The internet and related technologies have eaten the world over the last decades. Data is not the new goldmine for enterprises to optimize their performance based on data-driven insights. With each passing year, humanity is producing more and more bits of data than ever before. Database monitoring technologies are running the modern world and a vital part of this ingenious machinery. As the most crucial part of any enterprise’s operations, taking care of the database is the most critical aspect of technology administration in any business process.
We have discussed different aspects of database architecture and maintenance in many other articles before. Here we will discuss the importance of real-time database monitoring and the most relevant and advanced tools used for it. Here, we will walk you through the most critical aspects of real-time database monitoring and prepare a good ground for it with the help of tools.
What is ‘Database monitoring’?
Database monitoring is a critical process of monitoring a database’s performance. Keeping a close track of the most relevant performance metrics of a database will allow you to identify the pitfalls in it and improve those for better output from the database operations. In fast-paced business operations, it is essential to keep the database quick and reliable as possible.
As the database is the center of any technological operation in enterprises, any enhancement in terms of database performance will instantly resonate across all levels of the technology system to improve the user experience and the application infrastructure. An ideal database monitoring approach will analyze several variables to prevent or minimize the unavailability and other types of data security risks.
The process of database monitoring will typically track the data storage and movements in real time so that the administrators and other users involved can instantly identify the problems, diagnose them, and fix them before they start to disturb the client users. Database monitoring tools will take snapshots of the performance metrics set and also enable alerts when any problems appear at the first point. Some of the advanced tools will even put forth effective solutions, making the troubleshooting tasks easier for DBAs.
Why ‘Database Monitoring’ is essential?
As discussed above, databases function as the backbone of any technological operations of the information era. This means the performance and efficiency of databases are crucial for the success of any enterprise. In turn, poor database efficiency is simply poor performance and output. In business enterprises, their application’s poor performance will end up in customer dissatisfaction and, ultimately, business failure.
To avoid this, one should always make sure that the database performs correctly on top of everything else. This is where a robust monitoring approach becomes essential. The key takeaways of professional database monitoring are:
- Quicker diagnosis of issues and easy fixes at the very first point.
- Get a better insight into needed performance improvements.
- Understand security challenges.
- Be proactive than reactive to performance-related issues.
- Enhanced user experience.
Performing ‘Database Monitoring’ effectively
Enterprises database users may seek for professional database monitoring services. For expert database monitoring consulting, get in touch with RemoteDBA.com expert. Here are some conventional approaches to database monitoring.
As we had seen above, the basic database monitoring approaches can be divided into two as:
- Proactive and
- Reactive
Being proactive, we closely monitor the database to look for any early warning signs and address them before they become hazardous. On the other hand, the reactive approach is all about alleviating the troubles after these causes harm. Even though a responsive approach is the only possibility in some cases of incident response, proactive is always the ideal choice. For proactive database monitoring, the essential part is to track the most critical metrics of a database system.
Key database metrics
1. Performance in query execution
The majority of the performance issues may be related to inefficient queries in SQL. The problems may be like the tables lack proper indexing or inefficient joins etc.
2. Hardware
Hardware is the housing of everything. So, it is crucial to track the metrics related to hardware components like memory, processing power, free and available disk, proper configurations, etc.
3. Concurrency
There may be multiple users accessing the database concurrently in typical database scenarios, so there should not be any conflict in the queries and simultaneous activities.
4. Database changes
A new version of the application or a hardware change can affect the database. Modified objects can also cause performance issues, which should be tracked.
5. Measuring throughput
Monitoring the replication latency type of the throughput matrix is also crucial to identifying any database anomalies. You can quickly identify their standard value by following such metrics.
Along with these, it is also essential to monitor the availability of resources and consumption of them, track database logs, etc.
Database monitoring tools
Here are some top options in the latest database monitoring tools.
# SolarWinds® Database Performance Analyzer
This is a top tool now for network administrators, because it can recognize database response time and also help improve SQL query performance. The root cause analysis also covers SQL statements, system health, wait-basis analytics, response time, etc.
# Paessler PRTG
Paessler PRTG Network Monitor can closely monitor databases like MySQL, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL, etc. It can keep a close track of cloud service databases, web service DBs, and network metrics like traffic, packets, IPs, etc.
# Site24x7
This is not a dedicated tool for database monitoring. Being a cloud-based tool, it can monitor network capabilities, servers, and applications. Along with monitoring, Site24x7 has performance optimization features too, coming packed with a server monitoring toolkit.
# SQL Power Tools
This toolset is popular as a zero-impact DB monitoring option. A lightweight and straightforward toolkit, which offers an overview of the database’s performance to the users. This tool keeps track of various metrics like SQL wait time, SQL wait conditions, deadlocks, blocking, I/Q stall, disk usage, etc.
You can also find more database monitoring tools for all use cases, preferences, and budgets. So, if you do not want your valid customers to become former customers, it is high time to adopt an effective monitoring mechanism for your enterprise database to optimize its performance and avoid failure.
