Monitoring XenServer (public preview)

You can monitor the metrics and configuration data that are related to XenServer by using Instana. The XenServer sensor is automatically deployed and installed after you install the Instana host agent with the necessary configuration settings as documented.

The support for XenServer on Instana is disabled by default. To enable this optional feature, perform one of the following procedures:

Supported versions

Instana supports metrics and configuration data for XenServer 8.4

Configuring

To enable XenServer monitoring, add the host IP and credentials to the agent configuration file <agent_install_dir>/etc/instana/configuration.yamlas shown in the following example:

com.instana.plugin.xenserver:
  enabled: true # To enable the sensor, set its value to ‘true’.
  host: '' # IP address of XenServer
  user: '' # username to access
  password: '' # password to access
  poll_rate: 60 # default poll rate in seconds is 60

Metrics collection

To view the metrics, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Instana UI, go to the navigation menu.
  2. Click Platforms > XenServer. The XenServer dashboard is displayed.

Performance metrics

The XenServer sensor collects the following details and performance metrics from the XenServer host.

Host

The XenServer dashboard on the Instana UI displays the following details:

  • Host name
  • Number of virtual machines
  • Average CPU
  • Free memory

The Summary page of each host displays the following details:

  • IP address
  • CPU count
  • Pool session count
  • Pool task count
  • XenAPI memory usage
  • XenAPI free memory
  • XenAPI live memory
  • XenAPI allocation

Performance metrics

The XenServer sensor collects the following performance metrics from the XenServer host:

Table 1. Performance metrics of XenServer host
Data point Description Granularity
Average CPU Mean utilization of physical CPUs 30 seconds
Free memory Total amount of free memory 30 seconds
Total memory Total amount of memory in the host 30 seconds
Network Bytes tx Total bytes per second transmitted, aggregated across all physical network interfaces 30 seconds
Network Bytes rx Total bytes per second transmitted, received across all physical network interfaces 30 seconds