IBM BPM, V8.0.1, All platforms > Measuring and improving business processes > Monitoring > Service component monitoring overview

What do you monitor?

You can monitor service component events in IBM BPM by selecting certain points that a service component event reaches during processing. Each service component defines these event points, which generate (or "fire") an event when the application processes at that given point. You can also monitor performance statistics for service component events.

Regardless of the type of monitoring you intend to perform on your service components (problem determination, performance tuning, or process monitoring), you monitor a certain point that is reached during processing. This point is referred to as an event point, and it is these points that you select to be monitored. Each event point encapsulates the service component kind tag, an optional element kind (which are specific functions of a service component type), and the nature of the event. All these factors determine the type of event generated by monitoring.

Event natures describe the situations required to generate events during the processing of service components. These natures are key points in the logic structure of a service component that you select to be monitored. The most common natures for service component events are ENTRY, EXIT, and FAILURE, but there are many other natures depending on the particular component and element. Whenever an application containing the specified service component is later invoked, an event is fired every time the processing of a service component crosses the points corresponding to the event nature.

As an example of how events are defined for a service component kind, the MAP service component kind can directly fire events with natures of ENTRY, EXIT, and FAILURE. It also includes an element kind, called Transformation, which defines a specific type of functionality within the MAP component kind. This element also fires events with ENTRY, EXIT, and FAILURE natures. Consequently, the MAP service component kind can fire up to six different events depending on the combination of elements and natures that you specify. The list of all service components, their elements, and their event natures is contained in the event catalog.

Monitoring is a separate layer of functionality that lies atop the processing of your applications, and does not interfere with the processing of your service components. Monitoring is concerned with service component processing only insofar as it detects activity at a specified event point. When activity is detected, an event is fired by monitoring, which determines where the event is sent, and what data is contained in that event, based on the type of monitoring you are performing: