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The Cisco Prime IP Express server status dashboard in the web user interface (web UI) presents a graphical view of the system status, using graphs, charts, and tables, to help in tracking and diagnosis. These dashboard elements are designed to convey system information in an organized and consolidated way, and include:
Significant protocol server and other metrics
Alarms and alerts
Database inventories
Server health trends
The dashboard is best used in a troubleshooting desk context, where the system displaying the dashboard is dedicated for that purpose and might be distinct from the systems running the protocol servers. The dashboard system should point its browser to the system running the protocol servers.
You should interpret dashboard indicators in terms of deviations from your expected normal usage pattern. If you notice unusual spikes or drops in activity, there could be communication failures or power outages on the network that you need to investigate.
Starting from Cisco Prime IP Express 9.0, the Dashboard feature is available on the regional cluster also. It provides System Metrics chart by default. It allows you to display the server specific (DHCP, DNS, and CDNS) charts for various clusters. This can be configured in the Chart Selections page.
To open the dashboard in the web UI, from the Operate menu, choose Dashboard.
System Metrics—See the "System Metrics" section in Cisco Prime IP Express 9.0 Administrator Guide.
Tip | These are just the preset selections. See Selecting Dashboard Elements to Include for other dashboard elements you can select. The dashboard retains your selections from session to session. |
Each dashboard element initially appears as a table or a specific chart type, depending on the element:
Note the green box next to each dashboard element name in the above image). This box indicates that the server sourcing the information is functioning normally. A yellow box indicates that server operation is less than optimum. A red box indicates that the server is down. These indicators are the same as for the server health on the Manage Servers page in the regular web UI.
Graphed lines and stacked areas in the charts follow a standard color and visual coding so that you can immediately determine key diagnostic indicators at a glance. The charts use the following color and textural indicators:
If Magnified Chart is the selected Chart Link (see Figure 2), you can magnify a chart in a separate window by clicking the chart. In magnified chart view, you can choose an alternative chart type from the one that comes up initially (see Other Chart Types).
Note | Automatic refresh is turned off for magnified charts (see Setting the Polling Interval). To get the most recent data, click the Refresh icon next to the word Dashboard at the top left of the page. |
To convert a chart to a table, see Displaying Charts as Tables. You cannot convert tables to a graphic chart format.
Each chart initially includes a color-coded legend. To turn off the legend display on the main dashboard page, see Displaying or Hiding Chart Legends. Removing the legend renders the graphic chart size relatively larger, which can be helpful if you have many charts displayed. You cannot remove legends in magnified views.
Dashboard elements rendered as tables have data displayed in rows and columns. The following dashboard elements are preset to consist of (or include) tables:
Note | If you view a table in Expert mode, additional data might appear. |
Dashboard elements rendered as line charts can include one or more lines plotted against the x and y axes. The three types of line charts are described in the following table.
Tip | To get the raw data for a chart that shows delta or rate data, enter Expert mode, set the Chart Link to Data Table (see Displaying Charts as Tables), then click the chart. The Raw Data table is below the Chart Data table. |
Dashboard elements rendered as stacked area charts have multiple related metrics plotted as trend charts, but stacked one on top of the other, so that the highest point represents a cumulative value. The values are independently shaded in contrasting colors. (See the image below for an example of the DHCP Server Request Activity chart shown in Figure 1 rendered as a stacked area chart.)
They are stacked in the order listed in the legend, the left-most legend item at the bottom of the stack and the right-most legend item at the top of the stack. The dashboard elements that are pre-set to stacked area charts are:
The other chart types available for you to choose are:
Tip | Each chart type shows the data in distinct ways and in different interpretations. You can decide which type best suits your needs. |
You can open a help window for each dashboard element by clicking the title of the element.
To customize the dashboard display, you can:
Each chart supports:
Each chart has a help icon with a description of the chart and a detailed help if you click the chart title.
Note | The changes made to the dashboard/chart will persist only if you click Save in the Dashboard window. |
Refresh each display so that it picks up the most recent polling by clicking the Refresh icon.
You can set the cached data polling (hence, automatic refresh) interval to:
You can choose to display a graphic chart as a table when you magnify the chart by clicking it. At the middle of the top of the dashboard display are the controls for the chart links (see the image below)
Click the Data Table radio button. When you click the chart itself, it opens as a table. The preset display format is Magnified Chart.
You can dump the chart data to a comma-separated value (CSV) file (such as a spreadsheet) when you magnify the chart by clicking it. In the Chart Link controls at the top of the page (see Figure 2), click the CSV Export radio button, then click the chart. A Save As window appears, where you can specify the name and location of the CSV file.
You can include or exclude the color-coded legends for charts on the main dashboard page. You might want to remove the legends as you become more familiar with the data and track it on a slightly larger chart display. In the upper-right of the dashboard display are the controls for the legend display (see the image below). The preset value is Visible.
You can decide how many dashboard elements you want to display on the page. At times, you might want to focus on one server activity only, such as for the DHCP server, and exclude all other metrics for the other servers. In this way, the dashboard becomes less crowded, the elements are larger and more readable. At other times, you might want an overview of all server activities, with a resulting smaller element display.
You can select the dashboard elements to display from the main Dashboard page by clicking Chart Selections in the Dashboard Settings dialog (see Figure 3). Clicking the link opens the Chart Selection page (see Figure 1).
You can set the default chart types on the main dashboard view. You can customize the server charts in the dashboard to display only the specific chart types as default.
To set up default chart type, check the check box corresponding to the Metrics chart that you want to display and choose a chart type from the Type drop-down list. The default chart types are consistent and shared across different user sessions (see the image below).
Note | You can see either the CDNS or DNS Metrics in the Dashboard Settings > Chart Selection page based on the service configured on the server. |
Tip | The order in which the dashboard elements appear in the Chart Selection list does not necessarily determine the order in which the elements will appear on the page. An algorithm that considers the available space determines the order and size in a grid layout. The layout might be different each time you submit the dashboard element selections. To change selections, check the check box next to the dashboard element that you want to display. |
The above image displays the Charts Selection table in the regional web UI. The Clusters column is available only in regional dashboard and it displays the list of local clusters configured. You can add the local cluster by clicking the Edit icon and then by selecting the local cluster name from the Local Cluster List dialog box.
To change selections, check the check box next to the dashboard element that you want to display.
Specific group controls are available in the drop-down list, Change Chart Selection, at the top of the page. To:
Click OK at the bottom of the page to save your choices, or Cancel to cancel the changes.