Usage Alerts

A Usage alert profile (or flow analysis alert profile) is a set of conditions that define the limits of acceptable application usage for a monitored link. Based on the alert profile, APM can alert you if application usage conditions are outside of acceptable limits. These limits are defined in terms of traffic flow characteristics like traffic volume, application classification, and QoS type. If a condition is violated, indicating unacceptable performance, an alert is triggered. The alert is cleared when the condition returns to an acceptable level. APM indicates violation and clear events on the time axis of the Usage monitoring charts and in its event logs. If configured, it will also notify you by email.

For Usage alerts to take effect Usage monitoring must be started, an alert profile must be created, and then the profile must be applied to one or more monitoring points.

Create a Usage alert profile

To create a Usage alert profile:

  1. Navigate to > Manage Alert Profiles > Flow Analysis.
  2. Click New.
    • The New Flow Alert Profile page appears.
  3. In the Name field, specify the name of the alert profile you are creating.
  4. In the Select Condition field, select the condition you want to monitor.
  5. In the Rate field, specify whether you are alerting on the traffic rate or the retransmit rate.
  6. In the Direction field, specify the direction of traffic the alert is to monitor.
  7. In the Violates When field, specify the traffic volume threshold for the selected condition/rate/direction.
  8. Click Add Condition to add the condition to the profile.
    • Add more conditions to the profile if required.
  9. Click OK to save the profile.

Create a Usage alert profile based on an existing profile

To create a Usage profile based on an existing one:

  1. Navigate to > Manage Alert Profiles > Flow Analysis.
  2. Select the profile you want to base the new one on from the list.
  3. Click Copy.
    • A copy of the selected alert profile is created.
  4. In the Name field, specify the name of the alert profile you are creating.
  5. Edit the profile as required.
  6. Click OK to save the profile.

Edit a Usage alert profile

To edit a Usage alert profile:

  1. Navigate to > Manage Alert Profiles > Flow Analysis.
  2. Select the profile to edit from the list.
  3. Click Edit.
    • Add conditions to the profile by specifying the condition and clicking Add Condition.
    • Modify an existing condition by selecting the condition, modifying it, then clicking Add Condition.
    • Remove conditions from the profile by clicking the Remove button next to the condition you want to remove.
  4. Click OK to save your changes.

Delete a Usage alert profile

To delete a Usage alert profile:

  1. Navigate to > Manage Alert Profiles > Flow Analysis.
  2. Select the profile to delete from the list.
  3. Click Delete.
  4. Click OK.

Apply a Usage alert profile to a monitoring point

The last step in setting up Usage alerts is to apply a Usage alert profile to a monitoring point.

To apply a Usage alert profile to a monitoring point:

  1. Navigate to Usage > Monitoring Points.
  2. For the monitoring point interface you want to configure, click the icon.
  3. In the Configure dropdown, select Alert Profiles.
  4. In the Flow Alert Profile section, select the profile to apply.
  5. Click Apply.
    • The selected alert profile is applied to the monitoring point.

Remove a Usage alert profile from a monitoring point

To remove a Usage alert profile from a monitoring point:

  1. Navigate to Usage > Monitoring Points.
  2. For the monitoring point interface you want to configure, click the icon.
  3. In the Configure dropdown, select Alert Profiles.
  4. In the Flow Alert Profile section, select None.
  5. Click Apply.
    • No alert profiles are applied to the monitoring point.