Step 8: Configure Notifications

This section describes how to configure and customize your Horizon notifications.

This step is separate from setting up default notifications. We assume that you have followed the previous steps and are ready to proceed to more in-depth work with notifications.

Now that you have established your environment’s baseline, you can configure custom notifications based on your notes. Establishing notifications that are tailored for your environment and monitoring requirements lets the right people see and respond to the right issues in a timely manner.

Here, we will describe how to configure event notifications. You can configure event notifications to provide coverage of specific unique event identifiers (UEIs), allowing for granular control of incoming information. You can define multiple notifications for the same UEI to use different destination paths.

By default, Horizon uses the destination path of all notifications matching the event’s UEI. You can configure notifd to process only the destination path of the first matching notification by editing ${OPENNMS_HOME}/etc/notifd-configuration.xml and setting match-all="false" in the top-level notifd-configuration element.

Changes to ${OPENNMS_HOME}/etc/destinationPaths.xml happen immediately, with no need to restart Horizon.

Configure event notifications

An event notification defines a destination path and message template for a specific UEI. It is possible to define multiple notifications for the same UEI to use different filters, destination paths, and message templates.

Follow these steps to configure event notifications:

  1. Click the gear symbol in the top-right of the screen.

  2. Under Event Management, click Configure Notifications  Configure Event Notifications. A list of events that are configured for notifications is displayed.

  3. Click Add New Event Notification, select the UEI that will trigger a notification, and click Next.

    • (Optional) Build a rule to match a subset of IP addresses or services, and click Validate Rule Results  Next or Skip Results Validation. If you do not build a rule, notifications will be generated for all monitored IP addresses.

  4. In the Choose Path page, specify information to include in the notification, including the destination path, subject (for email messages), body text, and so on.

  5. Click Finish.

Event notification configuration is stored in ${OPENNMS_HOME}/etc/notifications.xml. Changes to this file happen immediately, with no need to restart Horizon.

Filter rules

Filter rules let you define which notifications to send or save. They work alongside your event notification configuration to enable better, more fine-tuned control over the notifications that you receive.

By default, the filter rule configured in ${OPENNMS_HOME}/etc/notifications.xml (for example, <rule>IPADDR != '0.0.0.0'</rule>) does not have the strict flag enabled. This means that if there is an event that is not associated with a node or interface (and therefore no IPADDR value), it will bypass validation and the notification would be processed. A strict rule (for example, <rule strict="true">IPADDR != '0.0.0.0'</rule>) will always be evaluated, and if there is no node or interface associated with the event, the notification will not be saved.

Beyond Quick Start

For more information on notifications, refer to Notifications in the Deep Dive section. The following topics are covered in the documentation: