Monitor validators

If you use the Clique or IBFT 2.0 proof of authority (PoA) consensus protocols, determine whether all validators are proposing blocks to identify possible network problems.

Enable monitoring of validators on the command line by specifying the POA metrics category and optionally specifying the number of recently added blocks to check.

`besu --metrics-enabled --metrics-categories=POA --plugin-metrics-recent-block-count=50`

The command line statement:

• Enables metrics using the --metrics-enabled option.
• Specifies the POA metrics category using the --metrics-categories option.
• Specifies the number of recently added blocks to check using the --plugin-metrics-recent-block-count option.

Viewing metrics

1. Configure and run Prometheus as described for Hyperledger Besu.

2. Open a web browser to http://localhost:9090 to view the Prometheus graphical interface.

3. Select Graph from the menu bar and select the Console tab.

4. From the Insert metric at cursor drop-down, select one of the following metrics, and select Execute. The values are displayed.

Name	Metric type	Definition	JSON-RPC equivalent
plus_poa_ibft_recent_signed_count	Gauge	Number of times this node was a block signer in the last n blocks, where n is the value specified for --plugin-metrics-recent-block-count	None
plus_poa_ibft_rounds_for_latest_block	Gauge	Number of rounds required to import the latest block	None
plus_poa_ibft_unique_recent_signers	Gauge	Number of unique signers in the last n blocks, where n is the value specified for --plugin-metrics-recent-block-count	None
plus_poa_recent_proposer_count	Gauge	Number of unique validators proposing blocks in the last n blocks, where n is the value specified for --plugin-metrics-recent-block-proposer-count	clique_getSignerMetrics, ibft_getSignerMetrics
plus_poa_recently_proposed_block_count	Gauge	Number of times this validator proposed an accepted block in the last n blocks, where n is the value specified for --plugin-metrics-recent-block-count	clique_getSignerMetrics, ibft_getSignerMetrics
plus_poa_validator_count_current	Gauge	Number of validators currently defined	clique_getSignerMetrics, ibft_getSignerMetrics

1. (Optional) Visualize the collected data using Grafana.

   1. Start Grafana.
   2. Open a web browser to http://localhost:3000 to view the Grafana graphical interface, and log in. For first-time users, the default name is admin, and the default password is admin.
   3. Import PegaSys+-dashboard-grafana.json located in <your-installation-directory/dashboard> to create the dashboard.