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Status Functionality already exists
Workspace Instana
Categories API-C Infrastructure
Created by Guest
Created on Nov 17, 2022

RELATED IDEAS

API: Support EntityId->Host parameter in query to get all Snapshots of a single Host

Introduction:

In an Enterprise Context, Instana contains valueable informations about running software on single machines or clusters, when an Agent is installed.

With the current API it is hard to replicate UI functionalities, like showing all processes/applications on a single host due to a missing common queryable ID.

Currently the API: {{baseUrl}}/api/infrastructure-monitoring/snapshots

can take a parameter query, to use a DFQN to query the needed snapshots.

With the given SnapshotId then detailed information can be gathered:

{{baseUrl}}/api/infrastructure-monitoring/snapshots/{SnapshotId}


It could be queried for hosts like:

/api/infrastructure-monitoring/snapshots?windowSize=3600000&query=entity.selfType:host&size=5000



Problem:

All Snapshots contain an EntityId, which seems to be a compound key that identiefies a snapshot additionaly to the ID. 


"entityId": {
"host": "EC2-i-0008aaaa",
"pluginId": "com.instana.forge.infrastructure.webserver.httpd.Httpd",
"steadyId": "695" },


The interesting Part of the ID, is the host field, which seems to identify the host the Snapshot is running on and which would be very helpful to query, to get all snapshots of an Host.


The problem is, that this host field can not be queried with an DFQN.


Use-Cases:

  • Get Inventory for Environments. e.g. for CMDB / EAM.

  • Custom business workflows, with custom tags on machines or containers.

    • Comparing different environment configurations

  • many more...


Improvement suggestion:


Add to DFQN the ability to query the EntityId object. Specialy the host field.

This way, it would be possible to fullfil the usecases very easyly.


e.g.

entity.id.host: "EC2-i-0008aaaa"


Workarounds

A possible workaround would be at the moment to use the FQDN of the host in the query. But this field could be non unique in some conditions.


Idea priority High
  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Jun 1, 2023

    Hello,


    Thank you for informing me that the Infrastructure Analytics API is now available for broader usage. I reviewed the APIs you recommended, but unfortunately, they do not have the functionality to perform the UI Infrastructure Feature to show the hierarchy of snapshots and their dependencies. (jvm->process->container->pod->Namespace->Cluster Node->host ...)


    One Problem I see is that the API's nature is to show single entity types, whereas a hierarchy will need to display multiple entity types in relation to each other.

    Another problem is that the Apis only offer metrics as additional data fields. But in our case, we need to get metadata and information as a table in multiple columns or JSON. It is more like a query with various required data fields, like name of pod, namespace, process, technology, and process env. Variables etc.

    This behaves very much like an SQL query.



    To fulfill this feature request, the provided API is not helpful and is of better use in other use cases.

    The easiest solution is still to change the existing Snapshot API and add the capability to query the compound ID in snapshots, described in the initial ticket description, especially the "steadyId".


    Don't hesitate to get in touch with me if there are questions so I can explain them in more detail.


    Best regards,

    Ali

  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Feb 9, 2023

    Hi Alireza, we have recently opened up the Infrastructure Analytics (Entity Explore) APIs for broader usage for use cases like yours.

    "Analyze Infrastructure is now supported on the API. The API features an endpoint for fetching filtered entities along with metrics and an endpoint for fetching entities grouped on a tag with aggregated metrics. There are also endpoints to retrieve entity types and metric names."

    I would recommend reviewing the following APIs and giving us feedback on how we can extend them further to suit your use case.
    1. https://instana.github.io/openapi/#operation/getEntityGroups
    2. https://instana.github.io/openapi/#operation/getEntities



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