Sun Management Center Server with the Performance Reporting Manager Add-on

The Sun Management Center performance reporting manager (PRM) add-on is used to track historical trends and generate reports for any data property being monitored by Sun Management Center agents. The PRM add-on can have a significant impact on the sizing requirements of the Sun Management Center server since it can involve the collection and processing of large volumes of data.

The impact of the PRM add-on is shown in the PRM segment of Figure C–1. In general, increasing the management activity and the total number of data properties being tracked by PRM reduces the number of agents that can be managed by the Sun Management Center server.

Determining the requirements for a Sun Management Center server with the PRM add-on requires two steps.

1. Based on the total number of agents to be managed by Sun Management Center server with the PRM add-on installed, refer to the PRM segment of Figure C–1 to determine the required machine class.

2. Based on the estimated number of PRM data properties you want to collect, determine the appropriate PRM configuration as described in the following section.

PRM Configuration Types

During Sun Management Center setup, you are given the option to select one of the PRM configuration types shown in the following table. The architecture column refers to the machine architecture listed in Table C–4.

Table C–5 PRM Configuration Type Requirements

PRM Configuration Type	Disk Space	Total Number of PRM Properties	Example Number of agents	Example Number of properties per agent	Architecture
Small PRM	5 Gbytes	50,000	100	300	Small
			400	100	Medium
Medium PRM	12 Gbytes	150,000	300	300	Medium
			500	300	Large
			750	200	Extra large
Large PRM	24 Gbytes	240,000	600	300	Large
			750	300	Extra large

Small Sun Management Center servers are typically used for a small PRM configuration; medium servers are used for a medium PRM configuration; and large and extra large servers are used for a large PRM configuration. You can use an extra large Sun Management Center server with a small or medium PRM, depending on the available disk space and anticipated PRM data collection requirements.

PRM Server Configuration Examples

The following table provides examples of the numbers of agents that can be managed by each architecture type, assuming that each agent is collecting an average of 300 properties each for PRM. The Hourly Data Collection provides the estimated time required to collect data. The Nightly Processing column provides the estimated time to process the collected data. The duration of the data collection and subsequent processing depends on the server hardware, the server activity, and the amount of PRM data in the database.

Table C–6 Server Examples: Number of Agents under Management

Architecture	Number of Agents	Total Number of PRM Properties	PRM Configuration Type	Hourly Data Collection	Nightly Processing
Small	100	30,000	Small	2 minutes	1 to 2 hours
Medium	300	90,000	Medium	7 minutes	3 to 4 hours
Large	600	180,000	Large	7 minutes	3 to 6 hours
Extra large	750	225,000	Large	6 minutes	3 to 6 hours

Generating Performance Reporting Manager Reports

A wide range of reports can be generated by specifying different numbers of agents, numbers of data properties, and report durations such as 4 hours to 1 month.

Typical reports take a few seconds to several minutes to generate. The actual time required is affected by the following factors:

• The number of actual data points included in the report

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  Note –

  Reports are limited to a maximum of 10,000 data points per report.

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• Amount of performance reporting manager data in the database

• Server performance and activity

• Concurrent generation of other performance reporting manager reports

For example, on a medium Sun Management Center server configured with the performance reporting manager add-on, a relatively simple report that includes 5 properties for 1 agent over the last 24 hours can be generated in about 20 seconds. Conversely, a more substantial report that includes 5 properties for 5 agents over the last 7 days can take around 10 minutes to generate.

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Note –

A medium Sun Management Center server with the performance reporting manager add-on is assumed to be a SunFire-280R with two 450 MHz UltraSPARC II CPUs, 1 GB RAM, and 1 GB swap. It is also assumed that the SunFire-280R is monitoring 300 agents and collecting 300 data properties per agent for the performance reporting manager.

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Scheduling Performance Reporting Manager Reports

If a report takes more than 30 minutes to generate, it is recommended that you schedule the report to run between 4:00 AM and 8:00 AM. Scheduling large reports to run after 4:00 AM reduces the load on the Sun Management Center server during normal business hours, and also can reduce the chance of conflicts with the nightly Sun Management Center and performance reporting manager tasks that typically occur between 12:00 AM and 4:00 AM.