I’m usually pretty hesitant to share scripts I write because inevitably it will get torn to pieces, but in this case I’d actually like some feedback so I can continue to grow this solution.
This script spawned from Jorge Segarra (@SQLChicken) and I working on a project together that had a SQL Agent job that somehow got hung up for 4 days on the SQL Server when it normally takes less than 10 minutes. Now, Jorge is a superb DBA so he had setup notifications upon SQL Agent failures but we had no way of knowing something was wrong with this particular job because it never actually failed.

So Jorge and I discussed the problem and thought why can’t we get some kind of notification for excessively long running jobs just like we get failures. So with our powers combined we came up with this solution.

Pre-Requisites:

• Permission to msdb..sysjobhistory, msdb..sysjobs, msdb..sysjobactivity
• Database mail setup (If you choose to be notified of a long running job)
• A database to store the stored procedure and log table the script loads. Jorge already had a database called DBAdmin on all his servers so he could store scripts like Brent Ozar’s sp_Blitz script and other things he finds useful as a DBA.

Script:

This first script creates the log table which will only be inserted into when a job exceeds the time limit you deem to be excessive.

CREATE TABLE [dbo].[LongRunningJobs](
[ID] [int] IDENTITY(1,1) NOT NULL,
[JobName] [sysname] NOT NULL,
[JobID] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL,
[StartExecutionDate] [datetime] NULL,
[AvgDurationMin] [int] NULL,
[DurationLimit] [int] NULL,
[CurrentDuration] [int] NULL,
[RowInsertDate] [datetime] NOT NULL
) ON [PRIMARY]
GO
ALTER TABLE [dbo].[LongRunningJobs] 
ADD CONSTRAINT [DF_LongRunningJobs_Date] DEFAULT(getdate())
FOR [RowInsertDate]

This second part requires more explanation and we’ve tried to detail what we did and why we did it with comments throughout the code. A high level description would be that this script looks at the average run time of a job and if a job that is currently running exceeds the average by 150 percent (arbitrary number that you can change) then it alerts the DBA team using database mail. So right away you may see some flaws (runtimes could vary drastically) with our plan but this is v1 so give us feedback!

Here’s the script to create the stored procedure. Our thought was to run this on a SQL Agent job as well every 5 minutes or so.  

-- =============================================
-- Author:        Devin Knight and Jorge Segarra
-- Create date: 7/6/2012
-- Description:    Monitors currently running SQL Agent jobs and
-- alerts admins if runtime passes set threshold
-- Updates: 7/11/2012   Changed Method for capturing currently running jobs to use master.dbo.xp_sqlagent_enum_jobs 1, ''
--
-- =============================================
CREATE PROCEDURE [dbo].[usp_LongRunningJobs]
AS
--Set Mail Profile
DECLARE @MailProfile VARCHAR(50)
 
SET @MailProfile = (
        SELECT @@SERVERNAME
        ) --Replace with your mail profile name
 
--Set Email Recipients
DECLARE @MailRecipients VARCHAR(50)
 
SET @MailRecipients = 'DBAGroup@adventureworks.com'
 
--Set limit in minutes (applies to all jobs)
--NOTE: Percentage limit is applied to all jobs where average runtime greater than 5 minutes
--else the time limit is simply average + 10 minutes
DECLARE @JobLimitPercentage FLOAT
 
SET @JobLimitPercentage = 150 --Use whole percentages greater than 100
    -- Create intermediate work tables for currently running jobs
 
DECLARE @currently_running_jobs TABLE (
    job_id UNIQUEIDENTIFIER NOT NULL
    ,last_run_date INT NOT NULL
    ,last_run_time INT NOT NULL
    ,next_run_date INT NOT NULL
    ,next_run_time INT NOT NULL
    ,next_run_schedule_id INT NOT NULL
    ,requested_to_run INT NOT NULL
    ,-- BOOL
    request_source INT NOT NULL
    ,request_source_id SYSNAME COLLATE database_default NULL
    ,running INT NOT NULL
    ,-- BOOL
    current_step INT NOT NULL
    ,current_retry_attempt INT NOT NULL
    ,job_state INT NOT NULL
    ) -- 0 = Not idle or suspended, 1 = Executing, 2 = Waiting For Thread, 3 = Between Retries, 4 = Idle, 5 = Suspended, [6 = WaitingForStepToFinish], 7 = PerformingCompletionActions
 
--Capture Jobs currently working
INSERT INTO @currently_running_jobs
EXECUTE master.dbo.xp_sqlagent_enum_jobs 1,''
 
--Temp table exists check
IF OBJECT_ID('tempdb..##RunningJobs') IS NOT NULL
    DROP TABLE ##RunningJobs
 
CREATE TABLE ##RunningJobs (
    [JobID] [UNIQUEIDENTIFIER] NOT NULL
    ,[JobName] [sysname] NOT NULL
    ,[StartExecutionDate] [DATETIME] NOT NULL
    ,[AvgDurationMin] [INT] NULL
    ,[DurationLimit] [INT] NULL
    ,[CurrentDuration] [INT] NULL
    )
 
INSERT INTO ##RunningJobs (
    JobID
    ,JobName
    ,StartExecutionDate
    ,AvgDurationMin
    ,DurationLimit
    ,CurrentDuration
    )
SELECT jobs.Job_ID AS JobID
    ,jobs.NAME AS JobName
    ,act.start_execution_date AS StartExecutionDate
    ,AVG(FLOOR(run_duration / 100)) AS AvgDurationMin
    ,CASE
        --If job average less than 5 minutes then limit is avg+10 minutes
        WHEN AVG(FLOOR(run_duration / 100)) <= 5
            THEN (AVG(FLOOR(run_duration / 100))) + 10
        --If job average greater than 5 minutes then limit is avg*limit percentage
        ELSE (AVG(FLOOR(run_duration / 100)) * (@JobLimitPercentage / 100))
        END AS DurationLimit
    ,DATEDIFF(MI, act.start_execution_date, GETDATE()) AS [CurrentDuration]
FROM @currently_running_jobs crj
INNER JOIN msdb..sysjobs AS jobs ON crj.job_id = jobs.job_id
INNER JOIN msdb..sysjobactivity AS act ON act.job_id = crj.job_id
    AND act.stop_execution_date IS NULL
    AND act.start_execution_date IS NOT NULL
INNER JOIN msdb..sysjobhistory AS hist ON hist.job_id = crj.job_id
    AND hist.step_id = 0
WHERE crj.job_state = 1
GROUP BY jobs.job_ID
    ,jobs.NAME
    ,act.start_execution_date
    ,DATEDIFF(MI, act.start_execution_date, GETDATE())
HAVING CASE
        WHEN AVG(FLOOR(run_duration / 100)) <= 5
            THEN (AVG(FLOOR(run_duration / 100))) + 10
        ELSE (AVG(FLOOR(run_duration / 100)) * (@JobLimitPercentage / 100))
        END < DATEDIFF(MI, act.start_execution_date, GETDATE())
 
--Checks to see if a long running job has already been identified so you are not alerted multiple times
IF EXISTS (
        SELECT RJ.*
        FROM ##RunningJobs RJ
        WHERE CHECKSUM(RJ.JobID, RJ.StartExecutionDate) NOT IN (
                SELECT CHECKSUM(JobID, StartExecutionDate)
                FROM dbo.LongRunningJobs
                )
        )
    --Send email with results of long-running jobs
    EXEC msdb.dbo.sp_send_dbmail @profile_name = @MailProfile
        ,@recipients = @MailRecipients
        ,@query = 'USE DBAdmin; Select RJ.*
From ##RunningJobs RJ
WHERE CHECKSUM(RJ.JobID,RJ.StartExecutionDate) NOT IN (Select CHECKSUM(JobID,StartExecutionDate) From dbo.LongRunningJobs) '
        ,@body = 'View attachment to view long running jobs'
        ,@subject = 'Long Running SQL Agent Job Alert'
        ,@attach_query_result_as_file = 1;
 
--Populate LongRunningJobs table with jobs exceeding established limits
INSERT INTO [DBAdmin].[dbo].[LongRunningJobs] (
    [JobID]
    ,[JobName]
    ,[StartExecutionDate]
    ,[AvgDurationMin]
    ,[DurationLimit]
    ,[CurrentDuration]
    ) (
    SELECT RJ.* FROM ##RunningJobs RJ WHERE CHECKSUM(RJ.JobID, RJ.StartExecutionDate) NOT IN (
        SELECT CHECKSUM(JobID, StartExecutionDate)
        FROM dbo.LongRunningJobs
        )
    )
    DROP TABLE ##RunningJobs
GO

Again please email me with any changes you find necessary so that I can happily update this script. Expect a similar post by Jorge on this too, he’s a co-author of the solution!