Options for Monitoring Multiple Productions

This page provides an overview of ways to monitor multiple productions.

Background

In some cases, an overall business process spans multiple productions. Although a namespace can have only a single production, you can have multiple productions in combination as follows:

Multiple namespaces running on a single instance of InterSystems IRIS®, each with its own production.
Multiple instances of InterSystems IRIS running on a single system.
Multiple systems, each running an instance of InterSystems IRIS.

Note:

InterSystems recommends that you use different namespace names for each production, even if they are running on separate InterSystems IRIS instances or on separate systems.

In such cases, it is useful to be able to monitor multiple productions side by side and see messages from multiple productions.

Production System Monitor

The Production System Monitor provides a high-level view of the state of your system, across all namespaces on a single instance.

Enterprise Monitor

The Enterprise Monitor displays the overall status of multiple running productions. The monitored productions can be running in different namespaces on the same InterSystems IRIS instance, running on multiple InterSystems IRIS instances on the same system, running on multiple systems, or running on any combination of these.

Enterprise Message Viewer

The Enterprise Message Viewer allows you to search for and view messages from multiple productions, without the need to store the messages centrally. It sends the search query to each production, and the productions return the messages that match the query to the Enterprise Message Viewer.

Enterprise Message Bank

The Enterprise Message Bank allows you to store messages from one or more productions in a central repository, where they can be stored, analyzed, and processed in other ways.

The Message Bank also stores Event Log and search table entries from the participating productions.

The Message Bank can require substantial resources. However, having messages retained centrally in the Message Bank means that you may be able to purge them in the originating productions.

Comparison of Options

Option	Productions	Setup	Notes
Production Monitor	Only within the same instance	None	Shows high-level information (not messages)
Enterprise Monitor	Can be on the same instance or elsewhere	Requires setup on the Enterprise Monitor system	Shows high-level information (not messages); includes option to define roles so users of this monitor can see only part of the data
Enterprise Message Viewer	Can be on the same instance or elsewhere	Requires setup on the Enterprise Message Viewer system	Shows only basic information about messages. Does not provide a resend option.
Enterprise Message Bank	Can be on the same instance or elsewhere	Requires setup on the Enterprise Message Bank and on the Message Bank client systems	Shows complete messages. Provides resend option. Also contains Event Log items and search table entries from client systems. More resource-intensive than other options.

When considering the Enterprise Message Viewer and the Enterprise Message Bank options, note these differences:

The Enterprise Message Bank contains an independent copy of each message, and the Enterprise Message Bank has retention policies that are independent of the policies on the systems running the business productions. Consequently, even if the original message is purged, the copy can still be available on the Enterprise Message Bank.
The Enterprise Message Viewer displays basic information about the message as well as the values in columns specified in the query. You cannot view the complete message or resend a message from the Enterprise Message Viewer. In order to access the message, you can follow a link in the Enterprise Message Viewer and open a Message viewer on the InterSystems IRIS instance running the production.
In contrast, the Enterprise Message Bank provides access to the complete message. It is possible to resend a message directly from the Enterprise Message Bank. You cannot resend a message from the Enterprise Message Viewer but can resend a message after following the link to the system running the production.