Scaling Up Monitoring

How do we design a monitoring system? The Amazon Prime team realized they didn't do a good job and changed their architecture.

The Complexity of Metrics

We need to monitor our servers, but individual metrics have more complexity than just setting simple limits for their readings.

SQL Server memory node memory footprints

Querying perfmon data to track memory usage patterns on NUMA nodes

Extended Events Max Dispatch Latency

The max_dispatch_latency property is the maximum duration that an event, once captured, would reside in the buffer before written to the target. The default for this property is 30 seconds, which is fine in practice but for live demos you can consider reducing it (minimum is 1 second).

Average Page Life Expectancy

A useful script that I wrote that will sample the DMV sys.dm_os_performance_counters table to provide an average PLE captured in (1) minute intervals.

Performance Counter DMV sys.dm_os_performance_counters

By querying a single DMV, sys.dm_os_performance_counters to be precise, you can collect counter information that you would receive from PerfMon for the various SQL Server counters.

Automating Performance Monitor Statistics Collection for SQL Server and Windows

You have about 100 SQL Servers installed in your production environment. You have performance problems on few of the servers, but they happen during the time when you are not watching the servers. So, how can you automate performance statistics collection on all the servers around the clock so we have the statistics for 24/7/365.

Collecting performance counters and using SQL Server to analyze the data

Quite frequently I find myself in situation where I need to get detailed information on performance monitor counters. For example I need to determine which processes are consuming all CPU at certain times.

Resource Governer

Investigating SQL Server 2008 Wait Events with XEVENTS

Some reasons for the slow-running of database applications aren't obvious. Occasionally, even the profiler won't tell you enough to remedy a problem, especially when a SQL Statement is being forced to wait. Now, in SQL Server 2008, come XEvents, which allow you to look at those waits that are slowing your SQL Statements. Mario Broodbakker continues his series about SQL Server Wait Events