May 2017 Summaries

The latest update to OneAgent introduces several enhancements and fixes across different platforms, including Java, .NET, Node.js, and SAP technologies. Notable improvements include support for Heap and ETW metrics in .NET Core, enhanced Node.js package reporting, and better management of crash reports, which reduces CPU consumption on machines with numerous crash reports. The update also addresses issues with process grouping and data presentation consistency, and ensures that OneAgent updates are not hindered by network monitoring constraints during pending I/O operations. Additionally, the Security Gateway now supports custom certificates for Windows, and OpenStack project status reporting has been improved.

Dynatrace has introduced a new severity-based classification system for detected problems to improve focus on severe issues such as application availability problems while minimizing distractions from less significant resource issues. This new system categorizes problems into four types: Availability, Error, Slowdown, and Resource problems, each with distinct characteristics and impact levels. Availability problems indicate complete outages, Error problems signify increased error rates without complete failure, Slowdown problems involve performance degradation, and Resource problems relate to shortages in resources like memory or CPU. Dynatrace has updated the Problems page with new icons and a filter section to help users sort issues by severity. Additionally, the system will soon implement a redesigned alerting approach that involves migrating existing watch settings to new severity-level alert profiles, which will enhance notification delivery and filtering but require manual input for the transition.

Dynatrace has announced support for monitoring .NET Core applications on Windows, offering features like web and database response times, CPU usage, failure analysis, and garbage collection (GC) metrics, all available via the OneAgent with no code changes required. This support extends to standalone .NET Core apps, ASP.NET Core apps, and integrates with Azure App Service, providing detailed insights into performance through features such as transaction monitoring, exception stack traces, and custom entry points for non-web applications. Users can also benefit from real user monitoring if using IIS, Apache, or Nginx as their web server, allowing detailed tracking of user actions and performance metrics. While the current .NET Core support is in beta and covers versions 1.0 and 1.1, full support for ASP.NET Core with .NET Framework 4.X is available, and Linux support is forthcoming. Dynatrace credits Microsoft's open-sourcing of .NET Core as instrumental in their development process, facilitating access to CoreCLR and .NET Core Framework code and fostering collaboration via GitHub.