Manage analysis servers

This section describes how to configure external analysis database servers to be used with Performance Center.

External analysis database servers

When you view data online, Performance Center reads it from a local time series database installed on the Controller machine. By default, the database stores data from all tests that were run on the Controller for a period of 30 days—you can change the default value in Define general host settings. The local database runs as a service to ensure that the data is always available during the run (the service is called “Performance Center Data Service").

Using an external analysis database enables you to store data from different runs of the same test run on different Controllers in one centralized location. This helps you perform over-time analytics tasks, and provides the following benefits:

  • Easy access to live and post-run data.

  • Enables mashing up Performance Center data with other data vendors, and using third-party dashboards, such as Grafana, to easily visualize the data. For details on the Performance Center—Grafana dashboard, see https://grafana.com/dashboards/7706.

After you configure an external analysis server, all run data from your selected projects is stored on an external time series database.

When you view data after a test run has finished, Performance Center uses the data stored in the external database. If the external database is unavailable, the data is brought from the local database on the Controller machine.

Performance Center currently supports the InfluxDB time series database for storing data.

Note: We recommend using a different connection for different projects in order to keep data access authorization between projects.

Back to top

Configure external analysis servers

To configure your external analysis server, you need to add a connection to your time series database server, and assign it to different projects.

  1. In Performance Center Administration, select Configuration > Analysis Servers.

  2. Configure the connection to your time series database.

    Click Add new time series database connection, and provide the following details:

    UI Elements

    Description
    Name

    The name given to the server.
    Type

    The database server type.
    Server URL The URL for the server.
    Server Port

    The port number used by the database server.

    ID

    The server ID.
    Description

    A description of the server.
    Influx DB Authorization

    Database Name. The name of the Influx database server.

    User. The user name to access the Influx database server.

    Password. The password to access the Influx database server.
    Proxy Authentication

    Proxy Server. The name of the proxy server.

    User. Enter the relevant user name for the HTTP connection.

    Password. Enter the relevant password for the HTTP connection.

  3. Assign the database server to different projects.

    1. In the Linked Projects area, click the Assign Projects button to open the Assign Projects to the Analysis Server dialog box.
    2. Select the projects you want to assign to the server, and click Assign. The selected projects are added to the Linked Projects grid.

    3. You can see project details, and add or remove linked projects using the Linked Projects grid.

      Field Description
      Assign Projects. Assigns the selected projects to the analysis server.
      Remove Assigned Project. Removes the selected project from the analysis server.
      Refresh. Refreshes the grid so that it displays the most up-to-date information.
      ID The project's ID.
      Project Name The name of the project.
      Domain The domain in which the project was created.

  4. Click Save to save the analysis server template.

Back to top

Notes and limitations

The following are notes and limitations for the analysis server:

Communication Port

Port 8086 should be open for outgoing communication from the Performance Center server, and for incoming communication for the Performance Center host (for an internal database).

For an external database, port 8086 should be open for both incoming and outgoing communication from the Performance Center server and Performance Center host.
Communication security and system user Performance Center uses the same user name and password as the Performance Center system user to secure the data (IUSER_METRO by default). However, because the internal Influx database server is sensitive to some special characters, we recommend that you avoid using "\" in the password. If a Performance Center system user has a password with "\", you should change it before running any tests on newly-installed hosts.
Accessing the internal Influx server after reinstalling host

Problem: If you uninstall a host and reinstall it again, and during this time the Performance Center Help system user name or password is changed, access to the internal Influx database on the host will be denied.

This is because Influx stores its data in a folder that also includes the data of the previous authentication user. By default, the folder is under <installation drive>\var (the path is configurable under <host installation>\bin\influxdb\influxdb.conf).

Resolution: You must delete this folder in order for Performance Center to reconfigure the database with the new user. To avoid data loss when deleting this folder, we recommend changing the identity using the InfluxDB REST API.

Back to top

See also: