified by their virtualmachine name and not by the username_on_virtualmachinename. On the other hand, if the Report Powered OS flag is set to No, then this test will not report measures for those VMs to which no users are logged in currently.

Measurements made by the test
Measurement Description Measurement Unit Interpretation

Incoming traffic

Indicates the rate at which data (including framing characters) is received on a network interface.

Mbps

An abnormally high rate of incoming traffic may require additional analysis.

Outgoing traffic

Represents the rate at which data (including framing characters) is sent on a network interface.

Mbps

An abnormally high rate of outgoing traffic may require additional analysis.

Maximum bandwidth

An estimate of the capacity of a network interface.

Mbps

 

Bandwidth usage

Indicates the percentage of bandwidth used by a network interface.

Percent

By comparing the bandwidth usage with the maximum bandwidth of an interface, an administrator can determine times when the network interface is overloaded or is being a performance bottleneck.

Output queue length

Indicates the length of the output packet queue (in packets)

Number

If this is longer than 2, delays are being experienced and the bottleneck should be found and eliminated if possible.

Outbound packet errors

The number of outbound packets that could not be transmitted because of errors

Number

Ideally, number of outbound errors should be 0.

Inbound packet errors

The number of inbound packets that contained errors preventing them from being deliverable to a higher-layer protocol.

Number

Ideally, number of inbound errors should be 0.

Outbound packet discards

Indicates the number of error-free outbound packets that were discarded by this network interface during the last measurement period.

Number

Ideally, the value of these measures should be zero. These measures may report a non-zero value when an interface runs short of resources – e.g., NIC buffers.

 

Inbound packet discards

Indicates the number of error-free inbound packets that were discarded by this network interface during the last measurement period.

Number

Note:

If the Windows Network Traffic - VM test is not reporting measures for a guest, make sure that you have enabled the SNMP service for the guest.