This page summarizes questions and answers for Business Process Monitoring on the Monitoring and Alerting Infrastructure (MAI) in Solution Manager 7.1 and Solution Manager 7.2. Please note that due to ongoing development answers to questions might change over time. E.g. questions that were answered with "No" right now might be answered with "Yes" after the next Solution Manager release becomes available.

Please note that there is a separate FAQ page for classic (CCMS based) BPMon.

General FAQs

Transport of BPMon configuration

Question:
Can I transport the BPMon configuration between two SAP Solution Manager systems?

Answer:
No. Technically, the BPMon configuration is considered as master data and cannot be transported. However, in Solution Manager 7.1 you have the option to transfer whole solutions between Solution Manager systems via the solution transfer. This transfer includes the BPMon configuration. This feature is available in 7.1 for solutions using classic BPMon and BPMon on MAI. For Solution Manager 7.2 this option is currently not available. The solution transfer can only transfer entire solutions. Delta-transfers are not possible (i.e. it is not possible to transfer only the change configuration)

[Update] As of SAP Solution Manager 7.2 SP5, the solution export / import function also transfers BPMon configuration.See 10. Transfer of Monitoring Configuration for details.

Display technical alerts and BPMon alerts in one inbox

Question:
Can I display both alerts from BPMon and technical monitoring in one inbox?

Answer:
Yes. if you create your own query, you can choose to display both technical and BPMon alerts in one inbox. This works both in 7.1 and 7.2.

Monitor non-productive systems

Question:
In 7.2, can I configure BPMon for non-productive managed systems?  

Answer:
Yes. In the logical components of your Operations branch, include your non-productive managed systems (e.g. Development, Demo, Test, etc.). Afterwards, select the correct system role in the solution documentation. Now you are able to configure BPMon for the systems assigned to the logical components in this system role. In the Alert Inbox and Monitoring Application, you are also able to consume the monitoring for these systems. Again, make sure that you sleect the correct system role.

Getting started

Prerequisites

Question:
Which prerequisites have to be met in order to set up Business Process Monitoring in SAP Solution Manager?

Answer:
Technical prerequisites are ensured via the Business Process Operations section in the SAP Solution Manager Configuration. Please note that in 7.1 the MAI prerequisites are part of section "Technical Monitoring → System Monitoring". In 7.2, all prerequisites are contained in section Business Process Operations → Basic BPO Configuration.

Out-of-the-box key figures

Question:
Is there a list of key figures that come out of the box?

Answer:
Yes, there are more than 850 out-of-the-box key figures shipped with Business Process Monitoring.The offline version of the list is available here. We are currently in the process of moving all key figure descriptions to the Cloud Catalogue.

Question:
Instead of monitoring application logs every 5 mins or 10 mins or 30 mins, is it possible to wait until a batch job is completed and then send out all the errors to target recipients?

Answer:
Not with standard monitoring functions. This requires custom developement.

Question:
Is it possible to monitor the content of spool files with BPMon?

Answer:
Not with standard monitoring functions. This requires the development of a custom key figure. Development Guides are available in the Media Library of wiki page Business Process Monitoring.

Customer Key Figures

Question:
Can I configure my own (customer-specific) key figures with BPMon on MAI?

Answer:
Yes, customer specific key figures are available with BPMon on MAI same as with classic BPMon. On both infrastructures Business Process Monitoring offers a complete Customer Exit framework in order to develop customer-specific key figures. This is described in the SDN Blog New Business Process Monitoring functionalities in SAP Solution Manager - Customer Exit . Please also have a look at the Customer Exit setup guides available in the media library of  wiki page Business Process Monitoring. In many cases you can even have it simpler than this. If your new key figure shall only consist of one select statement on one table or view with up to 5 fields within the WHERE clause then you can use the Table Entry Counter monitor.

Question:
Will my customer key figures that I created on classic BPMon continue working after I migrate to BPMon on MAI?

Answer:
In general, the customer key figures will continue working after the migration to MAI just like the SAP key figures. However, In case you implemented a key figure to return more than one alert reocord during one data collection, you customer exit will require some adjustment as with MAI it is not possible to return more than one metric value per key figure during one data collection. 

Notifications

Alert Emails

Question:
Can I send automatic emails for alerts?

Answer:
Yes, this function is available out of the box.

Migration

Migration to Twin Cubes and migration to MAI

Question: 
We're thinking about migrating to BPMon on MAI. At the same time, we're thinking about migrating the Business Process Analytics cubes to the twin cubes. Should we observe a certain sequence when executing the migration activities?

Answer: 
No, these two migrations are completely independent. You can use any migration sequence you want. 

Creation of Operation Branch

Question:  
When upgrading our SAP Solution Manager sytsem to 7.2, at which point should we create the Operation branch? During the content activation? Or after the content activation? 

Answer: 
At the moment, the creation of the Operation branch within the content activation is not possible. The Operation branch should be created after the content activation.

Authorization for migration

Question: 
What authorizations are required for the user executing the migration to MAI?

Answer: 
The user needs the authorizations of the BPO Admin user (template for this user is available via section "Business Process Monitoring" in SOLMAN_SETUP).

Infrastructure

Parallelization of data collection

Question:
Can I parallelize data collections that belong to the same data provider? For example, there are several monitoring objects which data collections occur via data provider /SDF/E2E_BPMON_APPMON_PROVIDER. The problem is that due to the high amount of monitoring objects of the same category, the 5 minutes time window sometimes is not sufficient. So, I would like to know if we can somehow parallelize these data collections.

Answer:
No. /SDF/E2E_BPMON_APPMON_PROVIDER is called “stacked”. That means all metrics are passed from the DPC extension to the provider function module at once. Inside of /SDF/E2E_BPMON_APPMON_PROVIDER we build packages per context ID, which represents the monitoring object, and pass the requests sequentially (object by object) to the native BPMon collector. Once the data collection for all objects is finished,  /SDF/E2E_BPMON_APPMON_PROVIDER  returns the result to the DPC extension, which returns the data back to DPC on SolMan. Stacking is required to ensure that all metrics that belong to the same context ID, i.e. the same monitoring object, are called together. This also means that parallization is not possible.