Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor

Overview

This document provides a detailed guide to integrating Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor with Callgoose SQIBS for real-time Incident Management, Incident Auto Remediation, Event-Driven Automation, and other automation purposes. The integration enables automatic creation, updating, and resolution of incidents in Callgoose SQIBS based on alerts triggered in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor. The guide includes steps for setting up CloudMonitor alerts, configuring webhook notifications, creating API filters in Callgoose SQIBS, and troubleshooting.

Prerequisites

• Alibaba Cloud Account: Access to Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor.
• Callgoose SQIBS Account: With valid privileges to set up API filters and receive notifications.
• Webhook/API Endpoint: Available in Callgoose SQIBS to receive alerts from Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor.

1. Obtain API Token and Endpoint Details

To integrate with Callgoose SQIBS, you first need to obtain an API token and find the API endpoint details.

• Generate an API Token:
• Follow the guide on How to Create API Token in Callgoose SQIBS.
• Find the API Endpoint:
• Refer to the Callgoose SQIBS API Endpoint Documentation to get the endpoint details where the JSON payloads from Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor will be sent.

2. Debugging and Troubleshooting

You can enable debugging in the API tokens used with Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor notifications for troubleshooting purposes.

• Enable Debugging:
• You can update the debug value when adding or updating an API token.
• When API tracking is enabled, logs are stored in the API log section for your review. The debugging option will automatically disable after 48 hours.
• When API tracking is turned off, no logs are saved in the API log.
• Using API Log for Troubleshooting:
• The API log provides detailed information on all API calls made to Callgoose SQIBS.
• You can check the JSON values in each API log entry for troubleshooting purposes.
• Use the information in the API log to create or refine API filters to ensure incidents are created correctly based on the API payloads received.
• Callgoose SQIBS creates incidents according to your API filter configuration, giving you full control over how alerts from different services trigger incidents and alerts for your support team or automation processes.

3. Configuring Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor to Send JSON Payloads

To configure Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor to generate the JSON payloads similar to the examples provided, follow the steps outlined below. These steps will guide you through setting up the necessary alerts and webhook notifications within CloudMonitor to ensure that the JSON payloads match those expected by Callgoose SQIBS.

3.1 Setting Up Alerts in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor

To generate the required JSON payloads, you first need to set up alerts within CloudMonitor.

• Log in to the Alibaba Cloud Console:
• Access the Alibaba Cloud platform using your account credentials.
• Navigate to the CloudMonitor Section:
• In the Alibaba Cloud console, go to the CloudMonitor service.
• Create a New Alert:
• Click on Create Alarm to create a new alert.
• Specify Alarm Conditions: Define the conditions that will trigger the alert, such as specific performance thresholds, security events, or custom metrics.
• Configure the Notification Method:
• Choose Webhook as the notification method to send data to a webhook.
• Webhook URL: Enter the webhook URL provided by Callgoose SQIBS.

3.2 Configuring the Webhook Notification

To ensure that the JSON payload sent matches the examples provided, follow these steps when configuring the webhook:

• Add Webhook URL:
• In the Webhook URL field, enter the endpoint provided by Callgoose SQIBS.
• Ensure the protocol is HTTPS for secure data transmission.
• Customize Payload Format:
• Ensure that the payload includes key fields like "status", "event", "severity", "description", "timestamp", and others as shown in the example payloads.
• Example Payload Setup:

json

{
  "event": {
    "id": "$EVENT_ID",
    "status": "$STATUS",
    "severity": "$SEVERITY",
    "description": "$DESCRIPTION",
    "host": "$HOST",
    "timestamp": "$TIMESTAMP"
  }
}

• Placeholder Explanation:
• "$STATUS": Replaces with the status of the event (e.g., OK, CRITICAL).
• "$EVENT_ID": A unique identifier for the event.
• "$SEVERITY": The level of urgency.
• "$DESCRIPTION": A descriptive message of the event.
• "$HOST": The affected host.
• "$TIMESTAMP": The time the event occurred.
• Test the Webhook Configuration:
• Before activating the webhook, perform a test to ensure that the JSON payload is correctly formatted and is being sent to the Callgoose SQIBS API endpoint as expected.
• Review the payload in Callgoose SQIBS to confirm that it matches the expected structure.

4. Configuring Callgoose SQIBS

4.1 Create API Filters in Callgoose SQIBS

To correctly map incidents from the Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor alerts, you need to create API filters based on the JSON payloads received.

4.1.1 Example JSON Payloads from Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor

Alert Triggered (status: "CRITICAL")

json

{
  "event": {
    "id": "event123",
    "status": "CRITICAL",
    "severity": "high",
    "description": "CPU utilization is above 80%",
    "host": "server1.alibabacloud.com",
    "timestamp": "2024-08-05T12:00:00.000Z"
  }
}

Alert Resolved (status: "OK")

json

{
  "event": {
    "id": "event123",
    "status": "OK",
    "severity": "low",
    "description": "CPU utilization is back to normal",
    "host": "server1.alibabacloud.com",
    "timestamp": "2024-08-05T12:30:00.000Z"
  }
}

4.2 Configuring API Filters

4.2.1 Integration Templates

If you see an Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor integration template in the "Select Integration Template" dropdown in the API filter settings, you can use it to automatically add the necessary Trigger and Resolve filters along with other values. The values added by the template can be modified to customize the integration according to your requirements. Click here for details.

4.2.2 Manually Add/Edit the Filter

Trigger Filter (For Creating Incidents):

• Payload JSON Key: "status"
• Key Value Contains: [CRITICAL, WARNING]
• Map Incident With: "event.id"
• This corresponds to the unique event.id from the Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor payload.
• Incident Title From: "event.description"
• This will use the event description as the incident title in Callgoose SQIBS.
• Incident Description From: Leave this empty unless you want to use a specific key-value from the JSON payload. If a key is entered, only the value for that key will be used as the Incident Description instead of the full JSON. By default, the Incident Description will include the full JSON values.
• Example: If you use the "description" key in the Incident Description From field, the incident description will be the value of the "description" key. In the example JSON payload provided earlier, this would result in a description like "CPU utilization is above 80%".

Resolve Filter (For Resolving Incidents):

• Payload JSON Key: "status"
• Key Value Contains: [OK]
• Incident Mapped With: "event.id"
• This ensures the incident tied to the specific event.id is resolved when the alert status returns to normal.

Refer to the API Filter Instructions and FAQ for more details.

4.3 Finalizing Setup

• Save the API Filters:
• Ensure that the filters are correctly configured and saved in Callgoose SQIBS.
• Double-check that all key mappings, incident titles, and descriptions are correctly aligned with the payload structure sent by Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor.
• Test the Integration:
• Manually Trigger an Alert:
• Trigger an alert in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor that meets the criteria set in your API filters to ensure that incidents are created in Callgoose SQIBS.
• Verify Incident Creation:
• Check Callgoose SQIBS to confirm that the incident appears with the correct title, description, and other relevant details.
• Resolve the Alert:
• Acknowledge and Resolve the Alert:
• Once the issue is resolved in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor, ensure that the incident in Callgoose SQIBS is automatically marked as resolved.
• Verification:
• Verify that the incident is updated with the resolution status and that the resolution process is reflected accurately in Callgoose SQIBS.

5. Testing and Validation

5.1 Triggering Alerts

• Simulate a Monitoring Alert:
• Simulate a condition in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor that triggers an alert (e.g., CPU utilization exceeding a certain threshold).
• Verify that an incident is created in Callgoose SQIBS with the correct information.

5.2 Resolving Alerts

• Acknowledge and Resolve the Alert:
• After resolving the underlying issue in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor, ensure that the incident in Callgoose SQIBS is automatically marked as resolved.
• Validate the Resolution:
• Ensure that the resolution status and other relevant details are accurately reflected in Callgoose SQIBS.

6. Security Considerations

• API Security:
• Ensure that the Callgoose SQIBS API endpoint is configured securely and that the API token is securely stored and used.
• Alibaba Cloud Permissions:
• Confirm that the webhook in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor has appropriate permissions to send alerts and data to Callgoose SQIBS.
• Data Encryption:
• Ensure that the transmission of data between Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor and Callgoose SQIBS is encrypted, especially if sensitive information is involved.

7. Troubleshooting

• No Incident Created:
• If no incident is created, verify that the webhook URL in Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor is correct and that the JSON payload structure matches the API filters configured in Callgoose SQIBS.
• Incident Not Resolved:
• Ensure that the resolve filter in Callgoose SQIBS is correctly configured and that the JSON payload sent by Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor matches the expected structure.

8. Conclusion

This guide provides a comprehensive overview of how to integrate Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor with Callgoose SQIBS for effective incident management. By following the steps outlined, you can ensure that alerts from Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor are automatically reflected as incidents in Callgoose SQIBS, with proper resolution tracking when the issues are resolved.

For further customization or advanced use cases, refer to the official documentation for both Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor and Callgoose SQIBS:

• Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor Documentation
• Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor Webbook
• Callgoose SQIBS API Token Documentation
• Callgoose SQIBS API Endpoint Documentation
• API Filter Instructions and FAQ
• How to Send API

This documentation will guide you through the integration process, ensuring that your incidents are managed effectively within Callgoose SQIBS based on real-time alerts from Alibaba Cloud CloudMonitor.