PowerCenter development environments can have hundreds of developers who create and change objects such as workflows, sessions, mappings, and transformations stored in the PowerCenter repository. The solution collects data from the PowerCenter repository databases at regular intervals, checks for anomalies in the metadata of PowerCenter objects, and alerts appropriate users. The alert messages contain the required contextual information, such as the object name, name of the user who modified the object, and cause of the alert. The PowerCenter developers or architects can refer the alert messages to take corrective action effectively.

The solution contains rules that perform a wide range of checks against the PowerCenter objects metadata and generates alerts whenever there is a deviation. A simple example is to alert users when a developer does not follow prescribed naming convention for objects or saves an object without comments. A complex example is to perform detailed checks on object metadata, such as to see whether the developer uses the session name to derive the session log file name.

Proactive Monitoring for PowerCenter contains built-in rules that detect deviations. You can also create and change rules. You can customize and extend the solution based on the business needs.

A single installation of the solution monitors a single domain and its numerous repository databases.

Proactive monitoring solution provides targeted alerting capabilities. The solution contains predefined personas who receive alerts specific to their function.

The Proactive Monitoring solution contains the following predefined personas:

pcadmin. Any user who ensures proper functioning of PowerCenter domains, integration, repository, and other services.
apparchitect. Any user who is responsible for the logic of PowerCenter mappings, mapplets, transforms, sources, and targets.
dataarchitect. Any user who oversees the data movement with in PowerCenter.
itsecurity. Any user responsible for dealing with IT security issues, such as sensitive data and malware.
pcmonitor. Any user who tracks PowerCenter performance. By default, the pcmonitor persona receives all alerts.

In a continuous monitoring system, the solution can detect the same anomaly multiple times and send the same alert multiple times. To avoid such a situation, the solution provides the snooze feature. You can use the snooze feature to set a time period before which the solution does not generate any alert on the same anomaly.

For example, a developer updates a PowerCenter object that results in a session processing failure. This could be a planned development activity where the architects would want to stop receiving alerts for a specified period of time.

You can use the Reports dashboard in the Proactive Monitoring solution to get information about the health of the monitored services and a summary of deviations that occur over a period of time. Use the Manage Objects tab to manage objects configured for monitoring PowerCenter. You can manage rules, sources, folders, watchlists, and topics. You can also view the monitored events and activations.