It’s been amazing how much creativity and innovation is out there. Customers have been teaching me a lot over the last 20 plus years. Two identical applications behave differently for two different clients and their different customers and in their different environments. I am a Van Gogh fan. Like any Van Gogh painting, you see beautiful and mostly bright colors, and the amazing shades that are used. There are some similarities, among the paintings. And sometimes you can guess this one is also a Van Gogh painting. But they are different. There are yellow, blue, green, purple, and the occasional red copper color and more.
Application Monitoring also requires monitoring different parts of the Application Stack. It includes the application server, the database, web server, infrastructure supporting them all, storage, network and . . . And for all of these components, there are several specific information we need to monitor and measure. Remember that if you don’t monitor and measure, you won’t be able to improve it. And doing the same thing again and again, will not give you a different result.
If you have worked with me and know me, you know that I love the 10,000 hour rule, and Malcom Gladwell’s explanations from his book named “Outliers”. Ok, now we have Van Gogh and Malcom Gladwell. Where are we going from here.
People who have spent the 10,000 hours, actually monitoring and supporting high volume production applications, and monitor all different application stacks, have their own specific list of what they monitor. Working with these Pro-s, I have compiled my own list of what needs to be monitored. So I like to share that with you. I remember starting the list a few years back, and it was my Top 10 list. And now it has grown to be almost Top 35. And if I don’t stop myself, it will be 40 or more in no time. But the list is long enough already. This is a good list to begin with, and depending where the challenges are, and where the opportunities for improvement are, you can add the next best steps. And please share your ideas. Whatever you pick as your list, try to double the list and see if there is a measurable gain.
Please provide your feedback as I like to hear your perspectives. It would be great if you can tell me what else you would add to my list. I mostly learn from my customers.
More to follow soon. . .
Thanks. Vahan
Vahan.avedisian@quest.com
