VCF Operations Alerts using Dynamic Thresholds

We've discussed VCF Operations Dynamic Thresholds (DTs) a few times, mostly going into the details of what DTs are and how they are calculated.

• Aria Operations Dynamic Thresholds

• VMware Aria Operations Dynamic Thresholding

• The New Way of Evaluating Dynamic Thresholds in Aria Operations

In this blog I'd like to detail the use of DTs in VCF Operations Alert Definitions. In relation to this, it's important to highlight the last blog listed above, namely that Alert Definitions using DTs are only evaluated once daily (as of Operations 8.17) at the time configured in Administration - Global Settings - System Settings. Let's have a look.

All screenshots here are taken from VCF Operations 9.0.2. We'll first create a Symptom Definition using Dynamic Thresholds. Note: Dynamic Thresholds can't be used with Conditions.

In this Symptom Definition I'm using the CPU Usage (%) metric. Top right I've indicated to use a DT and the operator is "Above Threshold" in this case, but we also support "Below Threshold" and "Abnormal" which is either above or below the DT range.

Once I've created my Symptom Definition I create an Alert Definition using it.

Looking at CPU Usage (%) on a VM that has spiked beyond the DT looks like this.

Looking at the DTs themselves, they are .28 - 5.11 %. And as you can see we have a spike that went beyond that 5.11%, generating an Alert.

Note: the wording of the Alert isn't exactly as it should be, I have a bug open to get this fixed. Our Alert was generated as expected though, hope this was helpful, enjoy!