Do you know how to monitor background job status centrally…without an external scheduling tool?!

Do you know this problem – you operate several SAP backend systems and you should check in regular intervals that no important background jobs are canceling in the respective backend?! If you don’t use some automated monitoring tool (like Functional Scope of Business Process Monitoring in SAP Solution Manager) and if you don’t use an external job scheduling (like Scheduling), then you have to logon to all the backend systems respectively, call transaction SM37 in regular intervals and check for cancelled jobs. This is all very time-consuming and you don’t know which of your many systems is causing problems. Actually you can save a lot of time if you setup the Job Management Work Center in SAP Solution Manager.

 Technical Prerequisites

 The technical prerequisites are basically described in SAP note 1054005 – FAQ: Job Scheduling Management with SAP Solution Manager. Basically you require

• the two roles SAP_SMWORK_BASIC and SAP_SMWORK_JOB_MAN within the SAP Solution Manager
• the activation of corresponding BSP services in SAP Solution Manager
• an TRUSTED RFC connection to the respective backend system you want to monitor, including authorization for function group SXBP

Create Query in Job Management Work Center

You call the Work Center via transaction SOLMAN_WORKCENTER (ensure that your user has the above mentioned SMWORK roles assigned). You can then click on the Job Monitoring view and then click on the sub-view SAP Job Scheduler (BC-XBP). Here you can find some default queries shipped by SAP. As a next step you can click on the upper right-hand corner or Define New Query

In our use case you select the system/client combinations that you want to monitor and which are connected with the above mentioned TRUSTED RFC connections. Then you select the job status of interest, i.e. Canceled in our case. In order to read not too much data you should restrict the time frame of collection. Actually you can work with calculated, dynamic date selections.

Of course you can select more than one system/client combination at a time.

In our example we have chosen all canceled jobs within the last 30 days. If you have many job executions per day and reorganize your job data within a week you should select a more meaningful time frame, e.g. only the last 1 or 2 days.

After you defined your query you can apply the settings and the corresponding result list will show all the relevant jobs (e.g. all canceled jobs) from different systems in just one central view.

Actually when you use this kind of central monitoring functionality with different queries within the Job Management Work Center, then you can also benefit from the graphical feature described in a previous blog Diagrams for Job Scheduling Management

Visit us also on SAP TechEd 2011 at ALM264 – Manage Your Background Jobs Using Job Scheduling Management

In this hands-on session you will learn how to manage background jobs with SAP Solution Manager. With reference to the Solution Directory, you may document, request, schedule, and monitor jobs using the external job scheduling tool SAP Central Process Scheduling by Redwood. In addition, you will get an introduction of how to optimize your job schedule concept using Job Scheduling Management Health Check in SAP Solution Manager.

Frequently Asked Questions about Job Scheduling Management are answered under http://wiki.sdn.sap.com/wiki/display/SM/FAQ+Job+Scheduling+Management.

If you are interested in further reading. The following blogs (in chronological order) provide further details about Job Scheduling Management functionalities within the SAP Solution Manager.

• Job Scheduling Management with SAP Solution Manager
• Central Job Scheduling with SAP Solution Manager
• Creating a Job Request with SAP Solution Manager
• Job Scheduling Management Enhancements with EhP1/SP18
• Managing Standard Jobs centrally from SAP Solution Manager
• Monitoring Job Chains with SAP CPS by Redwood and SAP Solution Manager
• SAP is first vendor to provide a comprehensive Job Management Suite
• Job Interception: Controlling end-user scheduled jobs
• Implementation of a naming convention in Job Scheduling Management
• Don’t leave children unattended – How SAP Central Process Scheduling by Redwood manages the parent-child relationship of SAP jobs
• How SAP Central Process Scheduling and SAP Financial Closing cockpit work together
• Re-directing transactions SM36, SM37, SA38: Controlling end-user scheduled jobs – Part 1
• An easy way to identify end-user scheduled jobs which bypass your central scheduling tool
• A new column in transaction SM37 – Job Documentation
• Re-directing transactions SM36, SM37, SA38: Controlling end-user scheduled jobs – Part 2
• Creation of Job Documentation Macros
• Job Documentation Templates
• Best Practice: BW Process Chain monitoring with SAP Solution Manager – Part 1
• Best Practice: BW Process Chain monitoring with SAP Solution Manager – Part 2: Setup Example
• How to configure SAP’s standard Job Request form – Part 1
• How to configure SAP’s standard Job Request form – Part 2
• Diagrams for Job Scheduling Management