Editing an application's synthetic settings

To run synthetic functionality on an application, you need to turn Synthetic on for the application and then configure the application accordingly.  To turn Synthetic on for an application, on the Edit Application page, set the Synthetic field for the application to ON.

To run synthetic functionality, you also must make sure the current status is set to Active.

Synthetic configuration includes the following:

• Global SLA—Service Level Agreement that applies to all Execution Plans defined for this application
• Blackout Settings—Time periods when the Execution Plans do not run.
• Execution Plans—Plans for running predefined scripts to simulate use of the application

An Execution Plan provides the interface for a script and its execution. Through an Execution Plan, you specify configuration values for the script, indicate on which locations the script runs, and define the run schedule.

BMC Synthetic Transaction Execution Adapter (TEA) Agents can process up to 120 Execution Plans each.

This topic contains the following procedures:

• • To define a Global SLA for your application
  • To edit synthetic blackout settings
  • To create or edit an Execution Plan
  • To edit the Custom SLA for an Execution Plan
  • To reset the SLA for an Execution Plan to the Global SLA
  • To deactivate an Execution Plan
  • To activate an Execution Plan
  • To delete a defined Execution Plan
  • Related topics

To define a Global SLA for your application

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab. 
    
4. Click the  icon to open the Global SLA settings.

5. For each metric, set the following options:

   • Minor Level and Critical Level—Levels indicating when an event is triggered
     Default values are 10% for Minor and 20% for Critical. 
   • Send Notification—Level of event that triggers a notification
     Default is to send notification for Minor or Critical breach. 
   • Latency Threshold—(Performance only) Threshold beyond which the latency triggers an event
     Default is 2000 milliseconds. 

   For more details about the specific metrics see Monitoring-synthetic-transactions-in-the-Locations-view and Monitoring-synthetic-transactions-in-the-Executions-view.

6. Click Save. 

To edit synthetic blackout settings

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab.

4. Click Blackout Settings.
   The Blackout Settings dialog box opens.
   
     

   (Click picture to see more details.)

5. Do one of the following actions:

1. • Select Repeat on to repeat blackout periods weekly, at the same times on the same days, and set the following parameters:

     Parameter	Description
     Days of the week	Days on which you want the blackout period to take effect
     Start Time	Start time for the blackout period Start Time is the same for all selected days of the week.  Start Time is set based on the time set in your console User Preferences.
     Duration	Length of the blackout period Duration must be at least 15 minutes.
     End Time	The end time for the blackout period This parameter cannot be edited directly. It is provided as a visual reference, calculated based on the other values.

   • Select Occur once to start a one-time blackout immediately, and set the following parameters:

     Parameter	Description
     Start Time	Start time for the blackout period Note Start Time is set based on the time set in your console User Preferences. Click the action menu icon to select a date and time. By default, Start Time is set automatically to the current time.
     Duration	Length of the blackout period Duration must be at least 15 minutes.
     End Time	End time for the blackout period This parameter cannot be edited directly. It is provided as a visual reference, calculated based on the other values.

     Note

      Times for blackout settings are saved based on global (UTC) time. If you change your local clock (for example: daylight saving time), your blackout periods will appear to be at a different local time.

2. Click Save.

For more details about blackout settings, see Daylight-saving-time-and-blackout-periods.

To create or edit an Execution Plan

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab. 
   The Execution Plans that are defined for the application are listed. 
4. Perform one of the following actions:
   
   • To define a new Execution Plan, on the Execution Plans action menu, click Add Execution Plan.
   • To edit a previously defined Execution Plan, from the action menu of the specific Execution Plan, select Edit Execution Plan Settings.
5. In General Settings, configure the following settings:

   • Enter a unique Name for the Execution Plan and, optionally, a Description for the Execution Plan.
     The description appears in a tooltip when you place the cursor over the Execution Plan name on the list of Execution Plans.

     Note

     Execution Plan names must be unique within the same application configuration. You can use the same Execution Plan name in different application configurations.

   • To change the the Execution Plan Status, select Active or In active.
     The status of the Execution Plan determines whether the script runs. The Execution Plan is also affected by the status of the application. The status of the application takes precedence.
   • For a new Execution Plan: Select the script file that this Execution Plan runs.
     You cannot change the script association when you edit an Execution Plan.

6. In Script Attributes, set values for the script attributes that require user input, such as URLs, host names, and passwords.

   Note

   • The system does not validate script attribute values. For information about provided scripts, see Using-scripts-to-simulate-end-user-transactions.
   • If you define the Execution Plan to run a Silk Performer script on more than one location, ensure that each TEA Agent in each location has a local administrator account that uses the same user name and password.
7. In Execution Schedule, set the following options: 
   
   • Run Frequency—Set how often the Execution Plan runs. Run Frequency must be a whole number of minutes or hours. Minimum is 2 minutes. Default is 5 minutes.
   • Timeout Period—Set the amount of time the Execution Plan is allowed to run before it stops automatically. 
8. In Locations, you can add or remove locations where the Execution Plan runs. 
   
   • To add locations, click the  icon and select locations to to add.
   • To remove locations from an Execution Plan, clear the check boxes for the relevant locations.
9. Click Save.

To edit the Custom SLA for an Execution Plan

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab. 
   The Execution Plans that are defined for the application are listed. 
4. From the action menu of the specific Execution Plan, select Custom SLA.

5. For each metric that you want to set differently from the Global SLA, set Value Type for the metric you want to customize to Global, and then set the following options:

   • Minor Level  and  Critical Level—Levels indicating when an event is triggered
   • Send Notification—Level of event that triggers an automatic notification
   • Latency Threshold—(Performance only) Threshold beyond which the latency triggers an event.

   For more details about the specific metrics, see Monitoring-synthetic-transactions-in-the-Locations-view and Monitoring-synthetic-transactions-in-the-Executions-view.

6. Click Save.

To reset the SLA for an Execution Plan to the Global SLA

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab. 
   The Execution Plans that are defined for the application are listed. 
4. From the action menu of the specific Execution Plan, select Reset to Global SLA.
   A confirmation message appears asking if you want to reset the SLA for this Execution Plan. 
5. Click Yes.

To deactivate an Execution Plan

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab. 
   The Execution Plans that are defined for the application are listed. 
4. From the action menu of the specific Execution Plan, select Deactivate.

To activate an Execution Plan

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab. 
   The Execution Plans that are defined for the application are listed. 
4. Place the mouse cursor over the Inactive status of the Execution Plan to see why the Execution Plan is inactive. 
   

1. If the deactivation is at the Execution Plan level, from the action menu of the Execution Plan, select Activate.

To delete a defined Execution Plan

1. On the BMC TrueSight Operations Management console, from the navigation page, select  Configuration > Applications.
2. Click the action menu of the relevant application and select Edit.
3. Click the Synthetic tab. 
   The Execution Plans that are defined for the application are listed. 
4. From the action menu of the specific Execution Plan, select Delete.
5. Click Save.

Related topics

Using-scripts-to-simulate-end-user-transactions

Application-and-Execution-Plan-status

Daylight-saving-time-and-blackout-periods

Preparing-Silk-Test-script-execution-for-synthetic-transaction-monitoring