Monitoring of mobile applications has taken center-stage now, since the advent of mobile devices. Mobile applications have already changed the way people do business and as a result, monitoring technologies too need to keep pace with changing times.
Because mobile applications interactions are different from conventional personal computer ones, their performance monitoring and management too needs a different approach. However, most businesses and organizations still persist with conventional monitoring systems.
Mobile applications need monitoring for key performance data like throughput, region-wise performance data, response time, active users, etc.
Whether your server and API requests are performing optimally or whether there are issues at the domain level, your monitoring solutions should be able to dive down to the root cause of the application error.
Because mobile devices are region and carrier-dependent also, your monitoring tool should be able to identify problems by region as well. This narrows down the search field for the issue and you can then isolate the problem and take steps to rectify it. There are several other features that are necessary to application monitoring for mobile devices. For example, you may need specific information such as error by domain name itself; unless your tool provides this, you will probably not catch those errors until such a time as they crash the application. Mobile application monitoring may also need to take into consideration the device versions and the geographical or physical location and the carrier providing the mobile services.
Optimized Monitoring
Apart from pointing out errors, comprehensive application monitoring can help you make crucial decisions. The findings of the monitoring tool can help you determine what areas need strengthening, which mobile carriers to depend on, etc. such that your mobile applications perform optimally.
Application monitoring ensures that your applications are all working as intended and users are not facing problems. Monitoring tools will provide information about business applications and their performance in the form of reports. Depending on the tool you have chosen, you may also have access to reports via email. Some application monitoring software will provide you with a dashboard that helps you track the usage and performance applications.
Application monitoring offers many options. Generally though, it is agreed upon that comprehensive monitoring is more effective. This means not just the application, but its environment will also be monitored, among other elements, for possible issues. The monitoring itself may be undertaken by using a locally-installed monitoring tool on the server or by employing different technical processes to collect information on the application.
The significance of timely alerts
If application monitoring is to be effective, you need to ensure that you get timely performance reports. Application monitoring also takes care of compliance with SLA besides helping with capacity planning.
Adequate monitoring allows you to take corrective steps in case of a problem; issue resolution can then be taken up before it starts affecting the end-user or customer transactions. Some critical functions and applications may also be subject to real time monitoring. Corrective action can then be taken to ensure that serious outages are prevented from affecting the business.
Timely alerts during monitoring can help ensure the health of your application. When problems area discovered on time, corrective action can be taken before outages happen. Timely intervention also ensures long-term damage to your system and infrastructure. Further, because you are alerted of problems and issues on time, your tech support system is ready to deal with them. Thus, timely application monitoring alerts also help you create an entire IT infrastructure that is far more manageable and dependable.
Well-managed infrastructure systems create lesser loads for the business, overall. Depending on the application needs and the monitoring tools utilized, you can also check robustness of your user-intensive systems such as emailing, instant messengers, websites and user interfaces and other platforms that help users engage and communicate. Databases and other information-rich systems can similarly be monitored to ensure they are working optimally.
The advantages
Insisting on a robust alerting system in application monitoring tools has many advantages to it.
> Reduced outages
> Higher uptimes for applications, services, etc.
> Rapid resolutions for processes that are not performing or have failed
> Resolution before application failure can affect end-users
> Reduced chances of revenue loss due to failed or poorly-performing applications
Optimally-performing applications will not affect customer transactions or operations that are critical to your business. Timely monitoring and reporting ensures that your applications are an asset to your business and a big help in increasing and maintaining the revenue stream.
About the Author:
Tevron develops and delivers Application Monitoring Solutions, Service Level Agreement, IT Service Management, and End to End Performance monitoring solutions available globally. Tevron has also successfully delivered enterprise Application Monitoring Solutions and Testing solutions to support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers across the globe. Tevron's solutions designed to support diverse environments, business processes and applications with a service oriented management.
Performance testing has seen newer challenges in the cloud environment. Most businesses on restricted budgets find that online promotion or a strong online presence can help them. Further, many users prefer conducting their business online, making the case for cloud-enabled applications stronger. However, technology, including cloud technology, is dynamic and ever-changing. This presents newer grounds to cover, for performance testing methods as well. What worked well some months ago may not be adequate right now.
When it comes to performance testing solutions, the one element that comes to mind immediately would be real-time testing. But application monitoring needs to go beyond only real time testing, and bridge development and deployment, while keeping a sharp eye on its real-time performance. In cloud-based apps especially, the important of constant monitoring cannot be overlooked.
Certain elements are common to most application and performance testing.
Performance testing for cloud-based apps
Cloud-enabled applications have many advantages, such as helping to reduce operational costs. A small or mid-sized business firm can also successfully manage a business without needing to first make heavy investments in manpower or infrastructure in-house. Cloud based apps and resources use the cloud itself as a storing place, and the company that is harnessing it. Thus, testing for performance of cloud-based apps does not begin and end in the company's IT room. It is not dependent on the company that is using cloud technology. Instead, cloud-based applications will be affected by not just their platforms and environments, but also the different and rapidly changing environment within the cloud itself. Testing solutions for the performance of cloud based apps will need to take this into consideration.
Ensuring constant monitoring
Perhaps the one surefire method of ensuring strong performance of cloud-based apps is constant monitoring and hence testing and review methods too may need some modification. As part of performance testing of cloud-based apps, their ability to match expectations and requirements can be reviewed right from development up to deployment.
Updated performance testing solutions
Most cloud-based application monitoring is a service. If you have a vendor providing you services, you can ensure that your performance testing is in sync with the latest software changes and is keeping pace with the application updates. Your testing solutions could include a multi-pronged approach where the application is not tested in isolation.
Comprehensive performance testing
Your cloud-based application is dependent on its environment as well. Ideally, your application monitoring solution should take into account the working environment and the platform it is working on. Most performance testing should also reveal or detect discrepancies before they become apparent. For small or mid-sized businesses that operate through cloud-based applications mostly, sound performance monitoring and thorough and consistent application testing is indispensable.
About the Author:
Tevron develops and delivers Application Monitoring Solutions, Service Level Agreement, Performance Testing, and End to End Performance monitoring solutions available globally. Tevron has also successfully delivered enterprise Application Monitoring Solutions and Testing solutions to support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers across the globe. Tevron's solutions designed to support diverse environments, business processes and applications with a service oriented management.
If you were to analyze and dissect application monitoring, you would see that there really is no single answer to the question about what influences it. When undertaking monitoring, it is important to remember that most applications do not work in isolation. There is an interdependent maze that most applications operate within. This maze includes other applications as well as the software platform used.
Application monitoring may need to take into consideration the hardware details of the system as well. Factors such as hardware performance, capacity and speed can affect application performance. Further, if the platform on which the application runs, develops a problem, application monitoring alone may not be able to help.
Application monitoring, thus, is not just about the state of the application; it is equally about optimal performance. Optimized performance is not just about the functioning of a single application, it is about how all the different elements related to an application interact and engage to finally enable the application to perform.
Application monitoring may need to go as in-depth as the levels of coding. At times, comprehensive application monitoring may take into account the kind of coding undertaken in writing the application. Apart from coding, application performance monitoring will also take into account the loads that the application will handle. Load testing is a significant aspect of comprehensive application monitoring.
As networked environments grow in complexity, workloads are increasing at an unprecedented rate. The widespread adoption of different devices such as smart phones and other handheld communication devices is also aiding in increased virtualization. As a result, application monitoring now has greater grounds to cover.
When undertaking monitoring, it is worthwhile taking everything that touches the application into consideration.
Epic application performance monitoring needs to take into account the large sizes of databases that the application covers. Because Epic applications cover the medical and healthcare industry, performance testing solutions need to include areas such as Practice Management, Hospital Billing, Ambulatory and Inpatient EMR, etc. Epic also covers departments and ancillaries, and takes care of interoperability matters and the need for connecting affiliates.
As agencies involved in healthcare, including hospitals, medical groups and integrated healthcare organizations move towards adopting Epic applications, the need for adequate testing solutions is only going to increase. Further, because of the nature of industry that Epic applications serve, their effective performance is fundamental to the agencies using them. Services such as emergency rooms cannot afford to have applications that are not up and running when needed.
Epic consists of large databases that cover clinical as well as revenue functions for healthcare organizations. Epic performance needs to take into account not only healthcare concerns such as patient details, but also aspects such as system health, compliance with SLA, real user experience, etc. Performance monitoring for Epic applications also takes into account the environments.
Epic applications improve the productivity of physicians by helping to simplify the practice, including aspects of patient engagement. Eventually, effective Epic application performance results in better care delivery. The applications within this system take care of more than 100 specialties, all designed to make healthcare simpler with the use of pre-built content on reports, documents, order sets, etc. This makes for faster and effective care-giving, including for chronic care cases. For healthcare providers, the performance of their Epic applications must never flag, particularly since the system supports some critical areas within medical care, resulting in measurable increase in quality of care provided.
Management or review of application performance can often be incomplete because it tends to concentrate on the process of monitoring alone, and not for errors that may be expected or anticipated to occur in the lifecycle of the application. One of the reasons for this could be that anticipating problems or errors is never an easy task. Further, problems that do not have a precedent are often not easy to predict. Application monitoring is an intrinsic part of performance management, but it cannot prevent issues and application failures by itself, but if it is applied in a thorough manner, it may help raise timely alerts and reveal corrective measures that could be taken.
Elements to take care of, when managing application performance
Performance management needs to focus on whether the application will meet its end-user expectations or not. Outline application expectations, if needed, before going ahead with the monitoring agenda. Application monitoring will work best when it goes hand-in-hand with end-user expectations. Understanding user expectations will also help you outline a monitoring plan that will take precise as well as overall care of all the most important areas within the application. Another advantage to outlining user expectations is to ensure that you have all the monitoring tools in place. This will also ensure optimizing of the application monitoring process itself.
Remember to also measure the impact of application monitoring on the performance of the application, versus the results in case there is no monitoring in place.
How to determine the ideal time for application monitoring?
There is no fixed way by which to determine the right time to begin application monitoring. However, certain elements can become pointers.
> Over utilization: If an application is being utilized above its core capabilities, it may utilize more memory and need monitoring to pinpoint the precise problem. Over utilization may occur in terms of usage time or the number of users accessing it at any given time.
> System crash: At times, errors may occur unexpectedly. This can result in sudden breakdown or total stopping of the application's functions. Application monitoring that is thorough and comprehensive can catch a potential error before it brings about a complete system breakdown.
> Software failure: Software failures can be major contributors to application breakdown. However, regular monitoring can help raise timely alerts and allow you to take corrective action before the software fails entirely.
> Regular updates: If your software is not updated regularly, it can remain vulnerable to threats such as virus attacks or even hardware failure and configuration problems. Application monitoring can help determine critical updates needed and raise timely alerts so that appropriate action can be taken.
Critical elements
Application monitoring should cover everything, from server downtime to software, to processes and services, as well as hardware. Application monitoring can also include configuration changes. Application monitoring must be implemented keeping in mind it must be kept in mind that costs incurred in repairs and maintenance could be significantly higher than those incurred in monitoring.
About the Author:
Tevron develops and delivers Application Monitoring Solutions, Service Level Agreement, Automated Testing Solutions, and End to End Performance monitoring solutions available globally. Tevron has also successfully delivered enterprise Application Monitoring Solutions and Testing solutions to support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers across the globe. Tevron's solutions designed to support diverse environments, business processes and applications with a service oriented management.
Nashua, NH. USA - Tevron, the leader in IT performance and end to end monitoring & testing solutions, announced today that one of the world's leading enterprises for business process and document management deployed CitraTest APM across their Global locations for the active end to end monitoring of all of their call centers. They have over 140,000 employees.
Tevron was selected based on their powerful & flexible IT monitoring & testing technology that fully supports their very complex applications and environments (Windows 7, Windows XP, Citrix, Web). Being able to measure global call center application performance on an ongoing basis for both native web and web via Citrix is invaluable. Unlike the products from other vendors, Tevron offers a tightly integrated, simplified and scalable solution that meets the needs of their complex business and their ever changing technologies.
About Tevron (http://www.tevron.com)
Tevron is a global software company that develops and delivers the most powerful and comprehensive suite of End To End performance, Application Monitoring Solutions, SLA (Service Level Agreement) and Automated Testing Solutions available in the world today. Tevron has successfully delivered enterprise APM & Testing solutions that support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers worldwide.
Tevron, CitraTest APM, and the Tevron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. All other company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
© 2013 Tevron, LLC. all rights reserved.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 866 788 3650
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2033 184 432
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 698 088 4043
Nashua, New Hampshire - Tevron today announced the addition of support for Microsoft Silverlight to its suite of ETE Monitoring & Testing solutions. Silverlight is a powerful development tool for creating engaging, interactive user experiences for Web and mobile applications. Silverlight is plug-in, powered by the .NET framework and compatible with multiple browsers, devices and operating systems, bringing a new level of interactivity wherever the Web works. With the latest releases of CitraTest, CitraTest APM, and CitraTest VU, Tevron again is taking the lead role in the ETE Monitoring & testing industry in providing support for every development environment including Microsoft Silverlight and every application that is accessible from a Windows machine.
As developers create applications with richness and interactivity out of reach of traditional web technologies via the use of Microsoft Silverlight®, Tevron’s ETE Monitoring & testing solutions will continue to offer the industry lead for application monitoring, load testing, and general automation. To learn more about Tevron's automated testing solutions or to request additional information, please call +1.866.788.3650 or visit http://www.tevron.com.
ABOUT TEVRON
Tevron is a global leader in Application Monitoring and Automated Testing. Through our all encompassing customer-centric vision and advanced technology, our APM & Testing Solutions allow the unique flexibility of supporting every application across the enterprise with one methodology delivering the ability to test, monitor, enforce SLAs, and optimize performance with confidence and ease. Founded in 2001, Tevron® is a global organization and is privately held. Our vast and diverse range of customers are global leaders and include companies such as Alcon Labs, Alverno, Northrop Grumman, Xerox, Hewlett Packard, Siemens, and USPTO, to name a few.
TRADEMARKS
Tevron, the Tevron logo, and CitraTest are registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. Microsoft Silverlight, is a registered trademark of Microsoft. All other product references herein are either trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 866.788.3650
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2033 184 432
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 698 088 4043
Talk of application monitoring, and all you probably get to know about is niche solutions for niche products. Yet application monitoring needs to be comprehensive enough to cover all business needs and client deliverables.
Scope of Application Monitoring
To determine how much coverage you really need from your application monitoring system, look at the following questions:
> Does your business employ a number of applications and software?
> Are your operations cloud-based? Do you use cloud-based apps for key functions?
> Do you have client interfaces?
Most applications are running continuously because they form the backbone for client deliverables.
Choose the right application monitoring tool
Higher your dependence on applications, higher the need for dependability and monitoring performance. There are a number of factors that influence the need for monitoring.
> To catch problems before they snowball into larger issues
> To shield customers from problems, particularly in the case of active interfaces
> To ensure consistently high uptime
> In case of essential services, such as hospital operations, ensuring optimum performance
Requirements from your application performance monitoring tool
> The right application monitoring tool will provide you comprehensive coverage. This means freedom from needing to choose a different tool for different functions
> Ideally, your application monitoring tool should point out potential issues before they strike at operations
> Carry out real-time monitoring for customer interfaces so that glitches are caught before a customer faces downtime
Remember, these are only a small percentage of issues highlighted. Moreover, these are generic in nature. Choosing the correct tool will finally depend on your individual business needs.
Application monitoring and application performance management is relevant to most businesses today, and with good reason.
Profitability is the watchword for every business, regardless of industry. For businesses engaged in service-focused work, efficiency of applications, their monitoring and performance is of special importance. Regular application monitoring and maintenance for ensuring sound performance is a necessary ingredient for maintaining smooth operations.
As of now, there are many diverse kinds of enterprise applications globally; there are an equally large number of updates taking place for all these applications. If adequate application monitoring and resulting repairs are not undertaken for these, it can have a direct bearing on performance of these applications too.
When conducted well application monitoring can provide pointers to the application's health and boost its performance; thus helping services perform better, overall. Regardless of the industry, an application that performs well leads to better end-user experience and ultimately results in optimal utilization of time and resources.
What kinds of applications need monitoring for performance?
Any business that needs to have its applications performing consistently well needs sound monitoring and regular maintenance checks for optimal performance. Such businesses will need to ensure that their servers regularly clock high uptimes with reduced interruptions or problems. Further, an interruption for some applications can often mean starting at the beginning. This leads to loss of time; and users can lose interest in the application, especially in the case of commercial applications.
To prevent such losses in productivity, applications should be studied and regular monitoring carried out for the servers, the database, web and cloud services, if applicable, and virtual monitoring, ideally to ensure high performance.
Consistent application monitoring ensures troubleshooting and maintenance of operations while also highlighting trouble areas or inconsistencies in performance. This in turn, allows application managers and the technical workforce to run repairs and conduct maintenance checks in a more systematic and informed manner. For applications that are used commercially, this also helps keep a check on the end user experience and its improvement.
Thankfully, good application monitoring and application performance monitoring systems are available easily. These can be of several types, depending on the requirements of the business. The ideal enterprise application monitoring systems are those that can test and check performance end to end. A good monitoring system will test performances for IT enterprise applications, including end to end performance and compliance with the service level agreement.
Application monitoring can extend to transaction monitoring, real-time alerts, application availability, and more; all functions related to testing the performance.
Further, for applications supporting a large user base, a single-point monitor works better at monitoring it and mapping application performance. Such solutions are better because they do not disrupt user sessions. Repairs as indicated by performance reports, can also be conducted without interruptions in user interface or without impacting user-friendliness.
About the Author:
Tevron develops and delivers powerful and comprehensive Application Monitoring Solutions, Service Level Agreement, Application Performance, IT Services Management and Automated Testing Solutions available globally. Tevron has also successfully delivered enterprise Application Monitoring Solutions and Testing solutions to support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers across the globe. Tevron focuses on solutions that are scalable, flexible, and easy to maintain; they are also designed to support diverse environments, business processes and applications with a service oriented management.
IT services management is a high-level security application used for ensuring that IT applications are working at their optimum levels. Good application performance monitoring and IT service management go hand-in-hand. Seen in this light, one cannot have effective IT services management without first ensuring end-to-end monitoring.
IT services management tool focuses on process and application interfaces more from the perspective of the user, than from the perspective of the technology professional or the vendor. IT services management focuses instead on how to interface hardcore IT processes with business needs and preferences.
Thus, IT services management is concerned with the operational part of activities related to IT, instead of IT architecture or processes. IT services management will thus take into account customer concerns and expectations. IT services management will also analyze whether processes are meeting these expectations or not.
Intersection with business objectives
Due to its role as a means or instrument that enforces or enables IT intent and goals, IT Services Management intersects or overlaps more with non-hardcore IT disciplines. As such, it works in close sync with management of business services as well as IT planning and management. The significance of effective IT services management lies in its ability to assess whether business objectives are being met or not, and whether end-user expectations and experience is favorable.
IT operations and service management of IT operations do not encompass IT project management. But financial controls for IT services may fall under the purview of IT services management.
The ideal IT services management tool:
> focuses on processes more from the user's perspective
> monitors the end-user experience
> monitors enforcement of Service Level Agreement (SLA)
> undertakes creating SLAs and also
> monitors whether the IT services are meeting business needs and metrics or not
> monitors and assesses whether a particular application needs troubleshooting or no; in case it needs some repairing, end-to-end monitoring can help raise an alert
> identifies and quarantines performance-related issues such that they can be dealt with before it starts affecting end-user experience
> also undertakes action to restore performance levels before it affects user experience
> assesses and reviews performance of any new application or process such that it can be calibrated to meet business metrics and performance expectations
> is able to review application processes and software such that performance-related decisions can be taken
> undertakes real time management for client-centric businesses
For most businesses that are poised to take a leap into the next level, it is best to invest in complete IT services management solutions that enable effective customer service and alignment with business goals and delivery commitments. A sound management system will not only keep a watch on performance, it will also ensure improved service delivery and enforcement of best practices.
About the Author:
Tevron develops and delivers powerful and comprehensive Application Monitoring Solutions, Service Level Agreement, End to End Performance, IT Services Management and Automated Testing Solutions available globally. Tevron has also successfully delivered enterprise Application Monitoring Solutions and Testing solutions to support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers across the globe. Tevron focuses on solutions that are scalable, flexible, and easy to maintain; they are also designed to support diverse environments, business processes and applications with a service oriented management.
Nashua, New Hampshire, USA - Tevron today announced the addition of support for VMware vSphere to its suite of ETE Monitoring & Testing solutions. VMware vSphere is the industry's leading virtualization platform for building cloud infrastructures. With the latest releases of CitraTest, CitraTest APM, and CitraTest VU, Tevron again is taking the lead role in the ETE Monitoring & testing industry in providing support for every virtual environment including VMware vSphere and every application that is accessible from a Windows machine. As companies across the world move towards the Cloud and VMware vSphere, Tevron's ETE Monitoring & testing solutions will continue to offer the industry lead for application monitoring, load testing, and general automation. To learn more about Tevron's automated testing solutions or to request additional information, please call +1.866.788.3650 or visit http://www.tevron.com.
ABOUT TEVRON
Tevron is a global leader in application monitoring and Automated Testing. Through our all encompassing customer-centric vision and advanced technology, our APM & Testing Solutions allow the unique flexibility of supporting every application across the enterprise with one methodology delivering the ability to test, monitor, enforce SLAs, and optimize performance with confidence and ease. Founded in 2001, Tevron is a global organization and is privately held. Our vast and diverse range of customers are global leaders and include companies such as Alcon Labs, Alverno, Northrop Grumman, Xerox, Hewlett Packard, Siemens, and USPTO, to name a few.
TRADEMARKS
Tevron, the Tevron logo, and CitraTest are registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. VMware vSphere is a registered trademark of VMWare. All other product references herein are either trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 866.788.3650
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2033 184 432
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 698 088 4043
Nashua, NH. USA - Tevron, the leader in IT performance and end to end monitoring & testing solutions, announced today that one of the leading oil and gas drillers in the United States deployed CitraTest APM across their US locations for the active monitoring of all of their mission critical business drilling applications. They have over 9,000 employees.
Tevron was selected based on their powerful & flexible IT monitoring & testing technology that fully supports every one of their very complex applications and environments (Windows 2008 Server, Windows 7, Windows XP, Citrix). Having one enterprise monitoring solution that intelligently supports every application, every Windows operating system, and every version of Citrix is invaluable. Unlike the products from other vendors, Tevron offers a tightly integrated, simplified and scalable solution that meets the needs of their complex healthcare business and their ever changing technologies.
About Tevron (http://www.tevron.com)
Tevron is a global software company that develops and delivers the most powerful and comprehensive suite of End To End performance, Application Monitoring Solutions, SLA (Service Level Agreement) and Automated Testing Solutions available in the world today. Tevron has successfully delivered enterprise APM & Testing solutions that support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers worldwide.
Tevron, CitraTest VU, and the Tevron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. All other company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
© 2012 Tevron, LLC. all rights reserved.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 866.788.3650
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2033 184 432
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 698 088 4043
It's a well known fact that application monitoring is an ongoing process. Precisely for this reason, it is worthwhile to gauge the kind of monitoring support your system might need. Depending on the purpose they serve, most systems would need dedicated monitoring for different elements, i.e. internal applications, user interface, user experience, etc. For most client server and web applications though, end-user monitoring may be a necessity.
The Challenge
The challenge lies in recognizing application requirements from an end-user perspective. Many application monitoring systems are put into use with the understanding that these will cover the usual elements of application health monitoring. While this may be the case, several key areas such as actual end-user experience or end-user response time might be overlooked by a tool you may have specifically installed for monitoring purposes.
Real End-user Experience
You have employed the best infrastructure available. Your quality standards are also in keeping with industry best-practices. Your networks and servers are running fine and there are no technical issues. Despite these efforts, you still receive complaints on certain key business applications. If this sounds familiar, you may need to evaluate the end-user experience and employ monitoring your application specifically for this purpose.
The challenge also lies in defining end-user experience. For practical purposes, user experience is negative when your application pace is steadily declining, or the pace is slower than what the users are expecting, or it does not perform the task it is expected to perform. There are also other issues such as the application not reacting to commands, or behaving in an unexpected fashion, sending errors, etc. The application monitoring tool you decide to employ must be able to identify these problems. There are several different kinds of monitoring, specific to end-user experience:
- Agents that test system robustness by emulating end-users.
- Appliances that can help determine network behavior by monitoring web traffic for web-based applications.
- Agents that record end-user experiences from the user's perspective.
However, different kinds of monitoring systems come with diverse challenges; the foremost being the inability to replicate the user experience, and thus defeating the purpose of application monitoring.
Is there a Solution?
Even after you deploy different application monitoring systems, you may still not be able to get rid of end-user complaints. This could be because there are limitations to the monitoring approach of most tools.
Ideally, application health monitoring from end user perspective should include a tool that integrates different applications, their protocols, and their operating environments.
If you have a system that encompasses several different applications and you choose to monitor each one separately, the costs and effort of maintaining such a monitoring system would simply be prohibitive.
Ideally, you should choose a tool that can mimic your user behavior, while also taking into account diverse operating environments. Further, end-user experience of applications is best monitored by unobtrusive agents or those that do not affect other applications or servers.
About the Author:
Tevron develops and delivers powerful and comprehensive Application Monitoring Solutions, Service Level Agreement, End to End Performance, and Performance Testing Solutions available globally. Tevron has also successfully delivered enterprise Application Monitoring Solutions and Testing solutions to support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers across the globe. Tevron's solutions are scalable, flexible, and easy to maintain; they are also designed to support diverse environments, business processes and applications with a service oriented management.
Often, application monitoring is not taken seriously till the time a project goes live. At that stage, it gets difficult to tap problems and fix issues because end users are already involved. For this reason, application monitoring is best included at the time of deployment.
What are the other common challenges faced in application monitoring?
1. Applications with direct user-interface: Those applications that contain a higher volume of user-interfaces, such as banking applications or other interactive applications such as a touch-screen kiosk at a public place are prone to breaking down and leading to inconvenience, before being controlled effectively.
Application monitoring efforts introduced at the time of deployment itself can prove to be useful in detecting trouble before it grows bigger and affects operations. Proactive monitoring involves studying the application till it reaches a level where performance can suffer if the issue is not resolved.
2. A large user base: Applications that involve large user bases, for example a user base across the country, or globally. These applications need to support several parameters such as communication and illustrations that support several different languages and cultural preferences. In case of a global user base, such as that of a bank, the application may also need to support different currencies.
Effective performance of such applications may depend on performance monitoring undertaken by independent support groups located on site.
3. Shared resources and systems: Tracing problems is always difficult when there are multiple systems. In case of a shared system, most resources are also shared to enable optimization. However, when monitoring application performance of shared systems, the entire system must be expected to share the burden of breakdowns or a decrease in quality.
A similar problem is faced in set-ups that involve clusters of systems that share memory and network. Often, tracing the problem is the first challenge in monitoring performance in such applications because the source could be anything from a shared disk, to a CPU.
Meeting the challenges
The ideal performance monitoring tool will monitor the application, analyze performance in terms of quality and speed, and take corrective steps before the problem reaches the end user. Superior application monitoring tools also ensure SLA enforcement and bring out unauthorized changes or modifications to the system.
About the Author
Tevron develops and delivers powerful and comprehensive application monitoring solutions, service level agreement, end to end performance, and performance testing solutions available globally. Tevron has also successfully delivered enterprise application monitoring solutions and testing solutions to support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers across the globe. Tevron's solutions are scalable, flexible, and easy to maintain; they are also designed to support diverse environments, business processes and applications with a service oriented management.
Nashua, New Hampshire - Tevron today announced the addition of support for Microsoft Windows 8 to its suite of ETE Monitoring & Testing solutions. Windows 8 delivers a brand new user interface, Windows to Go, Windows Store, Internet Explorer 10 and much more.
With the latest releases of CitraTest, CitraTest APM, and CitraTest VU, Tevron again is taking the lead role in the ETE Monitoring & testing industry in providing support for every Windows environment including Windows 8 and every application that is accessible from a Windows machine. As companies across the world upgrade to the Windows 8 operating environment, Tevron's ETE Monitoring & testing solutions will continue to offer the industry lead for application monitoring, load testing, and general automation.
To learn more about Tevron's automated testing solutions or to request additional information, please call +1.866.788.3650 or visit http://www.tevron.com.
About Tevron
Tevron® is a global leader in APM and Automated Testing. Through our all encompassing customer-centric vision and advanced technology, our APM & Testing Solutions allow the unique flexibility of supporting every application across the enterprise with one methodology delivering the ability to test, monitor, enforce SLAs, and optimize performance with confidence and ease. Founded in 2001, Tevron® is a global organization and is privately held. Our vast and diverse range of customers are global leaders and include companies such as Alcon Labs, Alverno, Northrop Grumman, Xerox, Hewlett Packard, Siemens, and USPTO, to name a few.
Trademarks
Tevron, the Tevron logo, and CitraTest are registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. Windows 8 is a registered trademark of Microsoft. All other product references herein are either trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 866.788.3650
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2033 184 432
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 698 088 4043
Nashua, NH. USA - Tevron, the leader in IT performance and end to end monitoring & testing solutions, announced today that one of the leading academic medical centers in the USA that are engaged in basic and clinical research to bring medical advancements directly from the laboratory to the bedside deployed CitraTest APM (http://www.tevron.com/citratest-apm.asp) & CitraTest (http://www.tevron.com/citratest.asp) across their US locations for the monitoring and testing of all of their mission critical business & medical applications. They have over 2000 physicians and 10000 employees.
Tevron was selected based on their powerful & flexible IT monitoring & testing technology that fully supports every one of their very complex business applications (Thick client & Web) and environments (Windows 2008 Server, Windows 7, Windows XP, Citrix). Having one enterprise monitoring solution that intelligently supports every application, every Windows operating system, and every version of Citrix and Terminal Services is invaluable. Unlike the products from other vendors, Tevron offers a tightly integrated, simplified and scalable solution that meets the needs of their complex healthcare business and their ever changing technologies.
About Tevron (http://www.tevron.com)
Tevron® is a global software company that develops and delivers the most powerful and comprehensive suite of End To End performance, Application Monitoring Solutions, SLA (Service Level Agreement) and Automated Testing Solutions available in the world today. Tevron has successfully delivered enterprise APM & Testing solutions that support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers worldwide.
Tevron, CitraTest APM, and the Tevron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. All other company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
© 2012 Tevron, LLC. all rights reserved.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 866.788.3650
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2033 184 432
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 698 088 4043
Nashua, NH. USA - Tevron, the leader in IT performance and availability monitoring & testing solutions, announced today that one of the leading government hospitals whose specialized clinical programs include Blind Rehabilitation, Spinal Cord Injury, Neurosurgery, Radiation Therapy and Cardiovascular Surgery, deployed CitraTest APM (http://www.tevron.com/citratest-apm.asp) across their 7 US locations for the monitoring of all of their mission critical business & medical applications. The hospital hosted over 600,000 patients visits in 2010.
Tevron was selected based on their powerful & flexible IT monitoring technology that fully supports every one of their complex applications and environments (Windows 7, Windows XP, Citrix). Having one enterprise monitoring solution that intelligently supports every application is invaluable and extremely cost effective. Unlike the products from other vendors, Tevron offers a tightly integrated, simplified and scalable solution that meets the needs of their complex healthcare business and their ever changing technologies.
About Tevron (http://www.tevron.com)
Tevron is a global software company that develops and delivers the most powerful and comprehensive suite of End To End performance, Application Monitoring Solutions, SLA (Service Level Agreement) and Automated Testing Solutions available in the world today. Tevron has successfully delivered enterprise APM & Testing solutions that support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers worldwide.
Tevron, CitraTest APM, and the Tevron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. All other company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
© 2011 Tevron, LLC. all rights reserved.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 702.518.7435
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2089 066 591
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 800 664 6695
Application monitoring system performs by monitoring applications' incoming traffic and tracking illegitimate access and chances of data theft. It usually keeps track of the source and time of traffic for troubleshooting any application. Software of this type is generally facilitated for applications that require greater security like -finance software and databases.
Now, coming to the necessity of implementing application monitoring system, how this is important is necessary to understand. There are multiple natures, this application monitoring system can manifest. How application monitoring system can help you protect your business and IT infrastructure is quite easy to understand once the nature of different application monitoring system is known.
Uptime Monitoring
Uptime monitoring software checks and monitors the availability of each device and alerts the administrator in case any system fails. Uptime monitoring software can be implemented to ascertain where issues may arise in future within a network enabling administrator to balance loads.
Monitoring of Transaction
Transaction based applications are monitored facilitating transaction monitoring system. The transaction completion time can be tracked and compared with desired times. Successful execution of these transactions is the key to the success of any business.
Monitoring of Data Files
In some application environments transactions are conducted offline where the data travels from one point to another. This offline data travel is witnessed were businesses send their daily sales data to their head office each night in the shape of data file. This type of data flow can be tracked and controlled by constantly monitoring the several drop and pick points of the data files. At frequent equal intervals counts are taken at drop and pickup points to ensure the accurate flow of data files.
This can also act as proactively monitoring of the data flow as the problem will be known when files begin to amass at a drop point on its first occurrence and system can be prevented from getting blocked by looking into the reason of the accumulation of files.
Monitoring of Database
To monitor the transactional well being of a database some monitoring transactions, for instance generating records, updating the record etc. can be conducted and the time taken for each transaction is recorded.
In majority of the cases if system is overloaded the transaction time will be longer, which is the indication to look into the problem area in database and debug it before it goes down.
Monitoring of Resource
Constant monitoring of system resources can ward off application and operating system from slowing down and crashing. If disk space is full, the system can crash right away as they cannot write logs etc. on the disk.
These are a few of the natures of implementing application monitoring systems that are mostly utilized and this is why application monitoring systems are implemented by majority of the businesses.
Nashua, NH. USA - February 21, 2011 – Tevron, the leader in IT performance and availability monitoring & testing solutions, announced today that one of the leading health services companies that provides patients with a wide range of integrated health care services, including medical diagnosis and treatment, health education, self-care products, and services with over 8,000 employees, deployed CitraTest APM (http://www.tevron.com/citratest-apm.asp) & CitraTest (http://www.tevron.com/citratest.asp) across their US locations for the monitoring and testing of all of their mission critical business & medical applications.
Tevron was selected based on their powerful & flexible IT monitoring technology that fully supports every one of their very complex business applications (Epic, Web) and environments (Windows 7, Windows XP, RDP). Having one enterprise monitoring solution that intelligently supports every application is invaluable. Unlike the products from other vendors, Tevron offers a tightly integrated, simplified and scalable solution that meets the needs of their complex healthcare business and their ever changing technologies.
About Tevron (http://www.tevron.com)
Tevron® is a global software company that develops and delivers the most powerful and comprehensive suite of End To End performance, Application Monitoring Solutions, SLA (Service Level Agreement) and Automated Testing Solutions available in the world today. Tevron has successfully delivered enterprise APM & Testing solutions that support every IT enterprise application to hundreds of customers worldwide.
Tevron, CitraTest APM, and the Tevron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Tevron, LLC. All other company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
© 2011 Tevron, LLC. all rights reserved.
For more information:
North America (HQ)
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +1 702.518.7435
EMEA
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +44 (0) 2089 066 591
Germany
Tevron, LLC
Phone: +49 (0) 800 664 6695
