Configuring alerts

You can configure alerts to produce events by using some of the built-in functions in Analytics Service. Alerts are configured to fire when your data falls outside of specific thresholds.

About this task

Several built-in functions are available in the function catalog in Analytics Service:

• AlertExpression: Trigger an alert when the value of a data item reaches a particular level. Specify the condition to evaluate by using a pandas expression. Reference a data item by using the format df['data_item'] in your expression.
  Example: You might want to trigger an alert when the temperature exceeds a value of 100. When you configure the function, in the expression field, enter:

  df['temperature']>100
  

  For more information about writing expressions, see Using expressions.
• AlertExpressionWithFilter (Maximo Asset Monitor (SaaS) only): Trigger an alert when the alert condition is met. Define the alert condition as an expression by using pandas syntax. Apply a filter to the expression using a dimension value. Example: You might want to trigger an alert when temperature exceeds a value of 100 for device ID 73000. When you configure the function, select entity_id in the dimension_name filed, and enter 73000 in the dimenson_value field. Then, in the expression field enter:

   df['temperature']>100
  

• AlertExpressionWithFilterExt (Beta only): Configure the alert in the same way as you configure AlertExpressionWithFilter. Select pulse_trigger to suppress consecutive alerts. For example, if the alert condition evaluates to true for 100 consecutive data points, an alert is generated for the first data point only.
• AlertLowValue: Trigger an alert when the value of a data item drops below a specified lower threshold value.
• AlertHighValue: Trigger an alert when the value of a data item exceeds an upper threshold value.
• AlertOutOfRange: Trigger an alert when the value of a data item exceeds an upper threshold or drops below a lower threshold.

Note: The name that you give the alert (output metric) must be no more than 36 characters in length and consist only of ASCII alphanumeric characteristics and the special characters hyperns (-) and underscores (_).

Steps

To configure an alert, complete these steps:

1. From the side menu, click Setup.
2. From the Device types tab, select your device type and click Manage device type.
3. Select the Data tab. The data items are displayed.
4. Click to open the catalog.
5. Browse to find an alert function. Tip: Enter 'alert' in the search field.
6. Select an alert, for example, 'AlertHighValue'.
7. On the Configuration tab, select a data item to alert on in the input_item field.
8. Specify some threshold levels.
9. Assign a severity level.
10. Set the default status of the alert.
11. Set a priority for the alert, if required.
12. Click Next.
13. On the output tab, enter an alert name in the output metric field.
14. Click Create.
15. Find the alert data item on the Data tab. Alerts are labeled as Alert (calculated).
16. Wait at least 5 minutes for the function to run as part of the pipeline.
17. Verify that when a threshold is exceeded, a value of TRUE is generated for the data item.