Registry Database is getting heavily used and its running out of disk space

Products

• CA Application Test
• CA Continuous Application Insight (PathFinder)
• Service Virtualization

Issue/Introduction

The Registry database is growing by up to 10 GB daily.  What could be causing this usage and how can this be reduced.

Environment

All supported DevTest releases.

Cause

One common reason for the SQL Server registry database taking disk space is that many tests are being run that produce a report.  

In that case most data will be used by tables that have a name starting with HST_

If most space in the database is used by the table LISA_FRAME_DATA, then the growth is caused by the CA Application Insight component. 

Resolution

One common reason for the SQL Server registry database taking disk space is that many tests are being run that produce a report.  In that case most data will be used by tables that have a name starting with HST_

The tests may use a staging document with the 'Default Report Generator'.  Sometimes tests have been configured to run in CVS. 

If this is the case the following strategies can be used to reduce the usage: 
1) In the staging doc use the 'Load Test Report Generator' instead of the 'Default Report Generator'. 
2) Run the report cleaner more often than the default of 30 days. 
3) Configure the following in local.properties: 
perfmgr.rvwiz.whatrpt.autoExpire=true 
perfmgr.rvwiz.whatrpt.expireTimer=5d 

If most space in the database is used by the table LISA_FRAME_DATA, then the growth is caused by the CA Application Insight component.  This is also known as CAI or Pathfinder. 
If this module is not required, stop the broker and to set the following in local.properties: 
lisa.pathfinder.on=false 

Removing old records from the database is done automatically by the broker.  The default age for deletion is 7 days. However, this value can be adjusted using this property in the <broker> section of rules.xml: 
<property comment="Age of transactions that should be deleted when the clean runs [minutes old] 7200=5 days" key="lisa.pathfinder.transaction.cleaner.age" value="10080"/> 

After turning of Pathfinder for 10 days, just turn Pathfinder and the broker back on temporarily.  This should then remove the expired records for CAI.

If using SQL Server to store the registry database, can "shrink" the database in Management Studio of SQL Server to return the data back to the OS.

Additional Information

For background on database maintenance see: 
https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/ca-enterprise-software/devops/devtest-solutions/10-7/administering/database-administration/database-maintenance.html

For background on CAI see: 
https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/ca-enterprise-software/devops/devtest-solutions/10-7/using/using-application-insight/getting-started-with-application-insight.html