Using Foglight for SQL Database

Foglight for SQL Server monitors the SQL Server database activity by connecting to and querying the SQL Server database. The agents provided monitor the SQL Server database system. The dashboards included with the cartridge provide a visual representation of the status of the major components of the SQL Server agents. They allow you to determine any potential bottleneck in database performance.

This section covers the following key areas:

• Viewing the Databases Dashboard
  
• Foglight for SQL Server Toolbar and Views
  • Breakdown and Baseline Chart Formats
  • Home Page Toolbar

Viewing the Databases Dashboard

This section describes the various components of the Databases dashboard. For more information, refer to Viewing Databases Dashboard.

Foglight for SQL Server Toolbar and Views

The Foglight for SQL Server toolbar provides access to detailed views you can access using the toolbar.

Breakdown and Baseline Chart Formats

Several charts can display information in either of the following formats:

• Baseline format — where a selected individual metric is displayed as a single line.
• Breakdown format — a representation of actual activity of a metric or a set of metrics, compared with the typical behavior of these metrics for the selected time range. A breakdown display can also present a single metric divided by various components (for example, space utilization divided by the various components that occupy this space).

Home Page Toolbar

The Foglight for SQL Server Overview page provides the following toolbar buttons:

Name	Description
Overview	Opens the overview dashboard that provides a broad view of the instance’s health and performance. It also includes the Advisories tab that guides you through problem-resolution strategies and delivers a step-by-step action plan for maximizing database performance.
SQL PI	Opens the SQL Performance History dashboard, which displays SQL performance-related data including History View, Top activity, and locking information and provides advanced tools such as highlights, Change Tracking, and Compare.
Memory	Opens the Memory dashboard. The memory dashboard shows a summary of memory usage and also contains a dashboard to see the Buffer cache and Memory cache.
Activity	Opens the Activity dashboard that provides several views to check current and history activity along multiple vectors like Sessions, I/O and file activity, blocking, deadlocks, and more.
Databases	Opens the Databases dashboard which provides usage size, and status statistics about databases, files, and disks.
Services	Opens the Services dashboard that displays the current as well as overtime status of each SQL Server support service.
HADR	Opens the HADR dashboard which shows monitoring information regarding the disaster-recovering solutions provided by SQL Server: Log Shipping, Cluster, Mirroring, and Availability Group (Always On).
Logs	Opens the Logs dashboard that allows you to inspect the SQL Server error log and agent log.
Configuration	Opens the Configuration dashboard where you can view the value of all SQL Server configuration metrics.
User-defined	Opens the User-defined dashboard where you can define your own collection of data to be saved in the Foglight Cloud repository.