Java Agent producing a JVM with high CPU due to Automatic Entry Point or Backend Detection.

Products

• CA Application Performance Management Agent (APM / Wily / Introscope)
• INTROSCOPE

Issue/Introduction

      The Java agent is experiencing any or all of these conditions:

      1. A JVM with extremely high CPU or even crashes.

      2. Detection of a large amount of Automatic Entry Points/Backends. This can be seen in the Agent log.

          Example:

[INFO] [IntroscopeAgent.AutomaticBackendDetection] Backend Candidates: [<candidate1>,<candidate2>…]

 

      3. Autodetected Entrypoint/Backend methods have extremely high Responses Per Interval.

Environment

All APM 10.x releases with Autodetected Entry points/Backends functionality enabled (10.5 and later)

Cause

 

1.      Automatic Entry Point/Backend Detection thread dump analysis could be very CPU expensive in some JVMs (IBM).

    2.      Automatic Entry Point/Backend Detection detected a class/method which has extreme number of hits (i.e. 1 million+ Responses Per Interval). Monitoring such very high traffic class/method could be very expensive.

    3.      Automatic Entry Point/Backend Detection  keeps taking thread dump even after an Entrypoint/Backend has already been detected in the transaction.

 

 #2 is improved in 10.6.

 #3 has been fixed in 10.3 HF#18 and 10.5.

Resolution

Disable Automatic Entry Point Detection

       1.  On the IntroscopeAgent.profile, set introscope.agent.deep.entrypoint.enabled=false

See https://docops.ca.com/ca-apm/10-5/en/implementing-agents/java-agent/configure-java-monitoring/configure-smart-instrumentation/

 for details on this property

     2. If disabled, ensure that the AutoPersist.pbd file in /hotdeploy (if any) is also removed.

 

This does not require a managed application restart

 

Disable Automatic Backend Detection

       1.  On the IntroscopeAgent.profile, set introscope.agent.automatic.backend.detection.enabled=false

 

See https://docops.ca.com/ca-apm/10-5/en/implementing-agents/java-agent/configure-java-monitoring/configure-smart-instrumentation/

 for details on this property

     2. If disabled, ensure that the AutoPersist.pbd file in /hotdeploy (if any) is also removed.

 

This does not require a managed application restart.

Additional Information

   Various fixes in APM 10.6 should help improve this issue.

  Also see https://www.ca.com/us/services-support/ca-support/ca-support-online/knowledge-base-articles.tec1984947.html   Entry points are still reported in the investigator even though the feature is disabled.