Explorers and dashboards

Metrics Explorer

Columns in the table are now listed in the same order as the tag names in the Group By field.

Tooltips in the measurement streams for services were improved to include information about the service.

Traces Explorer

The precision of the timestamp shown in the Traces Explorer has increased to milliseconds, providing clarity between traces and spans that start or stop in the same second.

Trace Details pane of the Traces Explorer improved to make it easier to find the select span layer in the chart. The selected span layer is now highlighted in both the overview and the main section of the Trace Chart, and the main section of the trace chart automatically scrolls to vertically center the selected span.

The Event Graph chart now automatically zooms to show the entire graph of events and you can now color the graph by the span layers.

Application performance monitoring

The instructions for adding a new PHP service were updated to clarify how and when to restart the web server and the PHP engine.

Improvements in Traces Explorer were completed to display telemetry data coming from the APM instrumentation libraries.

The following APM instrumentation libraries were updated to support using AppOptics endpoints with the default certificates:

• Node.js Library version 11.2.0, on November 16.
• PHP Library version 7.2.0, on November 17.
• Python Library version 0.2.1 on November 8, which was then updated again to version 0.3.0 on November 25.

Database monitoring

Databases Area Overview

The Database Area Overview summary metrics were enhanced.

The Queries, Metrics, and Events tabs were added.

The Query Explorer was removed from the Analyze side navigation menu.

Data correctness on the Databases Area Overview charts was optimized.

Profiler

An additional set of internal queries was added. Click Hide Internal Queries to hide this query set.

The Compare to 7 days before time comparison option was optimized.

Other UX Improvements

The tooltips across the user selection on the Database Area Overview Charts, Inspector Panel Charts, and Database dashboard charts were synchronized.

Data correctness on the Inspector Panel and Database dashboard charts was optimized.

The No Explain Plan link for MySQL and Redis was fixed.

The Profiler label for the time comparison was corrected.

Host infrastructure monitoring

AWS and Azure cloud platforms

New unique identifiers were added to ensure unique display names for AWS services.

Tooltips were added to AWS and Azure charts.

A data source status indicator for AWS and Azure entities was added.

AWS and Azure metric columns in the Entity Explorer were optimized.

The Hosts Anomalies widget was added on the Home dashboard.

Kubernetes

The Kubernetes collector and the accompanying manifest configuration was updated to send more meaningful metrics to SolarWinds Observability. To see the latest enhancements and avoid an incomplete view of the data in your dashboards, update your configurations and deploy the latest version of the Kubernetes collector. See Upgrade Kubernetes monitoring.

Entity detail pages for Nodes, Pods, Deployments, StatefulSets, and DaemonSets were added.

The K8 Summary Dashboard and Cluster Detail were improved:

• Filtering was added to the Node list on the Cluster Details page.
• A Deployments list view was added.
• A Pod list view was added.
• The Top 5 Clusters alert was added.

Self-managed hosts

The Processes tab for self-managed hosts now shows processes running for the last two minutes. You can create an alert if a process is down on the host or on memory usages of the process from the Processes tab.

Network monitoring

The Topology widget was improved so that users can click on a connection status to display additional details about the connection.

NBAR2 information is now available on the Network Flows area overview.

The new Flows tab on the Network device details page displays data exported from that specific device.

Agent management

On hosts managed by SolarWinds Observability Agents (self-managed hosts), you can create pre-configured alerts for individual processes in the Processes tab. The pre-configured alerts trigger when the process is down or when the process uses too much memory.

In the Entity Explorer, go to the Agent-managed host details view. Activate the Processes tab, click the vertical ellipsis for the host, and launch the Create Alert wizard to create an alert when the process is down, or when the process uses an excessive amount of memory. Appropriate fields in the Alert wizard will be filled out automatically. See Alerts.

Fixed issues

SolarWinds Observability December 2022 fixes the following issues.

Case number	Description
N/A	The issue where Deployment for large clusters was not being loaded on the Cluster Details view was addressed.
N/A	The issue where you could not add Java instrumentation library to an Azure EC2 server was addressed.
N/A	The issue while muting an alert with multiple entities in scope, and unmuting a single entity within that alert was addressed.
N/A	Client-side cache invalidation issues in the Entity Explorer were addressed.

Additions to the Home page

The Home page now includes the following widgets:

• The Subscription widget displays information about your SolarWinds Observability subscription, including the type, end date, and entitlements.

• The AWS Entities widget displays an overview of the health of all observed AWS entities.

• The Azure Entities widget displays an overview of the health of all observed Azure entities.

• The Kubernetes Clusters widget displays an overview of the health of all observed Kubernetes clusters.

Network monitoring

The Topology widget adds status information, such as traffic or bandwidth availability, for connections between nodes.

Agent Management

You can now deploy the SolarWinds Observability Agent using an instrumented method, such as Ansible and Chef. See the SolarWinds Observability repositories for Ansible and Chef in GitHub for details.

The installation script for Agent deployment was improved to verify that the Agent was registered successfully and that the OTEL endpoint is reachable from the host.

Explorers

The entity details views in the Entity Explorer now come with annotations you can toggle on or off to show or hide anomalies and change events on the charts, graphs, and other widgets.

The health score widgets available in the Entity Explorer, area overviews, and custom dashboards have been improved with updates to the donut chart and changes to the links.

Entities in the Entity Explorer can be modified to redefine what is monitored or to change the name of the entity in SolarWinds Observability.

Updates to the Entity Explorer, Metrics Explorer, and Traces Explorer were added to make it easier to find and view traces and metrics data. See Services.

Several updates were made to improve the reliability and maintain the security of SolarWinds Observability.

Services

APM libraries updated

The .NET Instrumentation Library was updated November 7 to version 5.1.1. This version adds support for trace context in queries with a new InsertSqlTag configuration option, as well as updates to .NET 6+ async database instrumentation and embedded certificates that work with the AppOptics endpoint.

The Ruby Instrumentation Library was updated November 7 to version 5.1.3. This version adds embedded certificates that work with the AppOptics endpoint.

Improvements for viewing traces

The Transaction element details view in the Entity Explorer has a new Trace Response Time Breakdown chart, showing the average response time for traces over time.

The filter options in the Traces Explorer now include the Status and Method fields.

Metrics improvements

The way data and tags are managed in Metrics Explorer was improved to better view metrics with a large number of tags. The default view when loading a new metric in the Metrics Explorer is now ungrouped, displaying all data in one measurement stream series. Also, the Group By limit of 20 tags is now respected and visible in the Metrics Explorer.

Searches in the Metrics Explorer now supports the contains (:~) and exact match (:) operators.

Websites

The status of each probe is visible both in the list of synthetics probes and in the map view (with the colored icon representing the status). The list of IPv4 addresses associated with each probe have been moved to a dialog that appears when you hover over the number of IPv4 addresses in the list view. When you hover your mouse over a probe on the map, a better view of the probe's details is shown.

The Website Availability map on the Home page has also been updated with colored probe icons representing the success rate of the availability tests, and the success rate and tests performed for each probe are visible when you hover your mouse over the probe.

The maps have also been updated to correct some inaccuracies in the geography.

When adding a new website in the Add Data wizard, the number of uptime checks configured for the current website is shown in the Summary page, as well as the number of tests that will be performed per day.

The IP address of the probe used for availability tests is now included in the Root Cause Analysis section of the Availability Tests details pane.

Databases

The Database instance entity health score has been updated to include error rates.

Additional tooltips were added to Database Widgets/Metrics.

Database instance metrics have been renamed to include the dbo prefix.

References to the Observability Agent in database onboarding dialogues have been renamed.

Host infrastructure monitoring

Improvements for viewing Kubernetes clusters details

The Kubernetes clusters details page now includes options to view metrics by Namespaces or Nodes. Additionally, new metrics for Pods, Deployments, DaemonSets, and StatefulSets have been added.

Extended support for Linux

You can now observe processes from monitored Linux hosts.

Known issues

Large cluster deployments do not load
Issue	Deployment for large clusters is not being loaded on the Cluster Details view.

Logs usage graph on Subscription dashboard displays incorrect data
Issue	The Logs usage graph on the Subscription dashboard shows the daily amount instead of the month to date data, even though it is a monthly plan.

You cannot add Java instrumentation library to an Azure EC2 server
Issue	When you try to add Java instrumentation library to an Azure EC2 server, the Java service fails on verification, as it keeps waiting for connection.

A different number of daemonSet entities is created when data are sent to OTEL
Issue	Not all daemonSet entities are created when data are sent to OTEL.

Explorers

General updates to all explorers

Save and manage searches

Searches performed in the various explorers of SolarWinds Observability can be saved for future reuse. Click the save folder to save your search or select a previously saved search.

Saved searches can only be reused in the same explorer and view where the search was originally performed and saved.

The new Saved Searches settings page lists all searches that you have access to, which includes all of the searches you have saved, as well as any public searches that members of your organization have saved.

Time period selection maintained

Each explorer displays data collected during a specified time period. The time period drop-down menu is used to determine how much historical data to display. When a selection is made in the time period drop-down menu and you change views within an explorer or click to use another explorer, the time period selection is maintained.

Consistent time display across widgets

For screens that include multiple widgets with a time-based chart, if you hover over a point in time on one widget, a selected time crosshair appears on the other widgets at the same point in time. Look for the selected time crosshairs to compare data at specific times in the various widgets.

Entity Explorer

Faster load times for the Transactions tab

Transactions listed in the Entity Explorer are paginated, rather than listed on one page. By limiting the number of transactions that load in the Entity Explorer at a time, load times for the Transactions tab become much faster when a service has a large number of transactions.

Integrated smart search and filter pane

A smart search has been added to the Entity Explorer, allowing you to use the entities properties to quickly find the entities you were looking for. The smart search has been integrated with the Filters pane. When a key-value pair entered in the search field matches a filter option in the Filters pane, the option is selected. Similarly, when a filters option is selected, the search field updates to include the corresponding key-value pair.

Traces Explorer

Improved navigation between queries and spans

Navigating between queries and spans in the Traces Explorer was improved. Click a query in the Traces Explorer to view the spans associated with the query.

Easier access to exceptions from the Trace Chart

Errors and exceptions discovered during a trace are shown on the Trace Chart in the Traces Explorer. Now when you hover over an error in the Trace Chart, the exceptions are listed by name instead of date and time. Click the error(s) in the list to view the exception details in the side pane.

Services

APM names updated

Based on customer feedback, naming conventions were adjusted. APM agents are now referred to as APM libraries.

New Python Library released

The SolarWinds Observability Python Library was released, allowing you to monitor your Python-based applications. The Python Library gathers performance metrics from the services powering your Python application and creates distributed traces that follow the path of individual transactions through the entire application stack. Key features of the Python Library include:

• OpenTelemetry API/SDK 1.13.0, for trace generation
• OpenTelemetry Instrumentation 0.34b, for (auto-)instrumentation of common Python frameworks
• Includes SolarWinds c-lib 10.6.1, for unified inbound metrics generation, trace sample decision, and export to SolarWinds Observability
• W3C trace context propagation
• OTel, APM instrumentation startup, and trigger trace configurable with environment variables

APM libraries updated

The Java Library was updated in mid-September to version 0.13.0. This version disables the library for unsupported JDK versions, fixes JDBC span issues for DMLs, and fixes the transaction name mismatch for Spring transactions. This version also updates to liboboe 10.6.1 to support new metrics format and disables profiling. See Unified metrics for service entities.

The .NET Library was updated October 17 to version 5.1.0. This version adds a new configuration setting to define the SolarWinds APM collector endpoint and updates the Windows installer for the .NET Library to set the same endpoint. The diagnostic tool was also improved to include better messaging during the installation and the .NET SDK was updated to support W3C Trace Context headers. Finally, this version updates to liboboe 10.6.1 to support new metrics format and disables profiling. See Unified metrics for service entities.

The Node.js Library was updated to version 11.1.0 on October 13. This version updates to liboboe 10.6.1 to support a new metrics format. See Unified metrics for service entities.

The Ruby Library was updated to version 5.1.2 on October 13. This version updates to liboboe 10.6.1 to support new metrics format and disables profiling. See Unified metrics for service entities.

Unified metrics for service entities

The metrics collected by many of the APM libraries have been unified to make finding service metrics easier. 14 metrics have been replaced by three metrics, visible in the Metrics Explorer. The APM libraries have been updated to accommodate this new metrics schema and several service charts rely on the new metrics. In order for service data to show up correctly in all charts, update your APM libraries.

Required actions

Update your APM libraries to the following versions or later.

• .NET – v 5.1.0, available in the .Net Library downloads. See 5.1.0 release notes.
• Java – v 0.13.0, available in the Java Library downloads. See 0.13.0 release notes.
• Node.js – v 11.1.0, available at the npm Registry: solarwinds-apm. See 11.1.0 release notes.
• PHP – v 7.1.2, available in the PHP Library downloads. See 7.1.2 release notes.
• Python – v 0.1.0, available at the Python Package Index (PyPI): solarwinds-apm. See 0.1.0 release notes.
• Ruby – v 5.1.2, available at the Ruby community’s gem hosting service: solarwinds_apm. See 5.1.2 release notes.

Update your SolarWinds Observability customizations to use the new unified metrics.

• If any of your custom dashboards use the older metrics, edit your dashboard to use the new metrics instead. See Create and manage custom standard dashboards.
• If you have alerts set up that rely on an older metric, modify your alert to use the new metrics instead. See Alerts.

Metrics updated

• Unified metric: trace.service.response_time

  Dimensions: service, http_status, http_method, host, transaction

  Replaces:

  • trace.service.http_status.response_time
  • trace.service.http_method.response_time
  • trace.service.transaction.response_time
  • trace.service.host.response_time
  • trace.service.response_time

• Unified metric: trace.service.requests

  Dimensions: service, http_status, http_method, host, transaction

  Replaces:

  • trace.service.http_status.requests
  • trace.service.http_method.requests
  • trace.service.transaction.requests
  • trace.transaction.http_status.requests
  • trace.transaction.http_method.requests
  • trace.service.host.requests
  • trace.service.requests

• Unified metric: trace.service.errors

  Dimensions: service, host, transaction

  Replaces:

  • trace.service.transaction.errors
  • trace.service.host.errors

Services entity removal

You can now easily remove a services entity directly from the Entity Explorer. First, remove or disable the APM library's instrumentation. Then locate the entity in the Entity Explorer, hover over the table row to display a vertical ellipsis () in the last column. Click the vertical ellipsis, and then click Remove. See Delete entities.

Improved navigation within the Traces Explorer

It's now easier to navigate between queries and their related spans, as well as to view exception details when using the Trace Chart. For more information, see Traces Explorer.

Databases

Updates to the database instance on-boarding wizard workflow including wording updates and pagination for environments where there is a long list of agents.

Added an Instances tab to the database summary page to help users quicky identify the databases that are showing the lowest health score.

Updates to the primary database collection metrics to help make the data more usable and actionable.

Added additional informational tooltips to metrics to help guide users.

Various updates for security and user reported issues.

Websites

Custom request headers

With website monitoring, you can send custom request headers with availability tests. This allows you to identify hits to your website based on the headers sent by the probes or to test whether your website is available for specific user agents or other headers. To send custom headers for each test, configure your website monitoring in the Add Data wizard, or edit an existing website entity to add the custom headers.

Verify string content

You can verify whether specific text content exists in the page at the URL entered.

The availability test will look anywhere in the HTML of your website for the string. If you selected Contains and the text is not found, the test will be considered down. Similarly, if you selected Does not contain and the text was found, the test will be considered down. To add a string verification for each test, configure your website monitoring in the Add Data wizard, or edit an existing website entity to add the custom headers.

Add website entities faster

For users that want to monitor a website with the standard monitoring options, the process to add a new website entity is significantly faster. Every option that does not have to be unique to the entity has a default setting, allowing you to speed through the steps to create the entity.

Faster load times for the DEM area overview

When monitoring a large number of website entities, the grid view of the entities in the DEM area overview can get cluttered and take a long time to load all entities in the Websites widget. Instead of loading all entities in the grid view, a subset of entities are included. The remaining entities are hidden and can be displayed by clicking a Load more link.

New availability test details view

When you click an individual test, a Test Details panel opens. The test result, related traces, and a root cause analysis of any errors encountered during the test are displayed alongside standard test details such as the probe location, duration of the test, and the time the test ran.

Test result

The Test Result section of the panel includes the local time when the test was executed, the test result, the location of the probe testing the website, and the time in milliseconds that the test probe received a response from the website.

Root cause analysis

For tests that result in a failure, a detailed analysis of the test is available under Root Cause Analysis. This analysis includes a confirmation of the failed test, the completion time of the analysis, and the location of the probe used to analyze the test. After the failed test confirmation is the Root Cause Analysis Steps, with each step of the attempted test listed. Each step of the attempted test includes the duration of the step and the technical details related to that step, such as a traceroute or the requests sent and response received.

Related traces

If a trace is detected during a test, a summary of the trace is listed under Related Traces with a span chart. Click Trace Details to view the full trace in the Traces Explorer.

Logs

Logs exclusion filters added

SolarWinds Observability can exclude incoming log messages based on a filter of one or more strings or regular expressions. Logs that match the filter are not brought into SolarWinds Observability. Filters can be global to all logs or restricted to specific log sources.

Logs Explorer search improvements

The search in the Logs Explorer was improved to provide a more natural search syntax appropriate for log events. Simple text searches are supported, as are boolean searches or searches for entire phrases. The advanced search allows searching based on key-value pairs for certain attributes only. For JSON logs, a JSON-based search syntax can also be performed.

Add syslog logs instructions improved

The Add Data wizard updates include better instructions for syslog logs. Not only have the Windows instructions been refined, but new instructions were added for the different distributions of Linux. Instructions are now available for Windows, Linux (RHEL), and Linux (Debian/Ubuntu).

Host Infrastructure

Kubernetes summary dashboard improvements

The Kubernetes summary dashboard has been improved to include the following new widgets: Health Distribution, Top 5 Clusters (Warning Events), Top 5 Clusters (Nodes), and Top 5 Clusters (CPU Utilization). See Hosts Widgets for details.

Hosts summary dashboard improvements

The Hosts summary dashboard has been improved with new Operating Systems and Architecture widgets. See Hosts Widgets for details.

Disk read and write widgets

A summary of disk read and write information for each host can be found in the Disk Read and Disk Write widgets by clicking on the host name in the Entity Explorer.

Introduction of new AWS and Azure services

Additional support is now available for the following AWS and Azure services:

• AWS ApplicationELB
• AWS ELB
• AWS RDS
• Azure Front Door
• Azure CDN
• Azure Disk Storage
• Azure App Service
• Azure Durable Function
• Azure Cosmos DB
• Azure KeyVault

Cloud account information

Information about a host's cloud account can be found in the Details widget by clicking on the host name in the Entity Explorer.

 

Remove cloud monitoring for selected AWS entities

The SolarWinds-Observability:import tag is available for AWS entities you do not want to be monitored.

Poll custom tags within Azure entities

The ability to poll custom tags within Azure entities is now available in the Metrics Explorer.

Network monitoring

Network Collector adds support for SolarWinds Observability organizations hosted in the Microsoft Azure cloud. Additional configuration steps are necessary. See Add a network device.

You can now observe volumes on monitored network devices.

Agent Management

Based on customer feedback, naming conventions were adjusted. Agent Managers are now referred to as SolarWinds Observability Agents.

You can now download logs for individual Agents and plugins from target hosts. See Collect Agent logs from target hosts for details.

Subscription dashboard

The Subscription dashboard provides an at-a-glance overview of the monitoring areas and the entities within these areas that you are entitled to use, based on your subscription plan. For example, when you add Network Observability to your plan, you are entitled to monitor a certain number of network devices with SolarWinds Observability. The number of monitored entities depends on how many of these entities you added to your plan. On the Subscription dashboard, you can learn which entity types your are licensed to use in which each monitoring area, observe the current and historical usage of each licensed entity, review your subscription type or the date when your licenses expire, enabling you to properly plan your expenses. The dashboard also provides an option to choose your subscription plan or add more entities to your current plan.

Known issues

Additional Network Collector configuration is required for SolarWinds Observability organization hosted in Azure.
Issue	Network Collector requires additional configuration if your SolarWinds Observability organization is hosted in Azure.
Resolution or Workaround	See Add a network device.

Muting an alert with multiple entities in scope, and unmuting a single entity within that alert does not work.
Issue	When you create an alert with multiple entities in scope, mute the alert and then unmute a single entity within the scope of the alert, the alert stays muted; the Active Alerts page still displays the mute icon and will not receive any notifications.
Resolution or Workaround	SolarWinds Observability will display a notification about the alert settings being inconsistent.

If you are a member of multiple organizations and the trial period expires on one of the organizations, you will not be able to access any organization
Issue	If you are a member of multiple organizations and one of them is suspended due to the trial period expiring, you will not be able to access any of the other organizations.
Resolution or Workaround	If you are a member of multiple organizations, contact the SolarWinds support team to claim access to your organizations that haven't been suspended.

Explorers

Kubernetes in the Entity Explorer

The Entity Explorer gained several improvements for viewing Kubernetes entity data in SolarWinds Observability. The entity type filter now includes Kubernetes clusters, with a Filters pane designed to further refine the list of Kubernetes entities.

Hosts entities can also be filtered by the Kubernetes node state.

A Kubernetes cluster detail view shows widgets with the Cluster Health Score, Health of Cluster Nodes, the number of Cluster Nodes, and Cluster Pods for the selected Kubernetes entity. The Kubernetes nodes are also listed.

Additions to the Entity Explorer inspector panel

Transactions for a service entity are listed in the entity’s Transactions tab. Now when a transaction row is clicked in the entity details view, the Inspector Panel shows the average response time, requests rate, and error ratio for selected transaction.

Widgets in the service entity’s inspector panel provide an at-a-glance view of related host and website entities. Related entities are listed in a grid view, with each entity represented as a hexagon.

New embedded Logs Explorers

A version of the Logs Explorer is embedded in several viewers and tabs throughout SolarWinds Observability. The embedded explorer loads logs related to the currently selected item. Logs in embedded Logs Explorers can be opened in the full Logs Explorer.

• In the Traces Explorer, all logs related to a selected trace are available at the bottom of the Trace Details view.
  
• In a trace’s Trace Details view, all logs related to a selected span are available in a Logs tab in the Span Details view.
  
• When viewing a Service entity in the Entity Explorer, all logs related the selected entity are available in a Logs tab.
  

Traces Explorer enhancements

Significant improvements were made to the Traces Explorer, displaying more information for each trace and providing a better view of the information.

The Traces Explorer can now show traces that were collected over a longer period of time; previously only traces collected within the last day were shown.

The traces table also includes columns for related host or website entities, allowing you to see the relationship between a service’s traces and the related entities. Clicking on a related entity in either column will open the entity in the Entity Explorer.

Spans with an entry event of async are not included in the calculation of the total duration for the sync. Instead, ‘async’ is displayed for the percent of trace duration.

The colors in waterfall charts are mapped better to spans to make it easier to identify each span. Colors are assigned to spans based on the span names, ensuring more consistency in span colors in the charts.

Host Infrastructure

Kubernetes monitoring

An overview summary of all monitored Kubernetes entities is available with the other area overviews. This summary includes a selection of widgets displaying key performance indicators for the Kubernetes entities.

The Host Agent collects Kubernetes journal logs and sends them to SolarWinds Observability. When viewing the Kubernetes entity in the Entity Explorer, the Logs tab loads the entity’s journal logs.

See the Explorer updates for details about additional changes to the Entity Explorer related to displaying Kubernetes cluster data.

Finding host processes

Processes for a host entity in the Entity Explorer can be located quickly with a new search field or sorted by CPU usage.

Improved AWS integration

The Add Data dialog was improved to allow for selective service monitoring, better CloudFormation instructions, and additional confirmation dialogs to clarify what will and will not be monitored. The list of regions was also redesigned to be better understood.

AWS data collection can be filtered upon ingestion with a custom tag.

Improved Azure integration

The Add Data dialog was improved to allow for selective resource type monitoring. Azure data collection can also be filtered upon ingestion with a custom tag.

The Azure integration now collects more data, with logs available in a Logs tab of the host detail view and NetworkTraffic and DiskIOps composite metrics added.

Services

When an APM library detects a Host Agent, a duplicate host entity is no longer created in SolarWinds Observability. Instead, the existing host entity is related to the APM library’s service entity.

Several improvements related to the service entities’ traces and transactions have been made in the Traces Explorer and Entity Explorer. See the Explorers update for more information.

Websites

You now have more options when exporting the list of Synthetic Probes. Found in the SolarWinds Observability settings, the list of probes can be exported with location information included or with one IP address per line.

Website health scores were retooled with a better calculation to provide a more accurate representation of the website’s health.

Logs

Using a syslog daemon such as NXlog, you can collect application, operating system, and other log files on your Windows device and forward those logs to SolarWinds Observability. The Add Data dialog was updated to include instructions for forwarding syslog logs from a Windows device.

Database

Profiler

Rank the top selected queries by their total execution time for the selected time period. Total execution is represented as a percentage of the selected time period.

Rank the top selected queries by varying other sub-categories. For more information about the sub-categories available with the Profiler, see Profiler.

The Profiler saves the most recent query ranking that was applied, allowing you to jump back into your categorization and drill down into those specified queries.

Various performance updates were made to the Profiler, allowing for better organization and optimal performance.

Reformatted the query description so that large queries don’t overflow into other areas. Hovering over a query displays the full query in a tooltip.

Optimized the ranking algorithm to rank queries more efficiently and accurately.

Optimized page time transition from a Profiler query selection to the Query metrics page for the selected query.

Added the option to hide internal queries executed by SolarWinds Observability for database monitoring.

Query Details

Display important query metrics such as Latency, Total Time, Throughput, Query Id, and more on the Query Details page.

Click on the query text in the Query Details page to open the query in the Query Digest window. The Query Digest window formats the query in an easy to read and language specific format.

Click the drop-down window on the Latency graph to display P99 latency for the selected query.

Other improvements

• Extra details added regarding Database plugin deployment (supportability).

• Updates to time formatting for better readability.

Network monitoring

SolarWinds Observability displays the native state of interfaces and hardware sensors, as provided by the Network Collector. The native state for interfaces is composed of the operational status, admin status, and other details polled and processed by the Network Collector.

Network Collector adds only network devices for monitoring. When adding network devices, the collector checks the node category and only adds devices categorized as a network device. This way, only relevant devices, such as routers or switches are added to SolarWinds Observability.

The Topology Map widget displays topology connections between monitored network devices. You can see either all connections or filter the widget to show only L2 or L3 connections.

SolarWinds Observability Agent

Agent Management Improvements

In Agents, the Plugin section also displays dependent files and dependent plugins. Dependent files, such as dbo-dump, do not have a status. The vertical ellipsis for dependencies only provides actions relevant to the active row. If no actions are available, the vertical ellipsis is not available.

In Agents, you can restart SolarWinds Observability Agents. Click the vertical ellipsis next to the Agent, and click Restart.

Alerts

Alerting enhancements

SolarWinds Observability now enables you to alert on log data, as well as metric data for specific entities that are 30 days old or less.

From the Active Alerts page, you can filter to select websites, metric data, services, or network devices. You can also view a list of other entities that are currently receiving the same alert, which can help you perform troubleshooting. The History tab shows you a list of past alert activations, and the Related Entities tab provides information on relationship data. If you want to see failed certificates, go to the Metrics tab, and check the Logs tab to follow key values.

In addition, SolarWinds Observability now integrates with OpsGenie for alert notifications.

Explorers

Entity groups enhancements

You can now create Entity groups based on a search, allowing for an easier way to find and define the entities to group together. In addition, you can now edit entity groups you created manually to add or remove members in the group.

Entity Explorer enhancements

You can now filter Entities listed in the Entity Explorer based on the selected time period, hiding inactive entities from the view. This includes entities that are listed in the initial Entity Explorer list or grid view, in the Topology maps, or in the embedded Entity Explorer view in the entity details view’s related entities tab.

New custom dashboards

You can now create new dashboards with your own custom arrangement of metrics. When you send a metric to a dashboard from the Metrics Explorer, you also have the option to create a new dashboard to send the metric. You can create Custom dashboards, make dashboards private, add new metric tile widgets to the dashboards or rearrange them within the dashboard, and use metric streams to filter an individual tile widget or to filter all metrics in the dashboard.

Significant Metrics Explorer improvement

You can now filter metrics listed in the Metrics Explorer based on the selected time period, hiding metrics that are not available or have no data. You can also view charts for multiple metrics side-by-side to compare similar data sets or view related metrics simultaneously. In the metrics’ details view, you can now choose the method used to aggregate the charted data and, if desired, send the metric to a dashboard as a new tile widget.

Smart search improvements

The search fields throughout SolarWinds Observability have been improved to support the standard Lucene query syntax; to accept key:value pairs; and to autosuggest searchable properties for the current explorer, entity, or data set. Searches will also no longer be cleared when you select filters or otherwise alter your view.

SolarWinds Observability Agent

Improved SolarWinds Observability Agent installation process

In the Add Host wizard, you can now select how you want to install the SolarWinds Observability Agent. You can use a script or the installer flow. You can observe agent status based on the recently reported information related to its health state, and update the SolarWinds Observability Agent and all related agents from SolarWinds Observability.

Database Monitoring

New Profiler feature

SolarWinds Observability provides a Profiler functionality under the Analyze side navigation menu. With Profiler, you can organize the top 10 through 200 queries by a variety of options, and identify problematic queries such as queries that consume the most execution time.

Query samples

Collected query samples from monitored databases are now added to the query details page. This allows you to review the query text, execution time, total time, and expanded query details.

Host metrics

SolarWinds Observability adds a host metric collection to the Databases dashboard.

Redis database monitoring

SolarWinds Observability supports Redis as a monitored database option.

Host Infrastructure

Add Host dialog enhancements

The Add Host dialogue was updated alongside the improved SolarWinds Observability Agent installation process. The installation updates include commands to run and install the SolarWinds Observability Agent client on your target host using Windows or Linux. The available commands for Linux include the DPKG, DNF, RPM, RUM, or ZYPPER package manager.

Add Kubernetes to your configuration

The Add Data dialog was updated with an additional configuration option to add Kubernetes as a platform. Options for adding Kubernetes to your configuration include custom cluster IDs and API tokens and providing access to your Prometheus URL. Once your Kubernetes environment is set up, the container can be monitored as part of a clustered host in SolarWinds Observability.

Network monitoring

Network device monitoring

For network devices, you can observe details about interfaces, hardware sensors, and network device category (router, switch). Health Score calculation has been adjusted to reflect network device metrics and status. You can use the simplified steps for adding network devices, and you can stop observing devices that are no longer relevant.

See the optimized Network Collector Installation wizard and the updated Network Collector Web Console. See Add a network device.

Service entity

Automatic detection of relationships between service entities and self-managed host entities

When a service entity is running on a self-managed host entity that uses the Agent Manager to collect host data, the entities’ relationship is detected and shown in SolarWinds Observability.

Traces Explorer

The filters in the Traces Explorer have been improved to help you quickly locate and analyze specific traces and trace details, including a new option to filter the list of traces by selecting a group of traces in the heat map. The Trace Chart in the Trace details view includes a new overview section, better labels for spans, highlighted spans when a service is selected, and improved handling when spans are selected. In addition, a Code Profile tab and embedded Logs Explorer have been added to the span details view.

Time value presentations

The time values presented in all APM views have been improved.

Additional service entity details

The Entity Explorer list view (when filtered for services) and the Transactions tab in a service entity’s details view now include charts that show the service's request rate and error rate. Transactions for a service can be sorted by metric values, and a service entity’s details view includes additional information about the service entity’s transactions.

Websites

Options for sorting entities on the Websites tile

In the DEM area overview, you can now sort the list of honeycomb entities on the Websites tile by name or by health to quickly locate the entities you are interested in.

Additional synthetic probes

The number of synthetic probes used to monitor the websites has increased to seven. Probes in Tokyo, London, Sydney, and Sao Paulo have been added.

Improved options for managing website entities

When adding a website entity for monitoring, you can now include a non-standard port for both HTTP and HTTPS URLs. Also, in a website entity’s details view in the Entity Explorer, the menu now includes the options to edit the website entity’s name and the criteria used for monitoring the website, or to remove the website from monitoring altogether.

Alerts

Alerting enhancements

SolarWinds Observability now provides alerting on a wider range of entity types. It also offers internal alerts and advanced muting of alert notifications. You have the flexibility to view your alert notifications on Microsoft Teams, PagerDuty, or Zapier, or in any application that can receive notifications using a webhook. In addition, you can access an audit log that tracks alert definition changes.

Fixed issues

SolarWinds Observability July 2022 fixes the following issues.

Case number	Description
N/A	The units and decimal point digits for network device statistics were adjusted for better readability.
N/A	The Host option is available in the onboarding menu for all customers on production.
N/A	The Network Device Utilization chart no longer displays incorrect data.
N/A	The Synthetic Probes list was fixed to display available actions.
N/A	After you enter Explore mode, the browser back button is no longer nonfunctional.
N/A	When creating a new API token, you no longer receive an Unknown Error popup.
N/A	The TCP ingestion for logs no longer fails to connect.
N/A	The HTTPS ingestion for logs no longer fails to connect.
N/A	DBO query names are no longer blank.
N/A	Alert notifications were adjusted to work with Microsoft Teams.
N/A	Configuring SSO Integration with Azure AD no longer fails.
N/A	Setting up a website on production cluster no longer freezes on the second step of the configuration.
N/A	Alert notifications were adjusted to work with Slack.
N/A	You no longer receive an error message on Localhost when running the app locally on Kubernetes.
N/A	You no longer receive an error on the local environment when you run the data seeding command.
N/A	When trying to view Websites in the Entity Explorer, it no longer returns an Unknown error.
N/A	New AWS entities are no longer missing in the Entity Explorer.

Known issues

Notifications in the Network Collector Web Console point to unlicensed pages
Issue	If you click a notification in the Network Collector Web Console that leads to an unsupported feature, you are redirected towards a 403 "Forbidden" page.
Resolution or Workaround	Ignore the notifications.

SolarWinds Platform features not supported for Network Collector (High Availability, Orion Agents, device templates, custom properties)
Issue	In the Network Collector Web Console, you can access options for specific SolarWinds Platform features, such as SolarWinds High Availability, Orion Agents, device templates, or custom properties. However, these features are not supported in the Network Collector.
Resolution or Workaround	SolarWinds recommends that you do not use High Availability, Orion Agents, device templates, or custom properties on your Network Collector.

Information on routers not polled in SolarWinds Observability
Issue	When you add a network device to SolarWinds Observability, you cannot see information about its category (router).
Resolution or Workaround	The category information will appear automatically after a few hours. If you need to display it as soon as possible, complete the following steps: Log in to the Network Collector Web Console, click Settings > Manage Nodes. Select the node, and click More Actions > Rediscover. Click More Actions > Poll Now. The category information will appear in SolarWinds Observability shortly.

Supported entities

• AWS cloud hosts
• Azure cloud hosts
• Databases
• Logs
• Network devices
• Self-managed hosts
• Services based on .NET, Java, Node.js, PHP, and Ruby programming languages
• Websites

Explorers

• Alerts Explorer
• Logs Explorer
• Metrics Explorer
• Queries Explorer
• Traces Explorer

Security capabilities

• Single sign-on (SSO) via SAML
• MFA authentication
• Session expiration
• User roles and user management