Why there are some metric without "Last Upload" in "All Metric" page?

Question

I am developing a MYSQL Plugin. after I deployed it to agent, and add target to it. I found there is something strange for some metric collecting/uploading. And I test it on both OMS 10.2.0.4 and OMS 10.2.0.5, they have the same issue.
In page “All Metric”, not all of metrics have a value under column “Last Upload”. And if I click the metrics without “Last Uploaded”, some of them actually have data collected/uploaded and display it in UI. Then I am very confused why those metric had no "Last Upload" in All Metric page? Does it mean those three metric only collected/uploaded once? Does it mean there are something wrong with my XML? or what?
Here is the definition for one of metrics without “Last Upload”,
===========================================================
<Metric NAME="ProcessList_Count" TYPE="TABLE" HELP="NO_HELP">
<Display>
<Label NLSID="mmd_ip">ProcessList_Count</Label>
<Description NLSID="mmd_ip_desc">The ProcessList_Count</Description>
</Display>
<TableDescriptor>
<ColumnDescriptor NAME="GroupBy" TYPE="STRING" IS_KEY="TRUE">
<Display>
<Label NLSID="mmd_ip_GroupBy">GroupBy</Label>
<Description NLSID="mmd_GroupBy_desc"> The GroupBy. </Description>
</Display>
</ColumnDescriptor>
<ColumnDescriptor NAME="Ip_User_Aggr_Count" TYPE="NUMBER" IS_KEY="FALSE">
<Display>
<Label NLSID="mmd_ip_Ip_User_Aggr_Count_Value">Ip_User_Aggr_Count</Label>
<Description NLSID="mmd_ip_Ip_User_Aggr_Count_desc"> The Ip_User_Aggr_Count. </Description>
</Display>
</ColumnDescriptor>
<ColumnDescriptor NAME="Command_Aggr_Count" TYPE="NUMBER" IS_KEY="FALSE">
<Display>
<Label NLSID="mmd_ip_Command_Aggr_Count_Value">Command_Aggr_Count</Label>
<Description NLSID="mmd_ip_Command_Aggr_Count_desc"> The Command_Aggr_Count. </Description>
</Display>
</ColumnDescriptor>
</TableDescriptor>
<ExecutionDescriptor>
<GetTable NAME="MysqlProcessAggregate" USE_CACHE="TRUE"/>
<GroupBy NAME="IpUserAggrCount_I" FROM_TABLE="MysqlProcessAggregate">
<By NAME="GroupBy" COLUMN_NAME="UserIp" />
<AggregateColumn NAME="Ip_User_Aggr_Count" COLUMN_NAME="Id" OPERATOR="COUNT"/>
</GroupBy>
<GetView NAME="IpUserAggrCount_II" FROM_TABLE="IpUserAggrCount_I">
<Column NAME="GroupBy" COLUMN_NAME="GroupBy" />
<Column NAME="Ip_User_Aggr_Count" COLUMN_NAME="Ip_User_Aggr_Count" />
<ComputeColumn NAME="Command_Aggr_Count" IS_VALUE="TRUE" EXPR=" " />
</GetView>
<GroupBy NAME="CommandAggrCount_I" FROM_TABLE="MysqlProcessAggregate">
<By NAME="GroupBy" COLUMN_NAME="Command" />
<AggregateColumn NAME="Command_Aggr_Count" COLUMN_NAME="Id" OPERATOR="COUNT"/>
</GroupBy>
<GetView NAME="CommandAggrCount_II" FROM_TABLE="CommandAggrCount_I">
<Column NAME="GroupBy" COLUMN_NAME="GroupBy" />
<ComputeColumn NAME="Ip_User_Aggr_Count" IS_VALUE="TRUE" EXPR=" " />
<Column NAME="Command_Aggr_Count" COLUMN_NAME="Command_Aggr_Count" />
</GetView>
<Union NAME="Result">
<Table NAME="IpUserAggrCount_II" />
<Table NAME="CommandAggrCount_II" />
</Union>
</ExecutionDescriptor>
</Metric>
===========================================================
===========================================================
<CollectionItem NAME="MysqlProcessAggregate">
<Schedule>
<IntervalSchedule INTERVAL="10" TIME_UNIT="Min" />
</Schedule>
<MetricColl NAME="MysqlProcessAggregate" />
<MetricColl NAME="ProcessList_Count" />
</CollectionItem>
===========================================================
Any help will be appreciated!!!
Thanks,
Satine

Answer 1

Hello Satine,
If the 'Last Upload' timestamp value shows "-", it means data for particular metric(s) never got uploaded from EM Agent. This can happen if:
- Metric collection is disabled
- Metric is defined as 'Real-Time metric'
- Metric is defined for scheduled collection, however, due to some parsing error, EM Agent
You mentioned -
"...And if I click the metrics without “Last Uploaded”, some of them actually have data collected/uploaded and
display it in UI. Then I am very confused why those metric had no "Last Upload" in All Metric page? Does it
mean those three metric only collected/uploaded once? Does it mean there are something wrong with my
XML? or what?..."
By clicking on the metric link (on 'All Metrics' page), you are performing a real-time collection - i.e., Agent is informed to collect the data and provide it to the caller APIs so that the data can be displayed on UI. Such a data displayed is not from EM Repository. Hope this addresses your confusion with - "...why those metric had no "Last Upload" in All Metric page...". If you want to see the history data, you need to expand the particular metric and click on the sub-links (which are the non-kyy metric-columns that you would have defined in the target-type metadata xml file)
Since you mentioned that when you are doing a real-time collection (by clicking on the metric link on 'All Metrics' page), you are retrieving data, I don't think there should be anything wrong in the metadata xml file. Yes, it can happen that EM Agent didn't find an entry in default-collection OR there was parsing issue for the entry in default-collection, which may cause the metric to be assumed as 'real-time' by EM Agent. However, looking at the example that you specified, don't think that should be the case.
Can you check
1. the 'Collection Schedule' and 'Upload Interval' mentioned for these metrics on 'All Metrics' page ? Is this
same as what you specified in the default-collection xml file ?
2. Are there any errors reported in emagent.trc / emagent.log for metric "ProcessList_Count" ?
Regards,
-Shant