Monitoring IBM App Connect Enterprise (ACE)

Instana provides a comprehensive monitoring solution for your IBM ACE environment, giving you end-to-end visibility into its performance. After you install the Instana host agent, you must configure the IBM ACE sensor. Then, you can view metrics and end-to-end traces of all requests in your IBM ACE environment in the Instana UI.

Supported information

Supported operating systems

The IBM ACE sensor is automatically installed after the host agent is installed on supported operating systems. For more information, see the supported operating systems for host agents.

The automatic discovery feature of the IBM ACE sensor in the traditional ACE environment supports the following OS:

  • Linux
  • AIX

Windows is not supported.

Supported ACE versions and platforms

  • The IBM ACE sensor supports metrics and configuration data for IBM Integration Bus (IIB) 10.0.x, IBM ACE 11.0.x, and IBM ACE 12.0.x that are installed in all supported operating systems. However, the automatic discovery feature of the IBM ACE sensor in the traditional ACE environment supports only IBM ACE 11 or later; IIB 10 is not supported.

  • IBM ACE Tracing supports different versions and platforms. For more information, see Supported IBM ACE Tracing versions and platforms.

    Notes:
    • For IBM Integration Bus 10, make sure that you use version 10.0.0.24 or later. Or else, the Number of Thread In Pool metric does not report the correct value in accordance with the WLM policy.
    • In a cloud-native environment, only IBM ACE certified container image is supported.

  • The Instana ACE Tracing user exit supports the following platforms:

    • IBM ACE 11.0.0.8 or later.
    • Traditional ACE in Linux x86_64, Linux ppc64le, Linux s390x, AIX 7.2, AIX 7.3, Windows, and container ACE in IBM Cloud Pak for Integration (amd64 only).
    Notes:

Other supported information

The IBM ACE sensor supports both local and remote monitoring.

Configuring the IBM ACE sensor

You can configure the IBM ACE sensor in a traditional or cloud-native environment. For more information, see Configuring the IBM ACE sensor.

Configuring tracing for IBM ACE

You can trace IBM ACE with the Instana ACE Tracing user exit. For more information, see Configuring tracing for IBM ACE.

Viewing metrics

To view the metrics, complete the following steps:

  1. From the navigation menu in the Instana UI, select Infrastructure.
  2. Click a specific monitored IBM ACE instance.

You can see the IBM ACE dashboard with all the collected metrics and monitored processes.

Configuration data

  • Default Queue Manager Name
  • Product Name
  • Version
  • Build Level
  • Platform Name
  • Platform Architecture
  • Platform Version
  • Application Name

Performance metrics

Integration server

Metric Description
Initial Heap Memory The initial amount of memory that the JVM requests from the operating system for memory management during startup.
Used Heap Memory The amount of memory that is in use.
Committed Heap Memory The amount of memory that is allocated to the JVM by the operating system.
Max Heap Memory The maximum amount of memory that can be used for memory management.
Initial Nonheap Memory The initial amount of memory that the JVM requests from the operating system for memory management during startup.
Used Nonheap Memory The amount of memory that is in use.
Committed Nonheap Memory The amount of memory that is allocated to the JVM by the operating system.
Max Nonheap Memory The maximum amount of memory that can be used for memory management.
Cumulative GC Time The time when the data is collected, in seconds.
Cumulative Number of GC The total number of garbage collections occurred for this instance of the JVM.

Message flow

Metric Data type Description
Total Elapsed Time Numeric The total elapsed time in microseconds that a message flow spent in processing input messages.
Maximum Elapsed Time Numeric The maximum elapsed time in microseconds that a message flow spent in processing an input message.
Minimum Elapsed Time Numeric The minimum elapsed time in microseconds that a message flow spent in processing an input message.
Total CPU Time Numeric The total CPU time in microseconds that a message flow spent in processing an input message.
Max CPU Time Numeric The maximum CPU time in microseconds that a message flow spent in processing an input message.
Min CPU Time Numeric The minimum CPU time in microseconds that a message flow spent in processing an input message.
CPU Time Waiting For Input messages Numeric The total CPU time in microseconds that a message flow spent in waiting for input messages.
Elapsed Time Waiting For Input messages Numeric The total elapsed time in microseconds that is spent in waiting for input messages.
Num of All Input messages Numeric The total number of input messages.
Total Size of Input Messages Numeric The total size of input messages in bytes.
Maximum Size of Input Messages Numeric The maximum size of input messages in bytes.
Minimum Size of Input Messages Numeric The minimum size of input messages in bytes.
Number of Threads in Pool Numeric The number of threads in the pool.
Number of Times That Max Threads Reached Numeric The number of times the maximum number of threads is reached.
Number of MQGET Errors Numeric The number of MQGET errors for MQInput nodes or Web Services errors for HTTPInput nodes.
Number of Messages with Errors Numeric The number of messages that contain errors.
Number of Errors when you are processing Messages Numeric The number of errors that occur when you process a message.
Number of Transaction timeouts Numeric The number of transaction timeouts that occur when you process a message (for AggregateReply nodes only).
Number of Transaction Commits Numeric The number of transaction commits that occur when you process a message.
Number of Transaction Backouts Numeric The number of transaction backouts that occur when you process a message.
Thread Utilization Numeric The number of thread usage for each message flow.

Message flow node

Metric Data type Description
Total Elapsed Time Numeric The total elapsed time in microseconds that is spent in processing input messages.
Max Elapsed Time Numeric The maximum elapsed time in microseconds that is spent in processing input messages.
Min Elapsed Time Numeric The minimum elapsed time in microseconds that is spent in processing input messages.
Total CPU Time Numeric The total CPU time in microseconds that is spent in processing input messages.
Max CPU Time Numeric The maximum CPU time in microseconds that is spent in processing an input message.
Min CPU Time Numeric The minimum CPU time in microseconds that is spent in processing an input message.
Number of Invocations Numeric The total number of messages that are processed by this flow node.
Number of Input-type Terminals Numeric The number of input-type terminals.
Number of Output-type Terminals Numeric The number of output-type terminals.

Known limitations

If HTTPS is enabled for REST API interface, you need to specify keystore and keystorePassword parameters in <agent_install_dir>/etc/instana/configuration.yaml. For keystore type, only JKS or P12 is supported.

Health signatures

Each sensor has a curated knowledgebase of health signatures that are evaluated continuously against the incoming metrics and are used to raise issues or incidents, which depend on user impact.

Built-in events trigger issues or incidents based on failing health signatures on entities, and custom events trigger issues or incidents based on the thresholds of an individual metric of any entity.

For more information about built-in events for IBM ACE sensor, see Built-in events reference.

Troubleshooting

You might encounter some monitoring issues with Instana. For more information about how to resolve them, see Troubleshooting.