About the SLA Component

The Service Level Agreement (SLA) Component lets you specify service level rules for Process Definitions and Chain Definitions. This allows you to visualize processes that have started and/or completed before a specific deadline. The SLA Component also uses historic data to predict whether a Process will finish on time.

Note: This section describes the SLA Component in general terms. For more specific information, see the other topics in this group.

Note: To use the SLA Component, you must have the CustomModule.ServiceLevelAgreementlicense key. This key is enabled automatically for SaaS instances of RunMyJobs, but must be activated manually for on-premises installations.

The Problem

Assume you're running a chain of high-volume retail stores. Every day, each store reports on what it has sold and needs to replenish for the next day, and RunMyJobs processes those reports to generate work orders for loading the trucks that deliver merchandise to the stores. The work orders are printed every morning at the warehouse, so that the trucks can be loaded and dispatched in time to have the merchandise at the stores before they open.

Most of the time this system works well, but sometimes there are hiccups, and the processes that generate the work orders run long or fail to start for some reason. When this occurs, the work orders are not ready when the truck drivers arrive at the warehouse, leaving them with nothing to do. By the time the work orders are ready and the trucks are loaded, it's late enough in the morning that the trucks get stuck in traffic. The needed merchandise arrives at the stores late, the customers can't get the merchandise they want, and business suffers.

The Solution

The SLA component helps customers solve problems like these with a variety of features, including:

  • An SLA Dashboard chart that makes it easy for you to monitor the current SLA status of critical scheduled processes at a glance.

  • Logic that predicts, based on past statistics, when a process is going to miss a particular deadline.

  • The ability to automatically notify the appropriate people of late or potentially late process executions, via email or other alert types, so that they can fix the problem.

SLA Rules

To take advantage of SLA, you create SLA rules. Each SLA rule monitors a single Process Definition or Chain Definition. When you create an SLA rule, you specify when you expect the process to start or end by, and what should happen if the run doesn't start or ends late. RunMyJobs can notify operators of problems via email, alert alerts, and custom alerts.

SLA Dashboard

The SLA Dashboard is where you can see the current SLA status for all processes you are tracking with SLA rules.

SLA Operator Messages

If a process being monitored by the SLA Component is late or is forecast to be late, the SLA Component automatically generates an Operator Message that describes the problem. The Operator Message is attached to the process bound to the SLA (if any). Otherwise it is added to the process's SLA_LastAlert or SLA_StartAlert datum.

Tip: You can include the text of these Operator Messages in any email alerts, alert alerts, or custom alerts you create. For more information, see Alerts Area.

Forecasting

In addition to notifying you when a process doesn't start or finished late, the SLA Component uses predictions based on previous runs of a given process. If RunMyJobs predicts that a given process is going to fail to run on time (perhaps because an upstream process has been taking longer due to increased amounts of data), it can send notifications via various methods to operators, who can then take steps to make sure that the process runs as expected. In the SLA Dashboard, predicted process runs are shown in a lighter color than actual process runs.

Trends

To help an operator troubleshoot a problematic process, the SLA Dashboard includes a Trending column for each SLA rule, indicating when the process completed over last ten days that the SLA has been monitored for that rule. This kind of historic information can be useful for troubleshooting.

SLA_Monitor Process Definition

To begin monitoring processes, submit the SLA _Monitor Process Definition. Only after you submit this Process Definition will the SLA Component start evaluating SLA rules.

Note: You only need to submit this Process Definition once. After that, it will restart automatically every 24 hours.