Synthetic transactions in the Console

You can examine details about synthetic transactions in the BMC Application Management Console, through the Performance Analysis pages. To examine the transaction results, you can use synthetic Watchpoints or filters from the Synthetic Device Configuration Pack, or you can create Application Watchpoints based on common characteristics, such as the Execution Plan name.

The following sections in this topic describe synthetic transactions in the Performance Analysis pages:

List of synthetic transactions

Run a Performance Analysis query to locate problematic sessions, and ensure that you select Synthetic for the Traffic Data Type. The queries enable you to investigate performance and availability issues for pages and objects, and to analyze the affected sessions. Each run of an Execution Plan is displayed as a single HTTP session in the Performance Analysis pages.

After you perform a query, drill down to the results in the Sessions Found page. For synthetic monitoring, the results are mapped to the Performance Analysis infrastructure.

Example of synthetic transactions on the Sessions Found page

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• The User column displays the name of the transaction with the following syntax:
  agentGroup @ executionPlan
• The Total Pages column displays the following sum:
  numberOfTransactions + numberOfCustomTimers + numberOfPageTimers

Synthetic transactions on the Session Overview page

Click a transaction to show its details in the Session Overview page:

Example of a synthetic transaction on the Sessions Overview page

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Synthetic transactions in the Session Overview section

The upper section of the Session Overview page displays the Traffic Type as Synthetic, and it displays transaction metrics, such as the number of pages with errors and the number of slow pages. For synthetic transactions, a page or object represents the synthetic transaction run by the script, or timers on the transaction.

Below the Session Overview is the timeline. The first element on the timeline is the first transaction run by the script. Hover over the triangle marking the transaction and examine the transaction (page) name that has the following naming syntax:

• (Version 2.6.10) executionPlan---transactionName
• (Version 2.6.00) executionPlan-->transactionName

The transactionName comes from the script. If the script contains more than one transaction, they are displayed in chronological order on the session timeline.

If you have page timers or custom timers, then the timer name follows the transaction name with the following naming syntax:

• (Version 2.6.10) executionPlan---transactionName---timer
• (Version 2.6.00) executionPlan-->IransactionName-->timer 

The timers are aligned with the end of the transaction (the right-most edge of the transaction on the timeline), and not in chronological order.

Synthetic transactions in the Page and Object Overview sections

On the session timeline, hover over the triangle marking the transaction and click the transaction or timer name. The Page Overview section is displayed, which shows the number of errors and the duration of the transaction or timer.

Click the object bar at the bottom of the Page Overview section to see the Object Overview. If the transaction has one or more errors, click the Error box in the Object Overview to see what kind of error or errors (availability, accuracy, or execution) occurred.

Below the Object Overview, the POST parameters are displayed, showing details about the transaction or timer. You can use details, such as the execution plan name and error messages, to isolate and troubleshoot issues.

Execution log requests

To investigate details of synthetic transactions, you can examine the transaction's execution log. An execution log results file is a zip file that contains the results of the transaction. The file is on the BMC Synthetic Transaction Execution Adapter (TEA) Agent and contains the results of transactions (such as TINIT and TMAIN), including TrueLog files and text files. The execution log results provide deep diagnostics for you to examine issues in the session.

From the Action menu, select Request Execution Log:

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When the execution log is ready to download, the Download button is displayed:

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Related topic

Execution log requests and management

Using the Session Overview page to analyze a session