Configuring Productions
Configuring Alerts
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This chapter describes how to configure a production to alert users about important events, such as events that require user intervention. It includes the following sections:
An
alert sends notifications to applicable users while a production is running, in the event that an alert event occurs. The intention is to alert a system administrator or service technician to the presence of a problem. Alerts may be delivered via email, text pager, or another mechanism.
The alert mechanism works as follows:
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As part of the development process:
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Within business host classes for the production, the developers include code that generates alerts when applicable.
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The developers define an additional business host class called an
alert processor (also called an
alert target). The alert processor contains the logic to contact each user in the most appropriate way.
The developers might also develop business operations for the alert processor to call.
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You configure the production to include the alert processor, along with any business services that it requires. For details, see the
next section.
Each time any alert is sent, the alert text is added to the Event Log. This mechanism might be too passive for the most urgent messages. If you want the production to also actively seek the user, you must define and configure a business host that has the ability to contact a user device. This business host is known as an
alert processor or an
alert target.
To add the alert processor to the production:
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Add the business host class to the production. This class is a business operation or business process class, depending on its implementation.
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For the configuration name, specify
Ens.Alert
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If the alert processor has settings such as email addresses and telephone numbers, configure those.
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Add any business services that the alert processor calls.
Note:
Any production can include no more than one alert processor.
InterSystems IRIS can send alerts automatically whenever a business host encounters an error condition. The
Alert On Error setting controls this behavior. If
Alert On Error is True, then whenever the business host encounters an error, InterSystems IRIS triggers an alert.
Note that business hosts provide an optional grace period that enables the business host to retry before triggering the alert. Depending on the kind of business host, this grace period is specified by the setting
Alert Grace Period or
Alert Retry Grace Period.
InterSystems IRIS can send alerts when a business host’s queue has too many messages or has messages that have waited too long. To enable these alerts, specify the following settings with nonzero values:
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Queue Count Alert — Minimum number of items in the queue needed to trigger an alert. This alert has the prefix
QueueCountAlert: (not localized). This alert is useful in situations where large queues are building up.
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Queue Wait Alert — Minimum length of time for a message to wait in a queue to trigger an alert. This alert has the prefix
QueueWaitAlert: (not localized). This alert is useful in situations where a queue is not processing messages.
InterSystems IRIS generates alerts on other occasions, including the following:
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When a job is marked as dead.
This alert is prefixed with the non-localized text:
DeadJobAlert: for simplified routing and handling.
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When a business operation suspends its current message.