This article is the official release announcement for Teradata Viewpoint 15.00 with an effective release date of April 9th 2014. The Viewpoint 15.00 release has a whole new look and feel. The upgraded infrastructure embraces newer web technologies, improves performance, and enhances user accessibility, interaction, and discovery. As the versioning suggests, Viewpoint 15.00 supports the Teradata Database 15.00 release.
Summary
Themes of the Teradata Viewpoint 15.00 release are currency with the latest web technologies, support of Teradata Database 15.00, and to formally address Section 508 compliance and Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). As such, there have been significant modifications to the entire Viewpoint look and feel. Highlights:
- New Viewpoint Look
- New Add Content
- "Help" Improvements – search and context sensitive help
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Support for Teradata Database 15.00:
- Workload Management
- New reports for Blocking sessions
- Inclusion of Aster Workload Management Configuration
- New Metric Heatmap portlet (merged Capacity Heatmap and Metrics Graph metric portlets)
- Alert Viewer portlet new hide alerts feature
- Redesigned Node Resources portlet
Viewpoint has undergone a significant foundational re-architecture. However, the majority of portlet monitoring and management logic (functions and flow within portlets) remains the same. Below is some of the foundational changes you will enjoy:
- Flat design with new color scheme.
- Font size is changed from Verdana to Arial font.
- New icons for each portlet.
- Chrome is redesigned increasing the vertical real estate.
Here is a snapshot of the new Viewpoint 15.00 look:
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Header Changes. The next view displays how the header and Rewind bar have changed. The circled header icons represent access to "Help", the "Viewpoint Admin" menu, and a pull down for the Viewpoint "Profile" and "Log Out" options. Notice the fresh new look of Rewind. All the discrete time increments are clearly shown as separate buttons. Lastly, the Rewind bar now stays visible even when scrolling down a page.
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Add Content: The Viewpoint Add Content menu has been redesigned significantly improving the user interaction and discovery. One can add one or more portlets in an operation including multiple instances of the same portlet if desired. There is also a search option at the top to assist in finding the right portlet. New portlet category groupings assist in search and also understanding of portlet relationships. Lastly, notice that all portlets now have new unique representative icon.
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New "Help"including on-line search capability as well as context sensitive help directly within portlets taking you automatically to that portlet assistance.
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Teradata Database 15.00 New Features: Here is an overview of the Viewpoint additions related to this new Teradata release.
New Query Monitor Report – By Blocker View: This report is very useful in understanding the blocking contention going on in a Teradata 15.00 or newer system. This report lists of all sessions that are responsible for blocking another sessions or blocked by another sessions. The sessions are grouped in three categories:
- Root Cause – Sessions that are blocking other sessions.
- Granted – Sessions that are blocked but is also blocking other sessions. Consider a case of BT-ET transaction where there can be multiple SQLs.
- Waiting – Sessions that are blocked and is waiting
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Blocking Tab: A new blocking tab is added when user drilling down on a session in Query Monitor that is blocking other sessions. This shows information about the locks held by the session, the count of all sessions blocked by this session, and how long it has been blocking other sessions. It also lists the sessions that are blocked by this session so that user can see the sessions it is blocking and take appropriate action.
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Blocked By Tab in Query Monitor: This tab was redesigned to list all the sessions that is blocking the current session.
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Workload Management: Teradata Viewpoint 15.00 will support Teradata Database 15.00 Workload Management features such as:
- One can throttle a request at virtual partition level.
- One can specify a maximum estimated step processing time.
- One can sub classify on percent of table accessed.
- One can classify on usage of a Table in a particular statement.
- Added a new report displaying resource allocation across all SLG tier workloads in all Virtual Partitions for a Planned Environment.
For users of Teradata Integrated Workload Management, you can now define planned environments as state matrix options.
Please refer to Teradata Database 15.00 documentation for further information on this exciting new Database release.
Teradata Viewpoint 15.00 supports Workload Management for Aster 6.0 and newer. With this new addition, the Viewpoint Workload Designer portlet provides an alternate method of configuring rulesets as well as providing additional functionality such as:
- Have more than one named ruleset which can be editable by multiple users to make incremental updates
- Provides lock/unlock capabilities
- One can export, import, and clone rulesets
Ruleset Features such as Throttles and Workloads are added.
New Metric Heatmap portlet: The prior Capacity Heatmap and Metrics Graph metric portlets have been merged into one super metric portlet called Metric Heatmap (even the name is integrated). It provide a view toggle for doing easy transition to the different displays as shown below where the system CPU usage is shown with two different views within the same portlet.
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Alert Viewer portlet hide alerts: As a new type of filter, a hide option has been built into the Alert Viewer portlet allowing certain alerts to be hidden from view. One may use this to selectively hide duplicates or possibly as part of tracking resolved issues. The hide option can be executed for an individual query or through a tables action menu bulk operation (via check boxes). There is a new setting that then allows if hidden alerts should be displayed or not. If hidden alerts are displayed, they will have a strike-through representing the exception. All of these aspects are shown below.
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Enhanced Node Resources portlet: The Node Resources portlet has been re-designed but still servers the same purpose for helping to identify over/under utilized nodes and vprocs. This new version is much easier to navigate and understand. The chanes were enough to warrant its own article. Please refer to the "Node Resources Take-2" article for more details.
With the underlying infrastructural changes, all product portlets need to be upgraded in sync. The listing below documents the minimal product versions necessary for Teradata Viewpoint 15.00 compatibility.
- Viewpoint 15.00
- Data Lab 15.00
- DSA 15.00
- Unity Ecosystem Manager 15.00
- Unity Data Mover 14.11
- Unity Director / Unity Loader 14.11
Please refer to the Viewpoint Configuration Guide for details of the upgrade process and the User Guide for details of new features.
We sincerely hope you like the new Teradata Viewpoint 15.00 changes and how it helps in discovery and usability of the product. We always look forward to your thoughts and comments.