Documentation forSolarWinds Platform

Create dependencies between network objects automatically

This topic applies to all SolarWinds Platform products.

You can choose to calculate dependencies automatically using the Auto Dependency feature. Auto Dependency calculates node-to-node dependencies based on topology connections. First it determines the root node of each polling engine or cluster of connected nodes. Then it determines dependencies using the root node as the base.

Since the path followed by each polling engine may be different, a unique path is created for each polling engine. When a cluster is polled by multiple polling engines, dependencies are not created between nodes that are polled by different engines even if they are topologically dependent.

Manually created dependencies are always used if there is a conflict between an automatically generated dependency.

Automatic dependencies are recalculated when topology is recalculated. Ignored dependencies continue to be ignored when your topology is recalculated.

Enable automatic dependencies

  1. Click Settings > All Settings in the menu bar.

  2. Click Polling Settings in the Thresholds & Polling grouping.
  3. Select the Enable Auto Dependencies check box in the Calculations & Thresholds section.
  4. Click Submit.

Once Auto Dependency has been enabled, dependencies are calculated immediately and are displayed within a few minutes.

View automatic dependencies

Automatic dependencies are shown along with user-defined dependencies in the All Dependencies resource and in the Manage Dependencies page. Auto dependencies are automatically named with an AutoDep- prefix.

Manage automatic dependencies

Changes made to an automatic dependency add audit events to your event log.

Automatically calculated dependencies cannot be edited or deleted.

  1. Click Settings > All Settings in the menu bar.

  2. Click Manage Dependencies in the Node & Group Management grouping.
  3. If Auto Dependency has been enabled, the Calculate dependencies automatically icon is toggled on.
  4. Automatically calculated dependencies display Calculated Automatically in the Origin column.
  5. To show only automatically calculated dependencies, select Dependency Origins from the Group by drop-down menu, and click on Calculated Automatically.

Ignore an automatically calculated dependency

  1. Select the automatically calculated dependency and click Ignore Auto Dependency.
  2. Click Yes, to confirm that you want to ignore the dependency.

The automatically calculated dependency is removed from the Manage Dependencies tab and displayed on the Manage Ignored Dependencies tab. The ignored dependency does not affect the child's node status.

Restore an ignored automatically calculated dependency

  1. Click on Manage Ignored Dependencies.
  2. Select the dependency, and click Restore Auto Dependency.

The automatically calculated dependencies is removed from the Manage Ignored Dependencies tab and displayed on the Manage Dependencies tab. The dependency is then used when calculating node status.