Database monitoring is an important part of Instana’s automated microservices application monitoring. Oracle Database (link resides outside ibm.com) is a widely used relational database system developed by Oracle Corporation. The latest generation of Oracle Database is available on prem, in Oracle’s cloud, or in a hybrid cloud environment. Oracle Database monitoring comes out of the box with Instana’s infrastructure and application monitoring solutions.
Oracle Database monitoring is part of Instana’s automated application performance monitoring solution.
When the Instana agent is deployed into an infrastructure containing Oracle Database, it automatically detects the technology. However, licensing restrictions prevent Instana from providing automatic Oracle monitoring because only Oracle can distribute the driver JAR. Once you’ve downloaded and placed the driver JAR file, the only further setup required is providing credentials and setting DB permissions to access the Oracle Database monitoring information.
After Instana deploys its Oracle Database monitoring, it will immediately map out Oracle Database’s infrastructure. The Instana agent sends all data back to our dynamic graph model, which stores and contextualizes all collected monitoring data. Typical configuration data collected includes:
- Version
- SID
- Started at
- CPU count
- Max sessions
- DB block size
Some example metrics collected are:
- DB time per second
- Time waited per second
- SQL execution
- SQL parse
- User calls commit rollbacks
- Buffer cache
- Sessions
- Table space usage
A complete list is available in the Instana Oracle Database monitoring documentation.
Instana tracks Oracle Database key performance indicators to infer a health state about Oracle Database within the context of the monitored environment. Instana’s dynamic graph contains the contextual information needed to determine the root cause of Oracle Database problems.
Instana comes with multiple predefined health rules based on expert knowledge and best practices. A few of these health rules are:
- The ratio between DB CPU time and DB time is low
- Table space usage is high
- Total number of sessions at maximum
If there is an issue with Oracle Database health or performance, the Instana UI flags the issue and changes the health color of the instance. If service is impacted, Instana creates a service incident and sends an alert. Performance issues are correlated with all developer changes to help determine the root cause.