MON Control

To control and monitor remote AFD's there is an X11 interface, with the following appearance:

[image of labeled mon_ctrl dialog]

As shown this dialog is divided into four main areas: menu, heading, connection and status.

Menu

The menu area has four pull down buttons: Monitor, RView, RControl and Setup. If your mon_ctrl window does not have all buttons shown and described here, then the system administrator did not allow you to use this function.

[popup of Monitor button]
System Log Allows you to view the system log of the afd_mon process.  
Monitor Log Shows the log entries of any major activity of the remote AFD. Such as loosing the connection or a shutdown of the AFD.  
Search + (De)Select This allows to search for a given AFD (alias and real) name in the mon_ctrl dialog, if name type AFD is selected. If the name type Host is selected, it will search all AFD's for the given host alias or real host name. The names can be entered with wild cards. The found AFD's or hostnames will then be selected. [Search and select AFD dialog]
Retry If the remote AFD is red and the connection is back again it might take more then two minutes before afd_mon retries. To speed this up manually, press the retry button.  
Switch AFD Switch AFD allows to change the destination address of the selected AFD.  
Test Test the connection to the selected AFD. Two tests are possible, ping and traceroute. To make these visible you must configure PING_CMD and/or TRACEROUTE_CMD in AFD_CONFIG file. [Different tests to check network]
Info The Info button opens the mon_info dialog for this AFD, showing some internal details of this AFD.  
Enable/Disable AFD If the monitored AFD is taken offline for a longer time you can disable monitoring of the AFD with the help of this button.  
Exit Exit will close the mon_ctrl window and all other windows that have been started from this dialog. It does not effect any of the main process of afd_mon running in the background.  


[rview popup]
AFD Control This opens the afd_ctrl dialog, for the selected AFD.  
System Log System Log opens the system dialog of the selected AFD. See Log Files for a more detailed description of the output.  
Event Log Event Log opens the event dialog of the selected AFD. See Log Files for a more detailed description of the output.  
Transfer Log Transfer Log opens the transfer dialog. See Log Files for a more detailed description of the output.  
Input Log Input Log opens the input dialog. See Log Files for a more detailed description of the output.  
Production Log Production Log opens the production dialog. See Log Files for a more detailed description of the output.  
Output Log Output Log opens the output dialog. See Log Files for a more detailed description of the output.  
Delete Log Delete Log opens the delete dialog. See Log Files for a more detailed description of the output.  
Queue Queue opens the queue dialog. Here you can see all files being queued by the selected AFD.  
Load Load shows the current load of either: Files send per second, KBytes send per second, Connections done per second and the number of Active-Transfers. [Choice of different loads]


[control popup]
Start/Stop AMG This starts or stops the AMG. Stopping the AMG means that no more messages will be generated for the FD. FD will continue distributing as long as there are files queued.
Start/Stop FD This starts or stops the FD. Stopping the FD should only be done for a short time on systems with lots of traffic. Otherwise the AMG keeps generating messages until the file system is full or it cannot create any new directories to store the files.
Reread DIR_CONFIG When there have been any changes made in the DIR_CONFIG file and these changes should be activated, press this button. If there where any changes in the HOST_CONFIG file it will incorporate these changes as well. So it is not necessary to press the Reread HOST_CONFIG button.
Reread HOST_CONFIG To activate changes made by editing the HOST_CONFIG file manually (not using the edit_hc dialog), press this button. When you use edit_hc dialog to make changes to the HOST_CONFIG it will not be necessary to press this button, the Update button of that dialog will perform this task.
Edit Host Opens the edit_hc dialog, where you can make changes to each host shown by the afd_ctrl dialog. If a host has been selected this will then be the selected host when edit_hc dialog starts.
Directory Control This button shows the dir_ctrl dialog, which shows all directories monitored by AFD.
Startup AFD Starts the AFD by starting init_afd which in turn will start all process necessary for AFD to run.
Shutdown AFD Will do a shutdown of AFD.


[setup popup]
Font size Pressing Font size will give you a list of fonts which, when selected, will be used for the afd_ctrl window and all other windows called from it. It might be that your X server does not support all fonts shown on the right hand, then you will be shown less fonts. [Fonts that can be selected]
Number of rows Number of rows allows to change the maximum number of rows to be displayed for one column. [list of row numbers that may be selected]
Line Style Line Style allows to change the appearance of a single line. You can currently choose four different items: Leds, Process, Characters and Bars. Default will be that all four items will be visible. If you do have a very large number of hosts you can deselect some items to reduce the window size of the afd_ctrl dialog. [Possible line styles that can be selected]
History Length History Length allows to change the length of log history for receive, system and transfer log. [history length that may be selected]
Other options Other options has the option 'Force shift select'. Normally one can select a line by just pressing that line with the left mouse button. This can however lead to accidentally pressing a line and one can force the user to use the shift button together with the left mouse button to select a line. 'Auto save' will save the settings as soon as you exit the dialog. 'Framed groups' will make a black frame around a group line to make groups more visible. [Force shift select]
Open Groups Open Groups will open all groups.  
Close Groups Close Groups will close all groups.  
Save Setup Save Setup will save the above settings in the file .afd_ctrl.setup.@. in the users home directory. So when you start afd_ctrl again it will start with these settings.  


Heading

[closeup of mon_ctrl header line]

The heading is just a quick reminder of what the fields in the connection area mean:

AFD The alias name of the AFD that is being monitored.
fc This is the file counter field. It shows the total number files that are still to be distributed.
fs The total file size that is still to be distributed.
tr Shows the overall current transfer rate.
fr Shows the overall current file rate in files per second.
jq The number of jobs in the queue.
at The total numbers of active transfers.
ec This is the total number of errors. It does NOT count the errors of a host that is red.
eh This is the total number of hosts that are red.

Connection

The connection area is the actual area which monitors and controls the other AFD's. The meaning of each field is shown below:

[closeup of one line of mon_ctrl dialog]
1 AFD alias This field holds the name of the AFD alias. The background color indicates the current status of the connection:
Connected to remote AFD. Normal status.
Connecting phase.
Error. The connection to this AFD is broken or it has been shut down.
This AFD is disabled. afd_mon will not monitor this AFD.
This AFD is not being monitored. This can be due to the AFD currently being shutdown or more likely because afd_mon is not running any more.
2 AMG LED to show current status of process AMG (Automatic Message Generator).
Normal status. Process is up and running.
Process has terminated normally.
Abnormal termination. Process has been killed and is not running any more.
NOTE: This LED must be so that the AFD can function properly.
3 FD LED to show current status of process FD (File Distributor).
Normal status. Process is up and running.
Process has terminated normally.
Abnormal termination. Process has been killed and is not running any more.
NOTE: This LED must be so that the AFD can function properly.
4 Archive Watch LED to show current status of process Archive Watch.
Normal status. Process is up and running.
Process has terminated normally.
Abnormal termination. Process has been killed and is not running any more.
5 System Log Radar that shows the five last type of messages in the system log. It can have the following colors:
Color Log Symbol Description
<I> Information, nothing serious.
<C> Configuration, something has been configured.
<W> Warning. Most properly a configuration error, nothing to be nervous about.
<E> Error, AFD should still be able to continue, but something is wrong!
<F> A fatal error has occurred, the process involved has most properly terminated abnormally. Now you should really be nervous!
<#> Dummy sign. Is used for showing a new month in the system log or when there is garbage in the log file.
6 Receive Log History Here you can see up to 48 hours of what has happened in the receive log. It shows the current hour on the right hand side and will move one position to the left every hour. Each square represents one hour and the color will be always the one with the highest severity that has occurred during that hour. The order is as follows, starting with the highest severity: Fatal [Black], Error [Red], Warn [Orange] and Info [Green].
7 System Log History Same as above only for the system log and that it will have more colors. The order of the colors here is as follows, again starting with the highest severity: Fatal [Black], Error [Red], Warn [Orange], Config [Dark Green], Info [Green] and Dummy (date, etc) [White]
8 Transfer Log History See Receive Log History above.
9 File Counter Total number of files that still have to be send.
10 File Size Total number of bytes that still have to be send. The last character always shows the current unit: B for Bytes, K for Kilo Bytes, M for Mega Bytes, G for Giga Bytes and T for Tera Bytes.
11 Transfer Rate Displays the total current transfer rate of all connections.
12 File Rate Displays the total number of files send per second.
13 Jobs in Queue Displays the number of jobs in the queue.
14 Active Transfers The number of process currently distributing data.
15 Error Counter Number of errors that occurred. It does not include the errors of red hosts (ie. failed hosts), otherwise the numbers here would get so large that one does not see if a new one starts to get errors. If this field is not zero you can click on it with the left mouse button and you will receive a list of host names with errors and the last three errors for each host.
16 Error Hosts Number of hosts that are red. If this field is not zero you can click on it with the left mouse button and you will receive a list of host names with errors and the last three errors for each host.
17 Error Host Bar Displays a bar for the number of hosts that are red. The color of the bar will always be red.
18 Active Transfers Bar Displays a green bar to display the number of active transfers, that will increasingly turn blue the more transfers are active. A deep blue bar in it full length indicates that the FD has reached its maximum number of process that may be forked to distribute data.
19 Transfer Rate Bar Displays a yellow bar to display the overall current transfer rate graphically.

Selecting can be done by either holding down the shift key and pressing the left mouse button (temporary selection) or by holding the ctrl key and the left mouse button (permanent selection). The background of the line will change to black or grey respectively.

Status

The status line at the bottom gives some information about afd_mon and whats in its log files.

[closeup of one line of mon_ctrl dialog]
1 afd_mon LED to show current status of process afd_mon.
Normal status. Process is up and running.
Process has terminated normally.
Abnormal termination. Process has been killed and is not running any more.
2 Monitor System Log Radar that shows the five last type of messages in the monitor system log. It can have the following colors:
Color Log Symbol Description
<I> Information, nothing serious.
<C> Configuration, something has been configured.
<W> Warning. Most properly a configuration error, nothing to be nervous about.
<E> Error, afd_mon should still be able to continue, but something is wrong!
<F> A fatal error has occurred, the process involved has most properly terminated abnormally. Now you should really be nervous!
<#> Dummy sign. Is used for showing a new month in the system log or when there is garbage or no information in the log file.
3 Monitor Log Radar that shows the five last type of messages in the monitor log. It can have the following colors:
Color Log Symbol Description
<I> Information, nothing serious.
<W> Warning. A host could not be reached and it automatically switched over to the backup system.
<E> Error. Could not connect to remote AFD, etc.
<F> A fatal error has occurred, the process involved has most properly terminated abnormally.
4 Clock Digital clock showing the time in 24h format.
Copyright © 2000 - 2022 by H.Kiehl
Holger.Kiehl@dwd.de
Last updated: 21.03.2022
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