Diagnostics for alerted issues

The Diagnostics dashboard streamlines the process of resolving issues that are impacting multiple devices. View alert information and underlying events to understand why the system triggered the alert, and how to troubleshoot the issue.

Monitors supported by the Diagnostics dashboard

The primary objective of the Diagnostics dashboard is to efficiently address issues affecting multiple devices. As such, it is not available for alerts triggered for an individual device or an individual user.

The Diagnostics dashboard currently supports the following monitors:

Built-in monitors with metric change detection
Built-in monitors with event metric threshold detection
Custom monitors that track aggregated event metrics
Custom monitors that track the summarized number of devices with issues based on an event metric.

For some rare custom monitors, the system may not yet be able to generate a troubleshooting dashboard. Nexthink will continue to improve dashboards for custom monitors in coming releases.

Diagnostics dashboard scope

Metric

The content on the dashboard changes dynamically depending on the alerted issue and whether the monitor type is metric change or metric threshold.

Additionally:

For custom monitors that evaluate more than one metric, the system only shows the metric that is used as the first aggregated metric in the monitor conditions.
For custom monitors that track the summarized number of devices with issues based on an event metric, the system selects the event metric by analyzing the monitor query.

Timeframe

The system preselects the timeframe based on the triggered alert. You cannot change this timeframe.

Monitor query filters

All filters applied in the monitor NQL query that are relevant for the monitored event metric are reflected in the Diagnostics dashboard.

A simple filter with a single value that includes data available in dashboard breakdowns is visible in the filter area. Remove the filter or apply it by clicking on the items in the breakdown charts.

A complex filter that can include multiple values for many properties is not directly visible in the filter area. You cannot remove this filter.

Dashboard Summary

At the top of a Diagnostics page of an alerted issue you can find the monitor name, the context for which the alert was triggered and the main condition that the system is monitoring.

Devices impacted during the last alert

You may also consult the number of impacted devices during the last alert in the top-right corner of the page. Consider the following:

The KPIs only show the number of devices impacted during the last alert.
The system regularly updates impacted devices until the alert is recovered.

Refer to the 'Understanding Impacted devices' section in the Alerts overview documentation.

To open the list of impacted devices:

Hover over the gauge to reveal the action menu.
Select Drill down to devices to open the Investigations page with the impacted devices' results.

Alert timeline

View the timeline of the alert and the monitored metric. The monitor provides the values in the timeline, and the metric value aggregation corresponds to the monitor’s NQL query.

Alert timeline for Metric change monitors

In the case of alerts triggered by changes in the monitored metric, i.e. Metric change and Metric seasonal change monitors, to see the timeline values:

Hover over the line chart to reveal the monitored metric values, the Baseline values, the Threshold values and the details of the triggered alert.

The Threshold value consists of Baseline value plus the custom-defined rule for the threshold.

Baseline estimation

The system calculates the Baseline value in the timeline based on customers' data only. The baseline is exclusive to alerts that monitor changes, and the calculation depends on the monitor type:

Metric change: The line represents the average from the last 7 days of all data points as defined in the monitor.
Seasonal metric change: The line represents the average from the last 7 days of all data points at a given time of the day for the metric as defined in the monitor.

Alert timeline for Metric threshold monitors

In the case of alerts triggered by breaches in a custom-defined static threshold, i.e. Metric threshold monitors, to see the timeline values:

Hover over the line chart to reveal the last monitored metric value KPI. If the metric is a ratio, the timeline displays the numerator of that ratio.

Alert timeline drill-downs

You can delve into the monitor’s NQL queries populating the alert timeline:

Hover over the KPI above the timeline to reveal the action menu. The Drill down to options vary depending on the alert issue or monitor.
Select the desired drill-down option to open the Investigations page with the results of the NQL query.

Object-count timeline

The bar chart below the alert timeline displays the device or user count based on the monitor's metric configuration. If the metric is a ratio, the timeline shows the numerator of that ratio:

Hover over the bar chart to reveal the object-count value.

Breakdowns

The breakdown tables enable detailed scoping of the analyzed issue. Use breakdowns to filter the page and focus on the specific employee population or technical criteria.

Filter results by Technical criteria such as the:
- Operating system
- Platform
- Device model
- Virtualization type
Organization: Filter results by entity and organizational hierarchy.
Location: Filter results by geolocation hierarchy. You must enable the geolocation feature first on the Product configuration page. Refer to the Product configuration documentation for more information.