Best Practices for Using Integrity Manager

MicroStrategy recommends the following best practices when using Integrity Manager:

• Run large integrity tests during off-peak hours, so that the load on Intelligence Server from the integrity test does not interfere with normal operation. You can execute integrity tests from the command line using a scheduler, such as the Windows AT scheduler. For information about executing integrity tests from the command line, see Executing a Test from the Command Line.
• Before performing a system upgrade, such as a database upgrade or a MicroStrategy metadata upgrade, create a baseline of the reports you want to test. You can create this baseline by executing a single‑project integrity test. Then, after the upgrade, you can verify the upgrade process by executing a baseline‑versus‑project test of the baseline and the upgrade project.
• Understand how Integrity Manager answers prompted reports, and how you can configure the answers to prompted reports, as described in Executing Prompted Reports with Integrity Manager.
• If you are having trouble comparing prompted reports, you can save static versions of those reports in a "regression test" folder in each project, and use those static reports for integrity tests.
• In a comparative integrity test, you must have the same OS version and the same font installed on your machine to use the Graph view to compare two PDF reports. Font rendering on a PDF is version and OS specific, so differences may result in formatting issues, which can affect comparison results.
• If your MicroStrategy security configuration involves security filters, make sure that the user executing the integrity test has the same security filters for both projects. For example, you can create a test user who has the same security filter for each project, and execute all integrity tests under this user.
  • Alternately, you can execute the test using multiple MicroStrategy users, as described in Executing a Test Under Multiple MicroStrategy User Accounts. Make sure that the users that you are comparing have matching security filters. For example, if User1 is assigned security filter FilterA in project Project1, make sure you compare the reports with a user who is also assigned security filter FilterA in project Project2.
• When you are comparing graph reports and noting the differences between the graphs, adjust the Granularity slider so that the differences are grouped in a way that is useful. For more information about how Integrity Manager evaluates and groups differences in graph and PDF reports, see Grouping Differences in Graph and PDF Reports.
  • If you are executing a performance test, follow the best practices described in Testing Intelligence Server Performance.

• When running Integrity Manager testing on a large number of objects, you may need to increase the memory available to the Integrity Manager process. You can do it by specifying a parameter when launching Integrity Manager.

  Heap size should not exceed the available memory on the machine from which Integrity Manager is launched.

  For example, on a machine with 16GB of memory, you should be able to safely use 12 GB for Integrity Manager.

  • Open Integrity Manager in command line with the -Xmx flag and the corresponding memory size, such as -Xmx12G for 12 GB or -Xmx10240m for 10,240 MB.

    For example, to execute Integrity Manager with 12 GB of memory, run the following :

    Copy

    MIntMgrW_64.exe -Xmx12G