Monitoring MSMQ
Learn how to monitor all your MSMQ services and queues according to user-defined thresholds.
This agent allows you to monitor MSMQ queues. Checks can be performed on the allowed number of messages within them. Also, the maximum age of the first message on the queue can be verified. You decide in the configuration file which server and queue it is you want to monitor, as well as the number of messages on which Nodinite should warn/fail for.
Stockpiling messages is terrible for your business. So we developed this Monitoring Agent to give end-users the power to get alerts and manage content to keep the system healthy.
This section describes what's being monitored and the rules for how Nodinite translates this into meaningful monitoring states. Also, some remote commands are available as Actions to help you swiftly manage problems. Actions are further detailed on the Managing MSMQ page.
List of MSMQ resources in a Monitor View.
Monitoring Features
- Automatic Discovery
- The Nodinite Message Queueing Monitoring Agent offers the automatic discovery of queues on the configured MSMQ Servers. Sharing access to any individual queue is very easy from within Nodinite using Monitor Views.
- State Evaluation - Make sure the MSMQ Service is operational and Queues are not stockpiling.
- Age and count - Provides means to get you alerted if queues are stockpiling messages.
If Nodinite can't check the state of your queues, chances are no one else can use them either.
- Age and count - Provides means to get you alerted if queues are stockpiling messages.
- Category-based monitoring - To help you sort out the different type of MSMQ artifacts the monitored Resources are grouped by Categories.
- All MSMQ artifacts belongs to either the 'MSMQ' (Service), 'MSMQ Private Queue', 'MSMQ Public Queue' or the 'MSMQ System Queue' category:
List of Categories being monitored.
- All MSMQ artifacts belongs to either the 'MSMQ' (Service), 'MSMQ Private Queue', 'MSMQ Public Queue' or the 'MSMQ System Queue' category:
State evaluation
Each monitored MSMQ artifact is displayed in Monitor Views within Nodinite as one Resource with its currently evaluated state. If you have 42 queues, then you will have 42 Resources available for use in one or more Monitor Views with potentially different monitored evaluated states at any given moment.
Live overview with different states summarized in a pie chart
The Nodinite Message Queueing Monitoring Agent evaluates the age and number of messages on the different type of queues. There will be one Resource for each queue available within Monitor Views (where included).
Whenever a queue has too many (or too old) messages, the Resource is evaluated as being in state Error or Warning depending on user-defined thresholds. It will remain in this state until the error condition is cleared by either removing messages or managing thresholds.
| State | Status | Description | Actions | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unavailable | Resource not available | Evaluation of the 'MSMQ Queue' is not possible either due to network or security-related problems | Review prerequisites | |
| Error | Error threshold is breached | Queue has too many or too old messages according to user-defined thresholds | Details Edit thresholds List messages Purge | |
| Warning | Warning threshold is breached | Queue has too many or too old messages according to user-defined thresholds | Details Edit thresholds List messages Purge | |
| OK | Within user-defined thresholds | Queue has NO not too many or too old messages according to user-defined thresholds | Details Edit thresholds List messages |
From within Nodinite, you can reconfigure the state evaluation on Resource level using the Expected State feature.
MSMQ Private Queue
- Private queues belong to the 'MSMQ Private Queue' category.
- The Application name is based on the display name from the Configuration This pattern guarantees uniqueness and a queue with the same name on different MSMQ services can be distinguished.
- The Resource name is the name of the queue prefixed
private$\
List of resources of category 'MSMQ Private Queue' in a Monitor View
MSMQ Public Queue
- Public queues belong to the 'MSMQ Public Queue' category
- The Application name is based on the display name from the Configuration This pattern guarantees uniqueness and a queue with the same name on different MSMQ services can be distinguished
- The Resource name is the name of the queue.
MSMQ System Queue
- System queues belong to the 'MSMQ System Queue' category.
- The Application name is based on the display name from the Configuration This pattern guarantees uniqueness and a queue with the same name on different MSMQ services can be distinguished.
- The Resource name is the name of the queue.
List of resources of category 'MSMQ System Queue' in a Monitor View
You cannot Post messages to a system queue
MSMQ Service
One MSMQ Service is displayed within Nodinite as one Resource. If you have 3 MSMQ Services configured, then you will have 3 Resources available for use in one or more Monitor Views.
- All MSMQ Services belong to the 'MSMQ' category.
- The Application name is based on the display name from the Configuration
- The Resource name is always 'MSMQ Service'.
Here's an example of Monitor View filtered by the 'MSMQ' category
| State | Status | Description | Actions | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unavailable | Resource not available | Evaluation of the 'MSMQ Service' is not possible either due to network or security-related problems | Review prerequisites | |
| OK | MSMQ Service is online | No problems exists connecting with the MSMQ service | Details |
From within Nodinite, you can reconfigure the state evaluation on Resource level using the Expected State feature.
Journaling
Nodinite Message Queueing Monitoring Agent provides MSMQ Journal monitoring. If the size of the Journal is too large, then Nodinite can provide alerts to help you avoid running out of disk space and you can also use this information to tune your settings for best performance.
Alert history
During root cause analysis or other purposes, it might be helpful to understand how often your MSMQ Queues problems happen. If your Monitor View allows it, you can search for historical state changes for the provided time span, either for all your queues and MSMQ services or individually. This topic is further detailed within the generic instructions on how to Add or manage Monitor View page.
| Search | Resource history |
|---|---|
 Search for alert history for all resources in the Monitor View |
 Alert history for the selected queue |
Frequently asked questions
Use the troubleshooting guide to find the FAQ and answers to known problems.