You can monitor whether a process exists or is running on a computer, and you can specify memory and process utilization thresholds. You can also monitor how long a particular process is running or monitor for unwanted processes.

Note
If you created a process monitor in a previous release of Operations Manager 2007 (such as in the beta version), you need to open the existing monitor in the Operations Manager 2007 R2 Operations console. A wizard walks you through the process of providing the new information that is required by the upgraded template.

The following procedure shows how to create a monitor for the SQL process.

To create a process monitor

  1. Open the Operations console by using an account that is a member of the Operations Manager Administrators role.

  2. In the Authoring view, right-click the Management Pack templates container and select the Add Monitoring Wizard.

  3. On the Select Monitoring Type page, select Process Monitor from the list of available monitors.

  4. Specify a name for the template such as “Monitoring SQL process.”

  5. Either select a management pack from the list of available management packs or click New to create a new management pack for this monitor.

    Note
    By default, when you create a management pack object, disable a rule or monitor, or create an override, Operations Manager saves the setting to the Default Management Pack. As a best practice, you should create a separate management pack for each sealed management pack you want to customize, rather than saving your customized settings to the Default Management Pack. For more information, see Customizing Management Packs http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=140601

  6. Click Next.

  7. On the Process to Monitor page, specify how you want to monitor the process. You have the following choices:

    • Monitor whether and how a process is running (for processes you want)

      Use this option to monitor the availability and performance of processes.

    • Monitor only whether the process is running (for unwanted processes)

      Use this option to detect the presence of an unwanted process.

  8. Enter the name of the process you want to monitor. You can also browse for the process. For the SQL process, type sqlservr.exe.

  9. Specify a target for the monitor. For example, to monitor all available computers, use the following steps:

    1. Click the ellipsis button to specify a targeted group.

    2. Click Search on the Group Search page.

    3. Select the All Computers group and click OK.

  10. Click Next.

  11. Define the running process criteria for the monitor. You have the following choices:

    • Monitor the number of instances for a given amount of time. An alert is generated if the number of process instances is less than the minimum or more than the maximum for longer than the specified duration.

    • Monitor the performance of the process. An alert is generated if a process runs for longer than the specified duration.

    Note
    If you are monitoring only for the presence of an unwanted process, this page is displayed, but you cannot make any changes to it.

  12. Click Next.

  13. Define the performance counters for the monitor. You have the following choices:

    • CPU usage. You can specify a maximum percentage of CPU that the process can consume. If the CPU usage exceeds that threshold, an alert is generated.

    • Memory usage. You can specify a maximum amount of memory (in MB) that can be used by a process. If the memory usage exceeds that threshold, an alert is generated.

    Note
    If you are monitoring only for the presence of an unwanted process, this page is displayed, but you cannot make any changes to it.

  14. Define when an alert is generated. Specify the number of times a threshold must be crossed (Number of samples) in a set amount of time (Sampling interval) before the alert is generated.

  15. Click Next.

  16. Review the summary of the monitor and click Create.

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