Job & Automation Monitoring

Scope & Content

Scope

The purpose of Job & Automation Monitoring is to provide transparency about the status of automation processes regarding Execution Status, Application Status, Start Delay and Run Time with the aim to offer these 4 core operations aspects for all kinds of (scheduled) automation processes (for simplification called “jobs” in the later text), that run on different platforms with a unified user experience using a common look-and-feel and handling pattern.

Job & Automation Monitoring replaces the Job Monitoring application that supports the monitoring of ABAP jobs only. See a high-level feature comparison with Job Monitoring here.

The basic concept is to collect individual job execution data into the central monitoring application, to correlate it with its job definition and evaluate every execution using historical data. The rating of the last (or latest) execution(s) is propagated to the job level and finally to the system level so that you can easily understand the current state of many jobs that are executed in the different systems. In case of issues with job executions, context-based navigation is offered from the job to the individual execution and finally a direct navigation to the corresponding job execution in the executing system (or service). This is for providing quick access for a more detailed analysis, for example to stop a non-ending execution or to restart a failed execution.  

Job & Automation Monitoring shall help to understand the current state of the automation processes across all involved cloud services and systems. The aggregated historical data shall help to detect deteriorations to avoid downtimes. On top, in case of a SAP ABAP system it shall help to efficiently monitor so called Standard Jobs, i.e. jobs that are scheduled by the SAP S/4HANA technical job repository (see SAP Note 2190119) or in lower releases by the SM36 Standard Job framework. 

Concept

Jobs and workflows are executed in the managed cloud services and on-premise systems. The individual executions are captured (start, end times, and status) by the local execution infrastructures. This “normalized” run data is sent to SAP Focused Run, where the individual execution data is assembled and correlated with definition data.


Content

Job & Automation Monitoring in SAP Focused Run collects data for these job / automation types: 

Supported Products

Features

Home Page

The Status Overview provides a summary regarding job execution for the systems in scope. It shows the number of systems and the number of automations ("jobs"). The jobs are rated based on the rating of the latest execution:

  • The Execution Status is rated 
    • green, if a job finished successfully.
    • yellow, if a job finished with warnings or errors without aborting.
    • red, if the job execution did not finish, i.e., aborted.
  • The Application Status is rated
    • green, if a job successfully processed the application data.
    • yellow, if there are warnings, but no errors.
    • red, if e.g., an ABAP job execution writes errors into the application log.
  • The Start Delay rating is rated green, if the technical delay of a job (e.g., in case of an ABAP job the time passed until a job gets a work process assigned) did not exceed the threshold defined.
  • The Run Time is rated green, if the runtime of a job did not exceed the threshold defined.  

The Application Overview provides a card-based overview, with more details:

  • Latest Rating - All Jobs: Information on the number of jobs and if latest execution of a job had an issue in any of the different aspects.
  • Latest Rating - Standard Jobs: Information on the number of standard jobs and if latest execution of a job had an issue in any of the different aspects.
  • Jobs with open alerts - All Jobs: Information on the number of jobs with alerts per aspect.
  • Jobs with open alerts - Standard Jobs: Information on the number of standard jobs with alerts per aspect.
  • Missing execution of mandatory job: Information on the number of jobs alerted because of missing execution.

In the Alert Ticker you see the most recent Job & Automation Monitoring alerts for the selected scope.

Please note that alerts, which are currently rated green are not shown in the alert ticker, whereas Job & Automation Monitoring considers/counts all alerts that are not confirmed. Consequently, the alert number in the Status Overview section is typically higher than in the Alert Ticker.

Monitoring

The jobs are listed and rated regarding Execution Status, Application Status, Start Delay and Run Time. The rating reflects the rating of the respective aspect for the latest execution of the job.

  • The list of jobs is default sorted by Execution Status rating in a descending order. You can change the sort order and filter the list of jobs.
  • The Column Open Alerts shows the number of not yet confirmed alert situations. By clicking on a number, you are navigated to the alert details.

To drill-down to a failed execution of a job in the remote system:

  • Click on a name to see the list of executions for the selected job sorted by planned start time.
  • Click on the arrow at the end of the line, to see the run details regarding the executed actions (e.g., reports and variants).

  • Click on the information icon next to each execution to get further details with the option to navigate directly to the job in the managed system by clicking on the Run ID value.

Alerting

Alerts are raised for every distinct job (definition) name. You can get alerted, if a job execution has a red or yellow Executions Status, a red or yellow Application Status, a Start Delay or Run Time that exceeds the threshold that you have set. Additionally, you can get alerted, if the execution of periodic job (that you have flagged as mandatory) is overdue by more than 15 minutes. On details how to configure alerts, please see the Configuration Guide.

The alert Additional Key contains the Name, Type and Context/Client of the job. The alert Additional Information contains the name of the job and the name of the job group, if the alert has been defined for a group. In the METRICS table the alerted executions of the job are listed and you have a direct link to the managed system like from the monitoring application.


Alert Notification

You can include the job name into the notification subject and execution details into the notification body. For this use Notification Management and define a notification template. With 4.0 FP03 there is a template for Application Job & Automation Monitoring. Use keywords ADDITIONAL_INFORMATION, JOB_EXECUTION_TABLE, JOB_EXECUTABLE_TABLE and JOB_EXCEPTIONS_TABLE.


Exceptions

Overview

The exceptions overview offers you for ABAP systems the exception categories “ABAP Application Log” and “ABAP Aborted Jobs” or “ABAP Job Application Log” and “ABAP Job Log” if the managed system is on ST-PI SP26 (SAPK-74026INSTPI) with note 3374186 V29 implemented.

You can drill down into the details, to individual exceptions.



Exceptions related to the execution of an ABAP job 

Job log or application log exceptions that are related to a job execution can be collected from an ABAP system, if it has ST-PI 7.40 SP20 (or higher). Please activate in the managed system Auto-linking Applog-Handles for jobs using transaction CRIT (more details below) to make sure application log messages written by a batch job are linked and can be collected with the job executions.

If there are exception details linked to a job execution, then this is indicated with a slightly changed icon as displayed below and on click on the icon you drill down to the exception messages and see their details. In case of ABAP jobs, the exceptions related to the Execution Status are those of category ABAP Aborted Jobs (or ABAP Job Log) and the exceptions related to the Application Status are those of category ABAP Application Log (or ABAP Job Application Log).


Analysis and Trend Reporting

In view Analysis information is offered for every job regarding number of executions, failed executions and run time. The table is default sorted by Total Run Time. You can change the sorting and apply filters. 

Click on the graph icon at the end of every line to navigate to view Trend Graphs, where you can see the values over time.

 

The data presented is based on hourly aggregates. For a large time frame the hourly aggregates are summed up to daily values automatically for better readability. Via custom time frame you can restrict to a certain period in the past and via the resolution option in the top right corner you can switch between Hourly and Daily.

Prerequisites

  • In managed ABAP system
    • ST-PI 700 SP31 (or higher) or 
    • ST-PI 740 SP16 - 20 and SAP note 3102288 or
    • ST-PI 740 SP21+ (optimally SP23+) and SAP note 3281776 is implemented
    • "Auto-linking Applog-Handles for jobs" is activated (for details see chapter Configuration)
  • SDA version (for download see here) is 
    • 1.63.6 (or higher)
  • In SAP Focused Run System, the following SAP notes are applied (and manual actions executed):
    • 3465616 - FRUN 4.0 FP03 Job & Automation Monitoring front-end correction
    • 3465605 - FRUN 4.0 FP03 Job & Automation Monitoring back-end correction

You can use this CSA policy to check, if the managed ABAP systems fulfill the minimum prerequisite for Job & Automation Monitoring.

Setup

Activation of Job & Automation Monitoring Use Case

Flag and save the use case setting.

Please note, that on activating Job & Automation Monitoring in SSI for an ABAP system, no job data will be collected yet. This needs to be done manually for every system in Job & Automation Monitoring, but can be automated via BADI implementation. This is described in the guides, that you find in section Configuration.

 

Monitoring On Prem Systems: Switch on Job Data Collection

SAP ABAP Job, SAP BW Process Chain and SAP Business Workflow execution data and meta data is collected by switching on data collection for the technical system. In the picture below for 7 systems there is data collection configured. For 2 systems there are issues with the data collection.


If you switch "On" on system level job type SAP ABAP Job data is collected from all clients. In the detail view you can restrict the ABAP job collection for specific clients and configure to collect data for further job types using the '+' option on the top of the table. Currently, SAP ABAP Job and SAP BW Process Chain and SAP Business Workflow are offered for Application Server ABAP.

Monitoring Cloud Services: Collect data via SAP Cloud ALM Push Proxy

You can push SAP Application Job execution data from S/4HANA Public Cloud Edition and job execution data from SAP Build Process Automation to your SAP Focused Run system by enabling SAP Focused Run Reverse Proxy in SAP Cloud ALM.

Configuration

In below section, basic configuration options are explained, for using the monitoring application. For alert configuration and further configuration options (with use case examples), please see the corresponding chapter of:

Option to Create Job Groups

By activating data collection Job & Automation Monitoring fetches by default all ABAP job / BW Chain executions from the managed systems. This is done to give IT administrators a holistic overview on the current situation and on trends.

To provide a view on specific jobs (potentially from different systems that a business user is interested in) you can create a job group in Configuration -> Job Groups and add the relevant jobs. You can define alerts for the jobs of the group (or a subset of the jobs). In general, it makes sense to create one job group per Job Monitoring alert recipient list.


Option to Set Run Time and Delay Threshold in Monitoring

Once job data is loaded from the managed system, you see that Execution Status, Application Status, Start Delay and Run Time are rated. The rating is set according to Rating Rules. You can adjust the thresholds for Start Delay and Run Time. Such a change is applied only to the user session, it is not (yet) possible to save the setting.


Option to Set Name of Job with Changing Name

The ABAP job scheduler has no concept of a job definition with a unique ID. When scheduling an ABAP job, the user defines what shall be executed, gives a job name and on save this entity gets a run ID. The job name does not need to be unique as together with the run ID it is unique for the ABAP system. To group the executions of a job the data collector creates a stable ID for a job as a hash value:

 

 ID

 Hash of

 JobId

 jobname + client + number of steps + job metadata [(step no + program + variant)]

 

If a job constantly changes its name (for example the job name contains a time stamp), the JobId hash value is constantly changing as well. To group executions in such a case, the JobId hash value is formed without the job name. On the monitoring UI, such a situation is indicated as follows:

 

You have the option to change the name given by the data collector (by pressing the pencil icon), so that the name of the job represents all related job executions.

Note 1: The actual (i.e. current) name of the job is displayed in the executions view and is also included into the notification mail. Using the filter option you can find the job in the list of jobs with the actual name.

Note 2: ABAP jobs with differently changing names that execute the same (i.e. client + number of steps + job metadata[(step no + program + variant)] are identical) are grouped together.

Option to Get Application Status Rated for ABAP Jobs

For SAP ABAP jobs in many cases the rating of the Application Status is grey. This is normal, if the job does not write any application log messages. To ensure that application log messages that are written during batch execution of a program are linked to the job execution you need to do following configuration in the respective managed ABAP system:

  1. call transaction CRIT
  2. add "Auto-linking Applog-Handles for jobs"
  3. add criterion and maintain the filter value (enter “*” with Option [*] if all jobs shall be considered)
  4. activate the profile

Attention: With "Option" [=] the value * will be interpreted as *. 


Option to Collect Exception Messages from ABAP Application Log and Job Log

Note, that below configuration is not needed, if you are on 4.0 FP01 + note 3331712 or FP02 + note 3404427 and the managed system has ST-PI SP26 (SAPK-74026INSTPI) with note 3374186 V29 implemented, then by switching on Job Monitoring data collection for ABAP jobs is sufficient to get ABAP Job Application Log and ABAP Job Log exceptions collected.

If above is not fulfilled, to get the messages transferred to the SAP Focused Run system, it is necessary to activate an agent via Integration Monitoring configuration: Select categories ABAP Aborted Job and ABAP Application Log for collection for the client in which the job monitoring data collection runs (which is the default client). 


Note, that for category ABAP Application Log the system expects you to fill a value for the Object filter, but still all kind of Application log exceptions raised at job execution will be collected.

To determine the default client for an ABAP system, check in Simple System Integration (SSI). In below example, for system FT4ADM the default client is 200.

Use Cases

  • Have an overview on the current status
    • of all jobs executed in one or more systems
    • of a list of jobs across several systems (via job groups)
  • Understand, what (e.g. reports) the jobs and automations are executing
  • Have the option to directly navigate from Job & Automation Monitoring to the job execution in the managed system via URL
  • Get alerted and notified
    • if any job aborts in a system (using alert type Critical Execution Status)
    • if a job aborts several times in a row (but not at first abort)
    • if a standard job fails (using alert filter Standard Job)
    • if a "mandatory" job fails (using alert filter Mandatory Job)
    • if a job from a list of jobs fails or runs too long (using alert filter Job Name or by creating alerts for a Job Group)
    • if an ABAP job writes critical application log messages (using alert type Critical Application Status)
    • if a job does not run any more (using alert type Missing Execution of Mandatory Job)
    • if jobs that execute a specific report fail (using alert filter Job Executable)
  • Analyze

For a detailed description of use cases, please see see the corresponding chapter of the Configuration Guide 4.0 FP03 with Use Cases.

Housekeeping

In SAP Focused Run Job & Automation Monitoring data reorganization is as follows:

  • the data of individual executions are kept for monitoring depending on job frequency and deleted with a default rule that you cannot change. The rule is, that for every job at least the last 14 executions are kept, all from the last 24 hours and on top all failed executions for 3 days. 
  • jobs that are deleted in the managed service (that are not scheduled any more) are removed from the database after 2 weeks together with the related executions and schedules.
  • the data of individual executions are aggregated for analysis and deleted by default after 52 weeks. For changing the default to a value between 4 and 150 weeks navigate to Configuration -> Global Settings.

Note: Please ensure to confirm alerts as alerted job executions are not removed from the data base.

FAQs

Question 1: In Job & Automation Monitoring Configuration pane for a technical system of type Application Server ABAP I observe a red bar. What is the reason, what can I do?

Question 2: I have switched on data collection for a technical system of type Application Server ABAP, but the status of data collection stays "in progress" for more than 15 minutes or switches to "failed”. What is the reason, what can I do?

Background: By switching on data collection, you have implicitly created a "filter" in case of job type SAP ABAP Job and will collect job data from all clients or the client(s) that you have specified.

The following artifacts need to work for the collection to happen:

  1. Job SAP_FRN_JAM_DATA_COLLECTION needs to send configuration information to the agent 
  2. Agent version needs to be high enough (see prerequisites, optimally highest version)
  3. In remote ABAP system
    1. ST-PI (optimally with correction note, see prerequisites) needs to be applied
    2. the collection user (that is maintained in FRUN Simply System Integration) needs to have the authorizations from role SAP_FRN_SDAGENT_AJM_MS
    3. Job Monitoring relevant RFMs need to be maintained as a Unified Connectivity allow list.

For the collection to happen, in Agent Administration for the technical system the following files needs to have been placed for the creation or deletion of data collection threads (can be checked in Configuration tab):

  • com.sap.solman.agent.jobmon.housekeeping
  • com.sap.solman.agent.jobmon.metadata
  • com.sap.solman.agent.jobmon.runtime

Based on the files collection threads are created (access "Agent Internals" for the system):

  • for ABAP Job
    • jobmonhousekeeping [<<FRUN SID>>.JOB_ABAP_HOUSEKEEP_OP_<<host>>_<<LMDB ID of MS>>] Period [86400 S]
    • jobruntime [<<FRUN SID>>.JOB_ABAP_RUNTIME_OP_<<host>>_<<configuration ID of filter>>] Period [300 S]
    • metadata [<<FRUN SID>>.JOB_ABAP_METADATA_OP_<<host>>_<<LMDB ID of MS>>] Period [300 S]
  • for BW Process Chain
    • jobmonhousekeeping [<<FRUN SID>>.JOB_BW_HOUSEKEEP_OP_<<host>>_<<LMDB ID of MS>>] Period [86400 S]
    • jobruntime [<<FRUN SID>>.JOB_BW_RUNTIME_OP_<<host>>_<<configuration ID of filter>>] Period [300 S]
    • metadata [<<FRUN SID>>.JOB_BW_METADATA_OP_<<host>>_<<LMDB ID of MS>>] Period [300 S]
  • for SAP Business Workflow
    • jobmonworkflow [<<FRUN SID>>.JOB_WORKFLOW_OP_<<host>>_<<LMDB ID of MS>>] Period [300 S]

Error handling:

If threads are missing switch off data collection and wait (until after job SAP_FRN_JAM_DATA_COLLECTION has sent the switch off configuration to the agent) switch it on again. If after 5 min threads are still missing, reconfigure and restart the agents of the system (as described below).

If there are exception like “Empty CSRF token” in the Log tab for the threads the reason could be that the properties file is outdated. Also in this case reconfigure and restart the agents for the technical system or Host should be done:

  1. Re-configure the SDA (to push the updated Properties files to the system)
    • Via the Mass Action drop down 
      • select Configure Agent
      • Press Go button
  2. Re-start the SDA (once the Agent configuration has completed):
    • via the Agent Action drop down
      • select Restart Agent
      • press Go button

If there are exception like “... exception occurred during the execution of the function '/SDF/AJM_METADATA'.” in the logs, and if you find "UCON RFC Rejected", you need to check, if you have whitelisted the needed functions as described in Unified Connectivity Usage with SAP Focused Run .

If there are exception like "RFCExecutionException: The function named '/SDF/AJM_RUNTIME' doesn't exist!" in the logs check, if the managed system has the needed ST-PI level.

If there are exceptions like "com.sap.solman.agent.cfwk.PushException: HTTP POST request failed: statuscode=404" in the logs, this could be related to wrong reverse proxy settings. Check, that you have maintained the rewrite rules relevant for new job monitoring. Please check the Security Guide for the actual list. There are at least 5 in sum for job monitoring (ajmdataservice/metadata, ajmdataservice/runtime and ajmdataservice/reorg).

Question: In Job & Automation Monitoring Configuration pane in section Cloud Services some services are listed, but how can I enable their monitoring?

Answer: With Job & Automation Monitoring you can monitor jobs that run in cloud services like SAP Integrated Business Planning for Supply Chain, SAP Marketing Cloud, SAP S/4HANA Private Cloud Edition, SAP S/4HANA Public Cloud Edition and SAP Build Process Automation. To enable the data collection you need to Enable SAP Focused Run Reverse Proxy in SAP Cloud ALM, enable the data push in the managed cloud service (product dependent) pushing to the reverse proxy URL. 

Question: In the Additional Alert Key I see job name FRN_ARP_0000001242. However, this job does not exist. The actual job names, that we see in SM37 are:

  1. FRN_GP_C2022111514563629923_001
  2. FRN_GP_C2022111514563629923_002
  3. ...
  4. FRN_GP_C2022111514563629923_012
  5. ...

Answer: As explained in the Configuration section under Option to Set Name of Job with Changing Name: In case of the ABAP job scheduler there is no job definition with a unique ID. To be able to group the executions of a job for Job & Automation Monitoring a stable ID is formed by the data collector as a hash value that contains the job name. If a job constantly changes its name (e.g. job name contains a time stamp), the formed JobId hash value is not stable, which does allow to group executions under one JobId. To enable the grouping for such a case, the JobId hash value is formed without the job name and on the monitoring UI you have the option to give to such a job a name that represents the group of jobs. It is this name, that will be used at alert creation.

Still forward navigation from the alert details via URL to the job in the managed ABAP system is supported.

Question: In SM37, I see BI_PROCESS* jobs, but not in the Monitoring view. Why are those missing?

Answer: In SM37 all jobs are displayed, whereas in the monitoring application jobs that execute report RSPROCESS as those jobs are elements of BW Process Chains. Therefore, they are displayed as executables of the related BW Process Chain (job type SAP BW Process Chain).

Question: In SM37, I see jobs (that execute reports RBANK_PROC_START or RBANK_PROC_END), but not in the Monitoring view. Why are those missing?

Answer: PPF parent jobs are collected, but not the child jobs that execute reports RBANK_PROC_START or RBANK_PROC_END. Those child jobs are consequently invisible in the monitoring application. The reason for not collecting their execution data is, that the parent job runs until all child jobs have finished and if any of the child jobs fails, the parent job has a message in its job log. If the collector (as of ST-PI 7.4 SP20) finds such messages, it rates the parent job yellow.

Question: In the Monitoring view, I see jobs of type ABAP Job with yellow Execution Status rating, even though in SM37 they are rated green. Why are they rated yellow? 

Answer: ABAP jobs, that write messages of type E (Error) or W (Warning) into the job log without actually aborting are displayed in the Job & Automation monitoring application with yellow Execution Status rating.

Question: I have configured alert Critical Execution Status as I want to get alerted, if an ABAP job cancels / aborts. I realize that I also get alerted for jobs that do not cancel, but have yellow Execution Status in the monitoring application. Why?

Answer: Please apply note 3276373 to get alerted in case of red rating only. With 4.0 FP01 you (will) have the configuration option "Alert only in case of red rating". If you remove the flag an alert will be created on yellow (or red) execution status rating, else only on red. 

Question: I see in the monitoring view that ABAP jobs are collected, but not those that run more frequently than every hour. Why?

Answer: Most probably there is a one-hour difference between system time and the time in the system time zone. Please check this and make sure to set the system time zone (via transaction /nstzac), so that it matches the system time.

Question: I have upgraded to SAP Focused Run to a higher version and configure alerts. I miss the filter section or some filters (like filter for mandatory jobs) or other settings that should be available on my version of SAP Focused Run.
 
Question: I have upgraded to 4.0 FP01 and want to monitor SAP Business Workflow instances. Therefore in Monitoring configuration, I  try to add SAP Business Workflow, in the drop down only SAP ABAP Job and SAP BW Process Chain are listed.
 

Answer: After upgrade for activating new filter options and other options in alert configuration you need to run report REPT_AJM_ADD_DATA_CONT_TABLE (see also master guide).

Question: I've enabled job - Application Log linking on managed system for client 005 (using transaction CRIT). Still on navigation from the job UI list to Exception view always says "no data". There is no EXM collector on the SDA. Is that the reason? And if so, why wasn't it configured?

Answer: Yes, this is the reason. As described under "Configuration", to get the message details transferred to the SAP Focused Run system, it is necessary to activate the corresponding agent. This is not happening automatically (in 4.0 FP01), but needs to be done manually in Integration Monitoring configuration, by configuring category ABAP Aborted Job for collection and category ABAP Application Log for collection for the client in which the job monitoring data collection runs (which is the default client).

Question: I can see in the monitoring view that application log exceptions are collected. I would like to get alerted on specific messages and have configured alerting in Integration and Cloud Monitoring accordingly as described here. However, no alerts are raised. Why?

Answer: There is a discrepancy of the names of the collection context keys between the regular Applog collector (keys are uppercase) and the new Jobmon Applog collector (keys are camel case) and the ABAP Application Log Category field model in SAP Focused run uses DB mappings based on uppercase keys for alert calculation.

A fix is provided with SAP Focused Run 4.00 FP01 and ST/PI 740 SP22. You have to re-save existing applog/joblog Pull configurations in the Integration and Cloud Monitoring Configuration UI.

Question: I observe in Configuration in the Job Definitions view many jobs without Job Type and Client. What shall I do?

Answer: Apply the correction to the data collector it in the managed system, i.e. SAP note 3102288 on ST-PI 740 SP20 and below or or SAP note 3281776 on ST-PI 740 SP21 and above. Note that you will have to wait until the job is executed again in the managed system to get the job type value and the client filled in SAP Focused Run.

Question: After activation of data collection in Job & Automation Monitoring for an Application Server ABAP, I have observed that some finished and release jobs from the managed system, that I see in SM37, are not getting reflected in the Monitoring Application. Why?

Answer: Job & Automation Monitoring data collector for ABAP jobs collects job execution data with a maximum look back time of 6 hours and only those runs that are overdue, i.e. have status released and a planned start time in the past. 

Question: I do the outbound integration of the alert by implementing BADI_ACC_REACTION_EXT method IF_ACC_REACTION_EXT~REACT_TO_ALERT. The value of importing parameter IS_ALERT-CONTEXT_ID is no LMDB guid in contrast to other use cases. Why?

Answer: The context_id (i.e. managed object) of an Job & Automation Monitoring alerts needs a unique value (per job definition within a system) to allow the full usage of the advanced alert management APIs. Thus it cannot be the LMDB guid of the system.

To determine the LMDB guid of a Job & Automation monitoring alert use CL_AJM_ALERT_CALCULATION->GET_TECH_SYS_BY_ALRT_CONTEXT for the IS_ALERT-CONTEXT_ID. An alert is a Job & Automation Monitoring alert, if ls_alert-ref->get_technical_scenario( ) EQ if_ajm_constant=>co_jobmon_usecase.

Question: In the Job & Automation Monitoring application, I see ABAP jobs /UI5/UPD_ODATA_METADATA_CACHE and /UI5/APP_INDEX_CALCULATE with red or yellow application status, but when I navigate to Exceptions view, I can see no exceptions. Why?

Answer: UI5 jobs delete the application log errors that they write quickly as the developers think that a longer persistence of the logs will lead to problems. Therefore, the exception details cannot be collected by Exception Monitoring (EXM). To see the details of the exceptions you need to access the application log directly from SM37, by selecting the latest job executions and "Goto --> Application Log".

Question: We are forwarding alerts from FRUN to a 3rd Party Service Management using the outbound BADI connector. Alerts trigger is happening when the Alert is initially created in FRUN or any changes to Alert status is performed. However, for the sub alerts generated in FRUN at each collection frequency, the alert trigger is not happening.

Answer: With the default setting "Raise Alert: Grouped" a downstream action (like email) is triggered when there is a change in the alert rating (green to yellow / red, yellow to red / green or red to yellow / green). This means, that no new notification is sent on consecutive failures of a job as the rating does not change. You have the option to change the configuration to "Raise Alert: Atomic" and then every alert occurrence triggers a downstream action. 

Question: We have upgraded to 4.0 and see in SM21 "."CL_AJM_ALERT_CALCULATION_AMDP=>GET_RUNS_BY_EXECUTION_SATUS": line 78 col 8 (at pos 6390): SQLScript APPLY_FILTER Invalid filter: '000,001,200 AND NW_ABAP_JOB'.

Answer: On 4.0 the way in which alert configuration is stored has been changed and the alert calculation coding expects its input in this new format. Please save your alert configurations to update the persistence.

Question: We have upgraded from SAP Focused Run 3.0 FP02. We had alerts configured and alerting had worked, i.e. alerts had been raised. After upgrade alerts are not raised any more.

Answer: We changed in table AJM_ALRT_FLTR the way we persist the values. Instead of separation by comma (,) separation by semicolon (;) is used. The alert creation coding expects the new format. To adjust the data in table AJM_ALRT_FLTR, please run report REPT_AJM_ALERT_FLTR_STRING.

Question: We have setup alert “Missing execution of mandatory job”. We observe that we get false alerts on a regular basis at night, shortly after SAP_FRN_JAM_REORG_DATA runs. We also see, that in fact the executions are missing in Job Monitoring (even though they happened).

Answer: At data reorganization we used to stop accepting job monitoring data to avoid locking situations on the run data table. By improving the performance of the reorganization, we do not need to lock the reception anymore. We down ported the fix to 4.0. Please apply the relevant backend correction note.

Question: We use SAP Solution Manager for Job Monitoring. Will we be able to use SAP Focused Run to replace SAP Solution Manager?

Answer: See this document that goes along Configuration Guide Job Monitoring 7.2 and tells, if such monitoring is offered in SAP Focused Run or not. If not, if it is planned.

Please note, that SAP Focused Run differs from SAP Solution Manager Operations in so many ways that it can hardly be compared. Job & Automation Monitoring aims to be simple to use and provide out of the box generic monitoring and analysis for the various SAP on-prem and cloud products regarding the execution of jobs and automation artifacts. You can group jobs and configure alerts for all or a subset of jobs and trigger various downstream actions.

Question: We have activated job monitoring of critical jobs in Job monitoring. Now for some of the periodic jobs we want to activate missing mandatory execution alert. For this, when we set the mandatory flag we get error “Recurrence is blank”. However, these are the jobs scheduled via external job scheduler, so the recurrences info is not collected via FRUN. How do we enable missing mandatory execution monitoring for these jobs?

Answer: You need to set the recurrence value manually in the job definition list UI and then can flag the job as mandatory.

Question: I do the outbound integration of the alert by implementing BADI_ACC_REACTION_EXT method IF_ACC_REACTION_EXT~REACT_TO_ALERT. I would like to include information into the external ticket that is offered in the notification via placeholder <<METRIC_TABLE>>?

Answer: You can use method get_det_from_aem_for_alert_id in IF_ACC_REACTION_EXT~REACT_TO_ALERT.

Please note that RT_EVENT_METRIC is filled in dialog mode (i.e. at "Trigger Alert Reaction" from Alert) only for alert type "Missing Execution of Mandatory Job". However, in batch mode (at alert calculation) the API returns values for all JAM alert types.

Question: When we click the run ID value in the alert details or in Monitoring in the job execution popup, a URL is formed, but it does not work. It looks like the root of the URL is wrong, i.e. the host name. What can we do?

Answer: In LMDB for the related system maintain in tab "Attributes" for the attribute "Loadbalancer URL" as value the actual host name (e.g. https://xxx.xxx.xxx.corp).

Question: Why after upgrade of the managed system, in Job & Automation Monitoring the exception details for ABAP jobs with red status are not collected anymore?

Answer: If the managed system is on ST-PI SP26 (SAPK-74026INSTPI) with note 3374186 V29 implemented the new “ABAP Job Application Log” and “ABAP Job Log” categories are collected with the job data collection (instead of “ABAP Application Log” and “ABAP Aborted Jobs”). To get them fetched from the managed system (i.e. to create the needed extractors) please switch off ABAP Job Monitoring Data collection and then switch it on again.

If you had configured in Integration Monitoring the collection of “ABAP Application Log” and “ABAP Aborted Jobs” for Job & Automation Monitoring only, feel free to revert/remove that configuration.

Question: How can I get at a planned downtime alerts from System Monitoring, but no alerts from Job & Automation Monitoring?

Answer: Configure, that at Planned Downtime System Monitoring continues to raise alerts. For this call transaction MAI_TOOLS and Maintain Global Workmode Settings. Set for Technical System Monitoring Alerting switch on.

Question: After upgrading to 4.0 FP03 we made use of the new notification template for Application Job & Automation Monitoring and included the JOB_EXCEPTIONS_TABLE. However, in the notification the table remains empty (almost always) even though in the monitoring application, when navigating from the failed execution to the related exception, we see the exception data. Why in the notification no information is included?

Answer: Job executions and job exceptions are collected with 2 different collectors. Typically the job execution data arrives first and if the related exception data comes more than 1 min later, the alert notification will be sent out without the exception information.

There is a solution to this problem. For this the managed system's ST-PI has to be on SP26 (+ note 3374186 V29) or on SP27 or higher. Then new exception categories are collected for ABAP job monitoring and they can be collected every minute (and not only every 5 minutes). To make use of the increased collection frequency please apply note 3273282 in your Focused Run system and do the manual action* for the given managed system, if the configuration of “Abap Job Logs” and “Abap Job Application Logs” was already performed in Integration Monitoring or you had switched off and on Job Monitoring data collection with FRun 4.00 FP03).

*The corresponding collection configurations for Abap Job Logs and Abap Job Application Logs must be saved again from Integration Monitoring Configuration, for the new collection period (60 seconds) to be set at SDA configuration level

Question: After upgrading our ST-PI, we miss in the monitoring view most of the jobs with name "/AIF/*". How come?

Answer: Unfortunately, there were some customer cases, where "/AIF/" job executions, i.e. jobs that execute report "/AIF/PERS_RUN_PACK_EXECUTE" ran in such huge numbers (increasing the total number of job executions by a factor of 100(!)), that the data volume could not be handled by the data collector and the agent framework. As a consequence job monitoring did not work at all.

As AIF development is not able to optimize the number of jobs they create (they create one job per message), we were forced to exclude jobs that execute report "/AIF/PERS_RUN_PACK_EXECUTE" from being collected. Please use "Integration and Exception Monitoring" for AIF monitoring, e.g. ABAP Aborted Jobs filtering on job name starting with "/AIF/".

Release Notes

  1. Initial Version

Detail information available in Configuration Guide 3.0 FP02 with Use Cases.

In SAP Focused Run System, the following SAP notes should be applied:

  • 3126368 FRUN 3.0 FP02 Job & Automation Monitoring UI corrections
  • 3126422 FRUN 3.0 FP02 Job & Automation Monitoring back-end corrections

  1. Pattern support for alert filters Job Name, Execution User and Executable Name
  2. New Alert Type Missing Execution of Mandatory Job
  3. New view Analysis offering summarized information on
    • number of executions
    • number of failed executions
    • total and average run times 
  4. New view Trend Reporting offering trend information (based on hourly aggregates) for individual jobs regarding
    • number of executions
    • number of failed executions
    • total and average run times
  5. Option to monitor via proxy in SAP Cloud ALM cloud jobs like
    • SAP Application Jobs in SAP S/4HANA Public Cloud Edition
    • SAP Intelligent RPA Jobs    

Detail information available in Configuration Guide 3.0 FP03 with Use Cases.

In SAP Focused Run System, the following SAP notes should be applied:

  • 3204354 FRUN 3.0 FP03 Job & Automation Monitoring UI corrections
  • 3211130 FRUN 3.0 FP03 Job & Automation Monitoring back-end corrections

  1. Alert filter option Mandatory Job
  2. Optimized usage of the application for a group of jobs
    • you can create groups and assign jobs from different systems
    • you can efficiently configure cross system alerts, by defining them for a group of jobs
    • you can access the monitoring application for one or more groups (for better focus and performance)
  3. Report REPT_MIGRATE_JOBMON_TO_JAM for migrating monitoring rules of Job Monitoring to Job & Automation Monitoring
  4. Report REPT_ADD_JOB_TO_MANDT_JOBS for condition based update of mandatory jobs
  5. Report REPT_ADD_JOB_TO_GROUP for condition based adding of jobs to a job group
  6. Detail information on exceptions at job execution
    • drill down into exception messages related to an individual job execution, i.e. from job metrics Execution Status and Application Status
    • with ST-PI 7.40 SP20 (or higher) exception messages at ABAP job execution are collected

Detail information available in Configuration Guide 4.0 SP00 with Use Cases.

In SAP Focused Run System, the following SAP notes should be applied:

  • 3276434 FRUN 4.0 FP00 Job & Automation Monitoring front-end correction
  • 3276373 FRUN 4.0 FP00 Job & Automation Monitoring back-end correction

 

The following functions are new with FP01 (see high level info here)

  1. Alert on yellow Execution Status rating
  2. Alert only in case of successive failures
  3. Option to provide Job Name in Notification Subject using ADDITIONAL_INFORMATION keyword
  4. Data Provider for Job & Automation Monitoring for OCC Dashboard
  5. Monitoring of SAP Business Workflow instances (see high level info here)
  6. Monitoring of SAP Build Process Automation jobs

Detail information available in Configuration Guide 4.0 FP01 with Use Cases.

In SAP Focused Run System, the following SAP notes should be applied:

  • 3331730 - FRUN 4.0 FP01 Job & Automation Monitoring front-end correction
  • 3331712 - FRUN 4.0 FP01 Job & Automation Monitoring back-end correction

The following functions are new with FP02 (see high level info here)
  1. Improved SAP Business Workflow (WF) monitoring 
    1. run time description text is displayed in executions view popup
    2. in executables view executed tasks of WF instance are displayed
  2. Data Reorganization: 7 days after switching off data collection for a specific job type or an ABAP Application Server
    1. in SAP Focused Run system the related job definitions are marked as deleted and reorganized after 14 days
    2. related configuration data from the remote managed ABAP system
  3. You can Open Agent Internals of the data collecting host from monitoring configuration for Application Server ABAP
  4. Where used list of Notification and Outbound Variants implemented for Job & Automation Monitoring alerts.
  5. Change of default time frame of application from 7 days to last 24 hours.
  6. Various performance and resilience improvements that have been made available via down-ports.

Detail information available in Configuration Guide 4.0 FP02 with Use Cases.

In SAP Focused Run System, the following SAP notes should be applied:

  • 3404454 - FRUN 4.0 FP02 Job & Automation Monitoring front-end correction
  • 3404427 -  FRUN 4.0 FP02 Job & Automation Monitoring back-end correction

The following functions are new with FP03 (see high level info here)

  1. When adding jobs to a job group, you can filter jobs for multiple systems (before all or one system).
  2. Outbound BAdI GET_DET_FROM_AEM_FOR_ALERT_ID API provides information on failed job execution (e.g. start time and run ID).
  3. Notification template for Application Job & Automation Monitoring offers to include information on job execution (e.g. start time and run ID), on executables (e.g. ABAP report) and exceptions (e.g. Job Log Messages).
  4. Application Log and Job Log info is automatically collected with new EXM categories ABAP Job Log and ABAP Job Application Log on activating ABAP job data collection (i.e. there is no need to configure the collection in Integration and Exception Monitoring any more), if managed system is on ST-PI SP26 and note 3374186 V29 is implemented.
  5. Navigation from the Monitoring page to a managed ABAP system is possible also for WebDispatcher case by maintaining LMDB attribute “Loadbalancer URL”.
  6. Via filter in Monitoring you can find a job that has been grouped by the data collector (as it is constantly changing its name) using its current name (as displayed in SM37).
  7. Report REPT_ADD_JOB_TO_GROUP offers
    1. to add jobs from systems based on System role and Network.  
    2. to filter jobs by Scheduled by User

Detail information available in Configuration Guide 4.0 FP03 with Use Cases.

In SAP Focused Run System, the following SAP notes should be applied:

  • 3465616 - FRUN 4.0 FP03 Job & Automation Monitoring front-end correction
  • 3465605 - FRUN 4.0 FP03 Job & Automation Monitoring back-end correction