Configuring SLA rules for business transactions

Configure service level agreement (SLA) parameters for BMC Application Diagnostics business transactions to ensure that you meet the requirements for user satisfaction. In the BMC Application Management Console, you configure alert levels based on performance, availability, or both, and determine if and when to send notification about breaches.

You can set two levels of SLAs for business transaction: warning, indicating a possible problem, and critical, indicating that the problem requires immediate attention. The level determines when the system records a warning or critical event on the transaction, and when the system displays the event in the Application View. In addition to displaying events in the BMC Application Diagnostics system, you can send warning or critical notification to integrated monitoring applications such as BMC ProactiveNet.

You can configure global SLA rules, which apply to all transactions, and you can override the global setting with custom SLA rules, which apply to transactions with selected entry points.

This topic presents the following sections:

Configuring global SLA rules

Global SLA violation rules apply to all Application Diagnostics transactions for all monitored applications. You determine the global settings for performance and availability and the level of notification, if any, to send to integrated monitoring applications.

For performance rules, you define a latency threshold and the percentage of transactions that exceed that threshold. For availability rules, you define the percentage of transactions that end in an error. For each rule, you define two levels of breach (Warning and Critical) and the level of notification.

To configure a global SLA rule

To perform this procedure, you must have Administrator-level access, or higher, or have tenant Application Owner-level access.

1. In the Console, on the Diagnostics tab, select Administration > Transaction SLA Configuration.
2. From the Global SLA shortcut menu, select Edit.

3. Configure the performance levels, availability levels, or both.

    

    Click here to see parameter descriptions.

   • Global performance SLA parameters

     Parameter	Description
     Warning Level (%)	Percentage of transactions that exceed the latency threshold that generate a warning event Default value: 5
     Critical Level (%)	Percentage of transactions that exceed the latency threshold that generate a critical event Default value: 10
     Latency Threshold (ms)	Threshold at which a transaction is considered slow or interesting. This is the threshold on which the warning and critical levels are based. Default value: 2000 (2 seconds)
     Send Notification	Determines the performance level when to send notification: Never (Default)  When warning or critical level is breached  When critical level is breached Note: Events are always generated according to the warning and critical levels, even if notification is not sent.

   • Global availability SLA parameters

     Parameter	Description
     Warning Level (%)	Percentage of transactions with errors that generate a warning event Default value: 5
     Critical Level (%)	Percentage of transactions with errors that generate a critical event Default value: 10
     Send Notification	Determines the availability level when to send notification: Never When warning or critical level is breached (Default)  When critical level is breached Note: Events are always generated according to the warning and critical levels, even if notification is not sent.

4. Click Save.

Configuring custom SLA rules

A custom SLA violation rule applies to a specific entry point. You can customize both the performance and availability thresholds, or you can customize one of the parameters and use global values for the other. You select the entry point that you want to customize from the Business Transactions page.

To define a custom SLA rule

To perform this procedure, you must have Administrator-level access, or higher, or have tenant Application Owner-level access.

1. In the BMC Application Management Console, access the business transactions for which you want to customize the SLA rules in one of the following ways:
   • On the Diagnostics tab, select Administration > Transaction SLA Configuration and click View Business Transactions from the Custom SLA section on the page.
   • On the Diagnostics tab, select Business Transactions.
2. From the shortcut menu of a transaction, select Customize SLA.

3. In the Edit Custom Transaction SLA page, configure the performance levels, availability levels, or both.

    

    Click here to see parameter descriptions.

   • Custom performance SLA parameters

     Parameter	Description
     Select Global/Custom values	Global values: Current global values are displayed as read-only text  Custom values: Values are editable
     Warning Level (%)	Percentage of transactions that exceed the latency threshold that generate a warning event
     Critical Level (%)	Percentage of transactions that exceed the latency threshold that generate a critical event
     Latency Threshold (ms)	Threshold at which a transaction is considered slow or interesting. This is the threshold by which the warning and critical levels are based.
     Send Notification	Determines the performance level when to send notification: Never (Default)  When warning or critical level is breached  When critical level is breached Note: Events are always generated according to the warning and critical levels, even if notification is not sent.

   • Custom availability SLA parameters

     Parameter	Description
     Select Global/Custom values	Global values: Current global values are displayed as read-only text  Custom values: Values are editable
     Warning Level (%)	Percentage of transactions with errors that generate a warning event
     Critical Level (%)	Percentage of transactions with errors that generate a critical event
     Send Notification	Determines the availability level when to send notification: Never When warning or critical level is breached (Default)  When critical level is breached Note: Events are always generated according to the warning and critical levels, even if notification is not sent.

   Note

   If you set both the performance and availability parameters to Global values, then the custom SLA rule cannot be created.

4. Click Save.

To edit a custom SLA rule

1. From the shortcut menu of a custom SLA rule, select Edit.
2. In the Edit Custom Transaction SLA page, configure the performance levels, availability levels, or both.
3. Click Save.

To delete a custom SLA rule

1. From the shortcut menu of a custom SLA rule, select Delete.
2. Confirm the rule deletion.

Related topics

Monitoring application performance and errors from the Application View

Sending BMC Application Diagnostic events to integrated technologies

Configuring SLA rules for application servers