Stackify Retrace - Review 2022

Stackify Retrace (formerly known simply as Stackify) is a solid Information technology management tool that provides coverage for those burdened with both infrastructure direction and application performance direction (APM) duties. However, while Stackify Retrace (which begins at $50 per calendar month per server) can serve equally an infrastructure director, the visitor touts its product as "congenital for developers by developers) and it shows. We find its deep app insight and exceptional data presentation for APM so impressive that it merits our Editors' Choice honour in the APM category. The visitor also offers a code profiling tool called Prefix for desktop code, but that's not the focus of this review. (Information technology's too important to note that while Stackify Retrace appears in our infrastructure management roundup, it does not win our Editors' Choice award in that category, a distinction nosotros give instead to MMSoft Pulseway).

Stackify has extensively rewritten this production, and has renamed it Retrace. Information technology at present supports Coffee on parity with Microsoft .NET. Retrace at present supports monitoring non-web apps.

As mentioned, pricing for Stackify starts as depression as $50 per month per server and $x for pre-production environments, monitoring without code profiling is $15 per calendar month and Retrace APM for small servers is $25 per month per server; Stackify focuses on using logs as a key source of information for the health of a server more than any of the other products tested.

Logs have always been critically important for monitoring and diagnosing app problems. Stackify Retrace leverages the logs bachelor on most modern server operating systems, including Microsoft Windows and Linux, to provide its insight into the inner workings and interactions between apps and the supporting environment. In leveraging this information, Stackify Retrace is following the strategy of companies like Splunk, which have congenital entire platforms on top of log file assay to amend conform information technology for existent-time operational intelligence.

Stackify's deep app insight tin be seen in the figure below, which shows in one screen a graphical and tabular overview of their HelloStackify.Web demo app. Since many cloud-based apps use some type of database to store information, it's of import to have the ability to see bodily database transactions such equally the list of SQL queries in the lower left-hand corner of the screen. The figure beneath also shows web requests in both a graphical course and in a tabular list so you lot tin see the actual data behind the graphics. Yous tin can see these aforementioned graphics on the Stackify Sandbox website. The depth of app information provided by Stackify Retrace totally outshined the other products in the APM category, which is why information technology's our Editors' Choice for APM forth with LogicMonitor.

Stackify - Figure 1 - HelloStackify.Web Demo Application

Installation

Installing a local agent was a breeze using the Stackify installer. It does require access to the Cyberspace, but with the supplied links it only takes a few minutes. The downside here is you lot must install the amanuensis using the supplied key on every machine y'all wish to monitor. That's not a big deal for 10 or even 20 machines, but beyond that it could go tedious without some type of automation. Fortunately, Stackify Retrace now supports installation via command line scripting with all options as arguments, including the central. This makes larger scale implementation significantly easier. Other products in this category such as MMSoft Pulseway and Idera Uptime Infrastructure Monitor don't require the utilize of a primal, making them somewhat easier to install.

For those who want to get fancier with installation, Retrace supports Chef Cookbooks, which is an automation standard that can help with configuration and monitoring. Stackify also includes built-in back up for Amazon Web Servides (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and Docker container technology, which provides the possibility of different deployment strategies equally well.

Configuring fault notifications consists of selecting a specific monitored item and and then choosing what conditions will trigger that notification. Stackify uses a notification group that consists of 1 or more contacts associated with a specific app, server template, or resources monitor. Resource monitors include Azure queues, SQL queries, log queries and a website monitor. Each notification group also has adaptable time limits for sending an electronic mail or SMS reminder.

Configuring monitoring for custom apps required adding code to the app at the time we reviewed Retrace. That's to create logs which can, in turn, be monitored by Stackify. Stackify Retrace supports Microsoft .NET-based applications also as Coffee and not-spider web apps . The fourth dimension it takes to add a few lines of lawmaking to an existing application will exist well worth information technology in terms of the insight you will become into the inner workings of information moving between the dissimilar pieces of your organisation. The key hither is to pinpoint bottlenecks and resources issues in order to brand the system run amend.

Management Interface

The primary operator interface is clean and uncluttered. The figure beneath shows the Monitoring screen for the server named SMSERV2012R2. Stackify makes use of the sparkline graphical element introduced by Edward Tufte to show trends in a small amount of screen real manor. Any server issues testify up on the single status line as either a warning, critical outcome or outage. Opening the details folio for any server lets you rapidly identify any alert items, and then one click on the issue of concern brings upwardly a more detailed page to help you lot diagnose the issue. I liked the mode Stackify presented a lot of information in a compact class when compared to either Idera Uptime Infrastructure Monitor or Ipswitch Whatsup Gold.

Stackify - Figure 2 - Monitoring Screen for Server SMSERV2012R2

The bones server information displayed uses a customizable monitor template to display the information of virtually interest. Monitor templates can be modified to change existing threshold values or establish new ones. Initially, each Windows monitor template watches the deejay sub-arrangement, network interface and general system health parameters such as CPU and memory usage plus a few more. Each of these default categories have boosted information that tin can be displayed if needed.

By default the Stackify Retrace management console does non display any performance counters for a server, but they can easily be added. For Windows servers the list of available performance counters is huge and includes things like Hyper-V, Server Message Cake (SMB), and many more. Once you add a new performance counter to the template it will show up on all monitored servers in the master group. It'southward also possible to assign new templates on a group basis or past private server.

The figure below shows the Logs screen from the Stackify sandbox site. This screen shot is a good example of how the ability in log analysis actually comes into play with applications. The screen shown is highly interactive with multiple clickable elements. To see the data behind an fault just click on the View button adjacent to the right-hand side of the screen. Similarly, the Trace buttons will launch a separate screen to show the steps taken and lawmaking behind that particular action. Through the employ of byte code inspection Stackify provides deep insight into .NET applications. This includes the ability to see calls to external services and things such every bit Microsoft SQL database calls that include the query text.

Stackify - Figure 3 - Logs Screen from Stackify Sandbox site

Don't Forget the Hours Used

Every bit mentioned earlier, basic monitoring for applications and servers costs equally little as $ten per server per month for pre-production systems. Additional pricing tiers are $fifteen for monitoring without code profiling, $25 for small servers. The regular price is $50 per server per calendar month. However, Stackify works their pricing on a usage model, so these prices are the maximum you'll pay. If y'all don't use Retrace part of the fourth dimension, then you don't accept to pay for the time you're non using. That represents simply the software price, however. Because Stackify requires that code exist added to custom apps for total functionality, exist sure to include the homo-hours needed to make that happen to your bottom line estimate before purchasing.
Even with this caveat, however, Stackify provides the well-nigh in-depth data of any of the products tested for Windows and Linux servers. The aforementioned can be said for applications written using the .NET framework or Java. Graphical elements in the dashboards are informative, and information technology's like shooting fish in a barrel to drill downwardly with a few clicks to determine the nature of a problem.