Remove the 10 Application Perspective Limit When Creating Standard Alerts

Problem Statement

When creating a standard (non-smart) alert in Instana, users are limited to selecting a maximum of 10 application perspectives through the user interface. 

This limitation creates operational challenges for organizations that manage large application portfolios and want to apply the same alert definition across multiple applications.

During previous investigations, it was confirmed that this restriction appears to be a UI limitation rather than a backend platform limitation. Administrators can work around the restriction through alternative methods, but the limitation remains enforced within the standard alert creation workflow. 

As a result, users must either:

• Create multiple duplicate alerts
• Use workarounds outside the standard UI experience
• Maintain additional alert configurations that increase administrative overhead

This creates inconsistency between alerting approaches and complicates large-scale alert management.

Proposed Enhancement

Remove or significantly increase the limit of 10 application perspectives when creating standard alerts.

Potential options:

• Eliminate the limit entirely if no backend restriction exists
• Align the limit with Smart Alert capabilities
• Support a configurable limit based on platform guidance
• Provide users with a clear warning only if a genuine backend or performance threshold is reached

The preferred outcome would be to support an unrestricted number of application perspectives whenever the backend can safely process the configuration.

Business Value

Reduce Alert Administration Overhead

- Administrators can maintain a single alert definition across many application perspectives rather than creating and maintaining duplicate alert configurations. 

Improve Scalability

- Large enterprises often manage dozens or hundreds of application perspectives. Artificial UI limitations make large-scale alert administration unnecessarily difficult. 

Improve Consistency

- Users should have a consistent experience between standard alerts and Smart Alerts when applying monitoring policies across multiple applications. 

Reduce Configuration Complexity

- Fewer duplicate alerts mean:

• Simpler administration
• Reduced maintenance effort
• Lower risk of configuration drift
• Easier troubleshooting and auditing of alert policies