System Center Operations Manager 2012 R2 - About Dashboard & Creating custom dashboards - Part 8

Hello Everyone,

This blog is to discuss about SCOM Dashboards.

Dashboard is in simple term a diagrammatic view of monitored objects with almost based on real-time monitoring which shows You the state of object if it's healthy or not, any warning given or in critical state or to see the performance of different objects based on different performance counters (Usually takes approx. 1-3 mins max to reflect in monitoring so considered as real-time monitoring).

This gives customer a view to keep monitoring critical objects based on real-time monitoring to take immediate troubleshooting steps in case of any failure or crisis.

Now, Questions come in most of the readers mind may be:

• How it is differ from Reports?
• How to monitor critical objects through one screen?
• and so on...

So I will try to explain mostly points about SCOM Dashboard which will helps You to monitor Your environment with Real-Time Monitoring thereby reducing loss of business due to critical failures.

You can also DOWNLOAD the soft copy of this post by Clicking Here!

Part 1: To see SCOM Prerequisites & Installation Process, Click Here!

Part 2: To see SCOM Post configurations, Click Here!

Part 3: To see SCOM Console Overview, Click Here!

Part 4: To see SCOM Agent Installation Process, Click Here! 

Part 5: To see PRO-Tips configuration between SCVMM & SCOM, Click Here! 

Part 6: To see configuring monitors & rules, Click Here! 

Part 7: To see about Reports, Click Here!

Difference between Dashboard & Reports:

There are some major difference between both as shown in below picture:

Types of Dashboard:

By default, there are 4 different templates which are represented as Dashboard view in SCOM:

• Grid Layout: This includes upto 9 cells which can be added in dashboard as per required view.

• Column Layout: There are 5 vertical columns which can be used in this templates to created dashboard.

• Service Level Layout: To represent any Service Level object monitoring, this template is used like any service which is based on any SLA so that can be monitored.

• Summary Dashboard: This template includes data related to performance & state of the objects.

Other Type of Dashboard - Dynamic/Custom Dashboard:

Above explained dashboard are also known as default dashboard types and each monitored objects may have different default dashboard views like network monitoring view will be on different dashboard & windows computer monitoring will be on different dashboard view.

Another type of dashboard is Dynamic/Custom Dashboard in which You create Dashboard with integration of SCOM with Visio & SharePoint to give more efficient view for different monitored objects in single dashboard and that dashboard can be monitored through large LCD screens as well.

This dashboard can be created like as architecture diagram with all connection path of network, storage & compute together in such a way that if any failure occurred in any path then that will blink with Red Color light which will help to identify the culprit path easily & faster. This will help team to analysis & troubleshoot the issues faster.  
THIS I WILL SHOW IN MY NEXT COMING BLOG POSTS... :) 

How to Create Dashboard in SCOM:

Creating custom dashboard in SCOM is simple based on your requirement... I will try to explain You with screenshots.

To create Dashboard, follow below steps:

Open SCOM Console, Click on Monitoring Tab, Right Click on Monitoring, Click on New & Then Click on Dashboard View:

I will try to show all types of dashboard views so let's start with one by one views.

GRID VIEW DASHBOARD:

Select Grid Layout Template & Click next:

Give Name & Description:

Select Cells:

Select Layout format & Click Next:

Click Create:

Click Close:

You can see created dashboard in Monitoring Space:

Now, In each cells You have to add Widget to display monitored objects state as per Your Need so I will show for 1 Widget how to add. Click on "Click to Add Widget":

Now, as shown in below screens, You can choose any available Widget to be displayed on 1st cell (It's all Your choice how many cells You want & which cell should contain which widget):

Give Name & Description for Widget:

Select Browse option (represented as ...):

Now You can select any group or object as per Your need:

Click OK & Next:

Choose criteria & click next:

Choose Display options & Click Next:

Click Create:

Click Close:

Dashboard will looks like below:

You can also swap cells or re-configure or personalise the dashboard:

This is how simple dashboard is created in SCOM.

Steps for other types are similar so I will show You how those will look like below.

NOTE: Dashboard utilises more resources so make sure You have sufficient resources for SCOM like memory & CPU.

COLUMN LAYOUT DASHBOARD:

SUMMARY DASHBOARD:

SERVICE LEVEL DASHBOARD:

This is all about SCOM Dashboard. In my next blog post, I will show You default dashboard available in SCOM & integration of SCOM with Visio Tool for Dynamic Dashboard.

Happy Reading!!!

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