Question about Problem "MERGED"

[menda]

Hi All,

I have a question about Problem Merged.

Sometimes, Dynatrace merges problem with another one.

What conditions does this occur?

Can I know if the problem has been merged on the screen?

Best Regards,

Masahiko Enda

[wolfgang_beer · Accepted solution]

Dynatrace Davis AI merges problems if it finds two problems sharing the same root-cause. Most merges happen before a problem is even raised, so you do not really see them. In some cases a merge happens after a problem was already opened, then two problems are merged. We do handle that transparently, so within the Web UI you get one merged problem as a result. Both problem links will lead to the same merged problem. Problem notification sends out a MERGED state instead of a OPEN or RESOLVED state.

[sivart_89]

Is there any official documentation on this? I've seen situations where it seems some times a root cause will be provided for things such as a problem being shutdown then sometimes you shutdown the same process on a different host and you don't get a root cause.

I've bene trying to reproduce the situation where merging occurs but can't seem to find a definitive process to do that. We are looking to enable the 'Call webhook if new events merge into existing problems' feature but I want to understand what things look like before so I know the difference for when we enable it.

[PedroDeodato]

Have you had any updates on this matter? I have exactly the same questions!

[carlos_ortega]

Hi wolfgang,

We need to know how David works in order to merge problems. We have several scenarios that we don't understand:

1.- "multiple infraestructure problem" in which there are events that don't relation among them.

2.- Several problems with the same events that are not merged.

Can you tell us detail about how this feature works?

thanks

[jordan_rose]

Hi, I know this is an old post but does it still work like this? My question is for this scenario - 

If webhook is called for problem P-123 with "State = Open" and then P-123 is merged into P-234, what happens? Is webhook called for P-123 with "State = Merged"? 

We do have the "call webhook if problems merge..." option enabled.

[danielbr]

Hi @jordan_rose 

Were you able to get an answer for your question??
Does a webhook fire with merge for problem P-123?

Daniel

[jordan_rose]

Hi @danielbr ,

I have all but given up on this one. Support gave me the same answer as above. I have never seen a problem with status of "MERGED" and I have done extensive searching, but they do say you will rarely see that since it apparently happens before problems are created. 

We had a scenario where we sent several requests via webhook and the problems were all merged into one and they were left stale on our "monitoring board". I only enabled Call webhook for merged problems" after this and have yet to see any problems with status of MERGED. So I havent been able to test this. Explanations from support are vague at best, good luck!

[Julius_Loman]

Hi @danielbr @jordan_rose ,
Davis does not merge problems anymore. This was true with Davis 1.0 (until ~Dynatrace 1.181, so 4 years ago) problems were merged. With the current Davis root cause analysis, problems are marked as duplicates. With 1.0 you had this MERGE problem status, but this caused issues with integrations to other event management systems. 

[jordan_rose]

@Julius_Loman Thanks for the update. Chat support just recently told me MERGED problems are still a thing and even explained how they work even though I couldn't find any evidence of it. Also the custom integration still has an option to "Call webhook if new events merge into existing problems". Is it safe to assume that does nothing?

Do you know if hidden/duplicate problems call the webhook integration?

Thanks,

Jordan

[Julius_Loman]

@jordan_rose it does  .. One needs to distinguish between problem and event. Those are separate things within Dynatrace. Problems are raised based on events. A problem may consist of dozens of events. Just check the problem lifecycle. 

Afaik any problems call the webhook integration.