Foglight 6.0.0 - Administration and Configuration Guide

Manage Data Retention

Retention policies allow you to define how monitoring data is aggregated and for long it is kept before being purged from Foglight. All topology objects in Foglight form a hierarchy whose root is the super-type TopologyObject. Retention policies are inherited from the object’s type. These policies may be overwritten, in which case the modification applies to all child types in the hierarchy.

In addition to retention policies, the collected data has additional life-cycle properties that are defined in storage-config.xml. The life cycle involves several iterations of data collection, aggregation, and storage in database generations. Database generations are database structures that store aggregated data for a specific period of time.

For example, the default retention policy associated with TopologyObject causes the collected data to be rolled up to 15-minute periods after the age of 15 minutes, and stored in Generation 1 for three days. From there, four-hour interval data is rolled up to one-hour periods, and then stored in Generation 2. After 14 days, 5-day interval data from Generation 2 is rolled up to four-hour periods and stored in Generation 3 indefinitely, or until it is purged.

If there is no existing retention policy for a topology type, that type inherits the retention policy from its parent type. If no policies exist within the entire hierarchy, the type inherits the policy from the TopologyObject type. Conversely, setting a retention policy for a topology type completely overrides any policy it inherits from a super-type, and is applied to all sub-types of that topology type.

You create and manage data retention policies using the Retention Policies dashboard. To access this dashboard, from the navigation panel, click Dashboards > Administration > Data > Manage Retention Policies.

Another way to control the retention policies is through the Retention Policies dashboard. This dashboard allows you to control system-wide retention policies and to delete unwanted data from the database as a performance-tuning measure. For more information, see Manage Foglight Database Performance.

For more information, see the following topics:

Expand Your Collection of Topology Types

The set of topology types that exist in your environment depends on your monitoring needs, reflected in the type and nature of cartridges that you use for data collection. If you need additional topology types, you can add them to Foglight.

The following example shows the syntax for defining a topology type:

The Add Topology Types dashboard allows you to add new topology types to your topology model and to validate them. To access this dashboard, from the navigation panel, click Dashboards > Administration > Data > Add Topology Type.

You can explore your database schema using the Schema Browser. You can access the Schema Browser using the Dashboard Development page. For additional details, see the Dashboard Support Guide.

For more information, see Adding topology types.

Customizing Your Foglight Environment with Tooling

Foglight® includes a set of advanced administration features that allow you to address your monitoring needs beyond typical day-to-day use. These features are described in this .

For more information, see the following topics:

Merging Host Objects

Merging two or more hosts refers to the ability to consolidate data for those host objects using host aliasing rules.A host aliasing rule includes one or more property matching filters that select the topology objects that are to be merged, along with the logical definition of the merge operation. Property matching filters can only reference a subset of the entire property set for a topology type such as String or Boolean properties.

Simple merging rules contain one stand-alone rule. They are used to merge one or more host objects, or to rename a host object in the model. Advanced merging rules consist of a group of individual rules that are executed in pre-defined order. They can merge one or more topology objects. For example, merging two agent instances involves a rule for transforming the instance name and another one for merging the two instances.

Merging rules are useful in situations when a host name changes and there is a need to consolidate the data under a single host object. Consider for example an Agent Manager installed on a host whose name is Toronto123. The host reports into Foglight as Toronto123, which creates a new Host object, Toronto123. The system administrator modifies the host’s configuration which causes Toronto123 to start reporting itself using its IP address, 10.1.234.56. When the Agent Manager collects information from the newly-renamed host, a new Host object is created on the server, with the name 10.1.234.56. After noticing the problem, the Foglight administrator solves it by creating an alias for the host, mapping it to its original name, Toronto123.

Use the Manage Host Aliasing Rules dashboard to create host aliasing rules or to manage the existing ones. To access this dashboard, from the navigation panel, click Dashboards > Administration > Tooling > Manage Host Aliasing Rules.