Build 245

Build 245 is released on 28 March 2023.

Minimum version to update from directly: Build 241.

Cumulative release notes #244, #245

Release information

With this update, CockroachDB is replaced by PostgreSQL. The migration is performed automatically when you run the command instana update. The whole migration process can be completed within a few minutes. After the migration, the Instana backend components are started up as usual, and PostgreSQL is used instead of CockroachDB. CockroachDB is automatically shut down.

Features

Apdex widget

You can now add Apdex widgets to your custom dashboards to display and analyze the performance of your application or website over time. For more information, see Apdex.

IBM MQ Sensor

  • Added MQTT channel table to show all the MQTT channels in the queue manager dashboard.
  • Added MQTT channel dashboard to show each MQTT channel data.
  • Added MQTT channel metrics including Connections, In Doubt Input, In Doubt Output, Messages Sent, Messages Received, and Pending Outbound.
  • Added MQTT channel configuration data including Type, Status, Keep Alive Interval, Start Date/Time, Last Message Date/Time, Connection Name, Client Id, Client User, and Protocol.

For more information, see Monitoring IBM MQ.

IBM MQ Managed File Transfer monitoring

Instana now triggers built-in events if any IBM MQ Managed File Transfer (MFT) agent or resource monitor is not in running status. For more information, see IBM MQ Managed File Transfer monitoring.

IBM MQ Tracing

The support for tracing publish and subscribe messages is added. You can use the IBMMQ_PUBSUB_SUPPORT property in the mqtracingexit.conf file to control whether the publish and subscribe support is enabled. For more information, see Configuring IBM MQ Tracing.

Support for AWS Lambda Runtime for Node.js 18

The Lambda layer for Node.js now supports the AWS Lambda runtime for Node.js 18.

Improvements

ACE Tracing

Enriched information for HTTP Sync Request node

New tags are added to the Instana UI for HTTP sync transport node. They include requestURL, X-Original-HTTP-Status-Code, X-Original-HTTP-Status-Line, and X-Powered-By. By using the new tags, now you can know the HTTP Sync Request destination URL, the request's response code, status line, and the technology that the target server used.

Enriched information for HTTP Reply node

A new tag, replyStatusCode, is added for HTTP Reply node. When the message flow executes completely, the HTTP Reply node gets the final response code and sets it as replyStatusCode. If the replyStatusCode is greater than 400, the corresponding call is marked as an erroneous call.

Improved HTTP Async Request support

Previously, the HTTP Async Response node and HTTP Async Request node in a message flow could not be displayed in one tracing call. Now the two flows can be tracked together in one tracing call.

Alert notifications

Add zone information for alerts on remote monitoring entities

Now the custom zone and availability zone information is included in alert notifications for events that are triggered on remotely monitored entities.

Apache HTTPd Sensor

Support for Oracle HTTP Server

Oracle HTTP Server (OHS) is a web server based on the Apache HTTP Server. Now OHS monitoring is supported on the following platforms where Instana Apache-httpd Sensor 1.2.7 or later versions are used:

  • Oracle HTTP Server version 12.2.1.4.0 for Linux x86_64
  • Oracle HTTP Server version 12.2.1.4.0 for Windows 64-bit
  • Oracle HTTP Server version 12.2.1.3.0 or higher for Solaris-SPARC 64-bit
  • Oracle HTTP Server version 12.2.1.3.0 or higher for AIX 7.2 ppc 64-bit

Db2LUW Sensor

Metrics improvements

A hadr_log_gap metric is added in the HADR configuration. The hadr_log_gap metric is a measure of the difference between the primary log sequence number (LSN) and the standby log LSN. A log_utilization_percent metric, which shows the total used log space in percentage, is added to the database section.

IBM ACE Sensor

  • The IBM MQ connections for remote monitoring support cipher suites.
  • The log messages for the IBM MQ connections include host information.

IBM i Sensor

OracleDB Sensor

Add support for databaseServiceName

The feature for connecting to the oracleDB by using the databaseServiceName field is added. For more information, see Sensor configuration.

IBM MQ Tracing

A new MONITOR_LEVEL property value quiet is added to prevent trace context propagation. If the MONITOR_LEVEL property is set to quiet in IBM MQ tracing, the trace correlation information will not be added to all messages. However, the messages can still be traced in the MQ server. For more information, see Configuring IBM MQ Tracing.

Logging

The Log Messages tab in Application Perspectives has improved presentation.

NGINX Tracing

A troubleshooting item about trace continuity with OpenResty Lua code is added to the monitoring NGINX documentation.

Oracle Sensor

You can configure maximum 3 nonzero custom poll rates for a few metrics. In addition, you can enable or disable the given metrics by using the configuration file <instana-agent-dir>/etc/instana/configuration.yaml. For more information, see Monitoring OracleDB.

Postgres Sensor

The metrics name is updated from Tuples Read to Tuples Returned to be consistent with Postgres official document. The Tuples Returned metric is the number of live rows that are fetched by sequential scans plus the number of index entries that are returned by index scans. For more information, see Monitoring PostgreSQL.

PowerHMC Sensor: Search query in the Infrastructure page

You can view PowerHMC Sensor by clicking Infrastructure or Platforms in the navigation bar of the Instana UI. Click the Map tab of the Infrastructure page, and then you can search in the search bar by using any query like entity.type:phmc, entity.type:phmc.console, entity.type:phmc.system, entity.type:phmc.lpar, and entity.type:phmc.vios. In this way, the number of entities in the graph is reduced, and you can identity PowerHMC-related entities in the graph more quickly.

Update the Instana UI for disabled widgets

The user interface of disabled widgets is updated in the Application, Service, and Endpoint dashboards of Application Perspectives. In previous releases, these widgets were replaced with the message Widget is not supported in Live Mode. Now the message is removed, and you can see an indicator that This widget is not updated during Live Mode when you hover over the indicator. In addition, the disabled widgets don't synchronize with other charts.

Fixes

ACE Tracing

Previously, if the message tree does not include a message body, the HTTPRequestHeader is added before the Properties subtree. As a result, the message structure breaks and causes the BIP2120E error. Now the ACE tracing can detect the Properties subtree location, and add the HTTPRequestHeader in a suitable location.

Application tagging

A bug in application tagging makes some Application Perspectives display or tag immediate database and messaging services downstream incorrectly. Now this bug is fixed.

Alert notifications

Previously, alert notifications on generic WebHook integration channels missed the the end field for closed incidents. Now this bug is fixed.

Custom dashboards

The performance of the calls per second metric on custom dashboards is improved.

IBM ACE Sensor

  • A bug that prevented monitoring multiple remote instances on an agent is fixed.
  • A fix for the security issue WS-2019-0379 is delivered.

IBM DataPower Sensor

A fix for the security issue WS-2019-0379 is delivered.

IBM MQ Sensor

  • Fixed the issue that two applications connect to the same IBM MQ queue manager queue shown as one item in the Queue Usage by application dashboard.
  • Fixed the issue that when one remote IBM MQ Queue Manager is configured in the agent configuration file <agent_install_dir>/etc/instana/configuration.yaml, the local Queue Manager with the same name is shown on instana UI.

Infrastructure context on logs

A bug that caused log messages to be associated with wrong infrastructure entities is fixed.

Logging

The logo and name for LogDNA in the UI is updated to Mezmo to align with the new branding.

OracleDB Sensor

A bug that prevented monitoring the FOREGROUND_SESSIONS metric is fixed.

Website monitoring

In rare cases, when fetch options were shared in multiple fetch requests, cross-site request forgery(CSRF) token authentication failed with the JavaScript agent (eum.min.js) of end-user monitoring. Now the bug is fixed.

UI SearchInput boxes

In all search boxes across the entire Instana UI, the X icon that was used to clear the search text is removed from the SearchInput fields. The X icon is not supported in all browsers. The X icon was failing to clear the search text in several browsers. You can backspace or delete characters in the search input box to clear the text.

Minor Releases

245-1

  • Fixed the availability of adaptive thresholds for Smart Alerts.
  • Fixed a UI issue in custom dashboard widgets that would cause the same option to be displayed multiple times.

245-2

  • Fixed incorrect version information in the installer.