Documenting Downtimes in Solution Manager

The Downtimes function plans system, server and instance downtimes and documents unplanned downtimes, for example to check that Service Level Agreements are kept. To avoid the SAP Solution Manager displaying alerts from closed-down systems during planned downtime, you can suppress these alerts.

 

Downtime types

Downtime type	Definition	Weighting	Effect on Service Level Agreement (SLA)	Effect on users
Planned downtimes	Downtimes planned and agreed in advance	1 (lowest weighting)	not included in SLA availability calculation (no penalty)	Users responsible or affected can prepare for the downtime and liaise with each other
Changed planned downtime	lengthens or shortens duration of a planned downtime	2	possibly SLA-relevant (can cause penalty)	Users responsible or affected must wait longer for the system/server to be available, but their work is not interrupted
Unplanned stop	unannounced and not agreed downtime because of unexpected events	3	SLA-relevant (can cause penalty)	Users are interrupted, and have little time to prepare
Crash	unexpected downtime because of system failure; can only be documented after the event	4	SLA-relevant (can cause penalty)	Users are interrupted, and have no time to prepare
Actual downtime	the period during a planned downtime in which the system is technically not available	n/a	n/a	n/a
Planned availability	availability planned and agreed in advance; the opposite of planned downtime	n/a	n/a	there can be no planned downtime during planned availability

Prerequisites

You are authorized for System Landscape Management.

You have installed SAP NetWeaver 7.00 SP 15 in the monitored system, to suppress alerts.

For further information, see SAP Note 1096782.

Features

• Planning and documentation of planned downtimes for systems, servers and instances:

  • One-off downtimes

  • Periodic downtimes, e.g. database server hardware maintenance on the first Saturday of every month

  • Copy downtimes from one server or system to another

• Document unplanned downtimes, e.g. system crashes

• Create standard texts with variables such as Systemname to inform persons affected by downtime

• Timed, user-specific notification of users of managed systems, e.g. one day or one hour before a downtime, by:

  • SMS

  • E-mail

  • SAP system message

• Response to alerts from the Computing Center Management System (CCMS) during a downtime, e.g. SAP Solution Manager can display, interrupt or suppress alerts.

Activities

To manage downtimes, choose  SAP Solution Manager: Work Center -> System Landscape Management -> Downtimes <-, or the transaction SOLMAN_DOWNTIME_MGMT, from the SAP Easy Access screen.