Resource balancing and activity trends

Domino® server resource utilization can be separated into two types, system activity and user activity. System activity, which includes the level of processor, disk, memory, and network consumption that Domino generates to keep the server running, is a fixed amount of activity, as long as systems are healthy and performing smoothly. Domino servers typically use a modest percentage of their resources to run. The remaining server capacity is used to support user activity, which varies with the usefulness of the data on the server.

Activity Logging servers account for their time precisely, recording user activity by person, database, and access protocol. When summarized and averaged, or trended over time, activity logging of trended statistics provides a way to measure and compare workloads across servers. You can use this information to identify the most active users and databases on each server. Using the Domino Change Manager, you can automate the creation and execution of workload redistribution plans to load a new server, decommission an old one, or balance workloads across unevenly burdened servers.

Activity Trends is part of the Domino Administrator. Activity Trends collects and stores activity statistics as current observations and historical trends. The activity statistics relate to the server, databases, users, and connections of users to databases. You can explore the collected data to see how database workload is distributed across servers. Using the data, Activity Trends recommends a resource-balancing plan. Then, working with the Domino Change Manager, which is a part of the Domino server, Activity Trends provides a workflow that facilitates implementing the recommended changes.

Domino uses the collected data to determine the load on the server. Then, using resource-balancing functionality, the Analyzer applies trends analysis and statistics to intelligent algorithms that can provide computer-aided load balancing on a set of servers or simplify the server decommissioning process.

The Domino Change Manager provides workflow capability that creates resource-balancing plans and implements database moves. The Domino Change Control database (DOMCHANGE.NSF) and Domino Change Manager are part of the Domino server core functionality.

Activity Trends includes:

Server profile definition -- For easy access to a named group of servers.
Statistics profile creation -- For easy access to a named group of statistics.
Activity trends charting -- You can chart a selected group of statistics for a single server or a group of servers.
Resource balancing -- Analyzes server resource use and creates recommendations for balancing the servers based on specified resource goals.

Activity Trends uses these Domino server features:

Activity logging -- To collect information that will be used for resource-balancing.
Activity Trends -- To set up times for data collection and retention.
Domino Change Manager -- To implement a workflow process in which changes made to the system are controlled and approved.