The configuration of a ServiceControl instance can be adjusted via the ServiceControl Management utility or by directly modifying the ServiceControl. file. The settings listed are applicable to the appSettings section of the configuration file unless otherwise specified.
Host settings
The following documents should be reviewed prior to modifying configuration settings:
- Setting a Custom Hostname for guidance and details.
- Securing ServiceControl for an overview of the security implications of changing the configuration.
ServiceControl/HostName
The hostname to bind the embedded HTTP server to; modify this setting to bind to a specific hostname, e.g. sc..
Type: string
Default: localhost
If the ServiceControl/ setting is changed, and the ServiceControl/ setting is not set, the path of the embedded RavenDB is changed. Refer to Customize RavenDB Embedded Location.
ServiceControl/Port
The port to bind the embedded HTTP server.
Type: int
Default: 33333.
If the ServiceControl/ setting is changed, and the ServiceControl/ setting is not set, the path of the embedded RavenDB is changed. Refer to Customize RavenDB Embedded Location.
ServiceControl/DatabaseMaintenancePort
The port to bind the RavenDB when in maintenance mode or RavenDB is exposed.
Type: int
Default: 33334.
ServiceControl/VirtualDirectory
The virtual directory to bind the embedded HTTP server to; modify this setting to bind to a specific virtual directory.
Type: string
Default: empty
This setting is provided for backward compatibility and should be considered obsolete.
ServiceControl/DbPath
The path where the internal RavenDB is located.
Type: string
Default: %SYSTEMDRIVE%\
The indexes and Esent logs can be stored in a different path from the the RavenDB database data files by using the following RavenDB configuration app settings:
Raven/IndexStoragePath
Only supported on RavenDB 3.5 storage engine (prior version 5). Use symbolic links (soft links) to map any RavenDB storage subfolder to other physical drives.
The path for the indexes on disk.
Type: string
Default: %SYSTEMDRIVE%\
Raven/Esent/LogsPath
The path for the Esent logs on disk.
Type: string
Default: %SYSTEMDRIVE%\
ServiceControl/LogPath
The path for the ServiceControl logs.
Type: string
Default: %LOCALAPPDATA%\
%LOCALAPPDATA% is a user-specific environment variable.
ServiceControl/LogLevel
Controls the LogLevel of the ServiceControl logs.
Type: string
Default: Info
Valid settings are: Trace, Debug, Info, Warn, Error, Fatal, Off.
This setting will default to Info if an invalid value is assigned.
ServiceControl/RavenDBLogLevel
Controls the LogLevel of the RavenDB logs. See Logging.
Type: string
Default: Info
Valid settings are: Trace, Debug, Info, Warn, Error, Fatal, Off.
This setting will default to Warn if an invalid value is assigned.
ServiceControl/TimeToRestartErrorIngestionAfterFailure
Version: 4.4.1+
Controls the maximum time delay to wait before restarting the error ingestion pipeline after detecting a connection problem.
Type: TimeSpan
Default: 60 seconds
Valid settings are between 5 seconds and 1 hour.
ServiceControl/InternalQueueName
Version: 4.27.0+
Controls the name of the internal queue that ServiceControl uses for internal control messages. This can be used when the internal queue name does not match the Windows Service Name.
Type: string
Default: The Service Name
ServiceControl/IngestErrorMessages
Version: 4.33.0+
Set to false to disable ingesting new error messages. Useful in some upgrade scenarios.
Type: bool true or false
Default: true
Data retention
ServiceControl/ExpirationProcessTimerInSeconds
The number of seconds to wait between checking for expired messages.
Type: int
Default: 600 (10 minutes). The default for ServiceControl version 1.3 and below is 60 (1 minute), Starting in version 1.4, the default is 600 (10 minutes). Setting the value to 0 will disable the expiration process. This is not recommended and it is only provided for fault finding. Valid range is 0 to 10800 (3 Hours).
ServiceControl/ExpirationProcessBatchSize
This setting was introduced in version 1.4. The minimum allowed value for this setting is 10240; there is no hard-coded maximum as this is dependent on system performance.
Type: int
Default: 65512.
ServiceControl/AuditRetentionPeriod
This setting is deprecated in version 4.0.0. See ServiceControl Audit configuration.
The period to keep an audit message before it is deleted.
Type: timespan
Default: There is no default; this setting is required.
Valid range for this setting is from 1 hour to 365 days.
ServiceControl/ErrorRetentionPeriod
The grace period that faulted messages are kept before they are deleted.
For a message to be considered for deletion, it needs to have a status of either Archived, RetryIssued, or Resolved.
Type: timespan
Default: There is no default; this setting is required.
Valid range for this setting is between 5 days and 45 days.
ServiceControl/EventRetentionPeriod
The period to keep event logs before they are deleted.
Type: timespan
Default: 14 (14 days).
Valid range for this setting is from 1 hour to 200 days.
Performance tuning
ServiceControl/MaximumConcurrencyLevel
This setting controls how many messages can be processed concurrently (in parallel) by ServiceControl. The default value is 10.
In some cases, the ingestion rate can be too high and the underlying database cannot keep up with indexing the new messages. In this case, consider lowering the maximum concurrency level to a value that still allows a suitable ingestion rate while easing the pressure on the database.
The maximum concurrency level should be incremented only if there are no verified bottlenecks in CPU, RAM, network I/O, storage I/O, and storage index lag.
ServiceControl/MaxBodySizeToStore
This setting sets an upper limit on body size to be stored.
This setting is not available in versions 4.4 and higher. It is still supported in Audit instances via ServiceControl.Audit/MaxBodySizeToStore setting
Type: int
Default: 102400 (100Kb)
ServiceControl/HttpDefaultConnectionLimit
The maximum number of concurrent connections allowed by ServiceControl. When working with transports that operate over HTTP, the number of concurrent connections can be increased to meet transport concurrency settings.
Type: string
Default: 100
ServiceControl/EnableFullTextSearchOnBodies
Version: 4.17.0+
Use this setting to configure whether the bodies of processed error messages should be full-text indexed for searching.
Type: bool true or false
Default: true.
Transport
ServiceControl/TransportType
The transport type to run ServiceControl with.
Type: string
Default: ServiceControl.
The assembly containing the transport type needs to be present in the ServiceControl directory for ServiceControl being able to instantiate the transport type.
NServiceBus/Transport
The connection string for the transport. This setting should be placed in the connectionStrings section of the configuration file.
Type: string
ServiceBus/ErrorQueue
The error queue name.
Type: string
Default: error
ServiceBus/ErrorLogQueue
The error queue name to use for forwarding error messages.
Type: string
Default:
ServiceControl creates the queue specified by this setting only if ServiceControl/ is enabled.
Changing the configuration file directly will not result in the queue being created. Use ServiceControl Management to add or alter the forwarding queue.
ServiceControl/ForwardErrorMessages
Use this setting to configure whether processed error messages are forwarded to another queue or not.
Type: bool true or false
Default: There is no default. This setting needs to be specified.
This entry should be set to false if there is no external process reading messages from the Error Forwarding Queue.
See Installation for details on how to set this at install time.
Plugin-specific
ServiceControl/HeartbeatGracePeriod
The period that defines whether an endpoint is considered alive or not since the last received heartbeat.
Type: timespan
Default: 00:00:40 (40 secs)
When configuring the heartbeat grace period, make sure it is greater than the heartbeat interval defined by the plugin.
When monitoring multiple endpoints, ensure that the heartbeat grace period is larger than any individual heartbeat interval set by the endpoints.
Troubleshooting
ServiceControl/ExposeRavenDB
ServiceControl stores its data in a RavenDB embedded instance. By default, the RavenDB instance is accessible only by the ServiceControl service. If during troubleshooting, direct access to the RavenDB instance is required while ServiceControl is running, ServiceControl can be configured to expose the RavenDB studio.
Maintenance mode is the recommended way to review documents in the embedded RavenDB instance.
The ServiceControl RavenDB embedded instance is used exclusively by ServiceControl and is not intended for external manipulation or modifications.
Type: bool
Default: false
After restarting the ServiceControl service, access the RavenDB studio locally at the following endpoint:
http://localhost:{configured ServiceControl instance maintenance port}/studio/index.html#databases/documents?&database=%3Csystem%3E
The ServiceControl embedded RavenDB studio can be accessed from localhost regardless of the hostname customization setting. To allow external access, the hostname must be set to a fully qualified domain name.
ServiceControl/DataSpaceRemainingThreshold
The percentage threshold for the Message database storage space check. If the remaining hard drive space drops below this threshold (as a percentage of the total space on the drive), then the check will fail, alerting the user.
Type: int
Default: 20
ServiceControl/MinimumStorageLeftRequiredForIngestion
This setting was introduced in version 4.28. The percentage threshold for the Critical message database storage space check. If the remaining hard drive space drops below this threshold (as a percentage of the total space on the drive), then the check will fail, alerting the user. The message ingestion will also be stopped to prevent data loss. Message ingestion will resume once more disk space is made available.
Type: int
Default: 5