Alert

The purpose of the Alert process is to provide a mechanism for evaluating a variable or set of variables against a threshold and provide an email or Slack message when that threshold is met. For example, if a model is running and the analysts needs to know if the grade of the model gets to a certain so they can re-tune it, then the Alert would provide this so the analyst does not have to go in and manually monitor.

This is similar to the Adobe Audit process, except it is a general purpose process, where the Adobe Audit has been built specifically to compare metrics against metrics from the Adobe API. 

Process Configuration

The Alert process should be connected to an output node of one of the processes on the workflow. This can be accomplished by dragging the Alert process onto the canvas and making a connection from the output node (aka dataset) to the Alert process. After that the process can be configured.

Alert processes have the following five screens for configuration.

Join

This section provides the information Syntasa needs if more than one set of data will be joined. 

Joins

To create a join, click the green plus button.

  • Join Type - left or inner join at this time
  • Dataset selector - choose the dataset that will be joined with the first dataset
  • Alias - type a table alias if a different name is desired or required
  • Left Value - choose the field from the first dataset that will provide a link with the joined dataset (i.e. customer ID if joining a CRM dataset)
  • Operator - select how the left value should be compared with the right value, for a join this will typically be a = sign
  • Right Value - select the joining dataset value that is being compared with the left value

Mapping

The Mapping screen is where the event data fields are mapped into the Syntasa fields, desired functions get applied, and user-friendly labels get created.

This section is where the input data is defined and labeled into the Syntasa schema. Syntasa has a growing set of custom functions that can be applied along with any Hive functions perform data transformation. It is recommended to consult Syntasa professional services with any questions before applying other than the default functions.

  • Type - Simple or Aggregation
    • Simple 
      • Simple is set as the default with Is Partitioned set to true
  • Aggregation
    • When aggregation is selected, a Group By column be made available for use
  • Is Partitioned - selection to specify if the dataset should be partitioned
    • partition column will appear to select the field(s) that should partition the table
    • if a partition is not selected, Syntasa will use event partition

Actions

There are six options available:

  • Add - select specific fields from the input table
  • Add All - select all fields from the input table
  • Clear - clear all selected fields from the mapping canvas
  • Function - access the function editor to create custom fields
  • Import - provide a file of custom mappings
  • Export - utilized to export the existing mapping schema in a .csv format that can be used to assist in the editing or manipulation of the schema

This updated file could then be used to input an updated schema into the dataset.

To Add field(s):

  • Click Actions button
  • Click Add
  • Select Field(s) menu presented
  • Select field(s)
  • Click Apply

To Add All:

  • Click Actions button
  • Click Add All
  • All fields from the input table are now populated in the mapping schema

To Clear:

  • Click Actions button
  • Click Clear
  • All fields in the mapping schema are cleared out

To apply Function:

  • Click Actions button
  • Click Function
  • Select Function and Select Field(s) editor displayed
  • Click on Select Function to scroll through list or begin typing desired function and select
  • Click on Select Field(s) to add one or more fields to apply the function
  • Click on Apply
  • Field(s) will be populated in the mapping schema

To perform Import:

  • Click Actions button
  • Click Import
  • Click on the green paperclip icon to browse to the desired file to import
  • Once file is selected, click Open
  • Click Apply
  • Wait 60 seconds to ensure the process of pulling in mappings and labels is complete
  • Use the scroll, order and search options to locate the cust_fields and cust_metrics fields to ensure all the report suite custom fields have been mapped

To perform Export:

  • Click Actions button
  • Click Export
  • syntasa_mapping_export.csv will be created and downloaded for the user

Filters

Filters provides the user the ability to filter the dataset (apply a Where clause) if required.

To create a filter:

  • click the Apply Where Clause button to enable filter editing
  • filter editor screen will appear
  • select the appropriate Left Value from the drop-down list or click --Function Editor-- to create and apply custom function
  • select the appropriate Operator from the drop-down list
  • select the desired Right Value for filter from the drop-down list or click --Function Editor-- to create and apply custom function
  • multiple filters can be applied
  • ensure the proper (AND/OR) logic is applied when adding additional filtering if required

Outputs

The Outputs tab provides the ability to name table and displayed name on the graph canvas, along with selecting whether to load to Big Query (BQ) if in the the Google Cloud Platform (GCP), load to Redshift or RDS if in Amazon Web Services (AWS), or simply write to HDFS if an using on-premise Hadoop.

Alert

The Alert tab provides the ability to configure who receives an alert, a maximum number of emails received, and the configure the alert triggering threshold.

Maximum Alerts - set how many times a recipient can receive an email

Alert Recipients - email addresses of recipients separated by semicolons

Modify Message - for making changes to the the email content

Thresholds - specifying an operator and value of a field to evaluate and send the alert when those conditions are met

Steps for Creating a Threshold

  1. Click the green and white plus icon in the Thresholds section
  2. Select a column, operator, and a threshold Value
  3. Add a Label
  4. Select Override Recipient if more recipients than defined default recipients (created above) are desired
  5. Insert semi colon separated list of email addresses

Expected Output

The Alert process will run with the results being written to the specified Output table for later evaluation. If at least one threshold is met the alert email will be sent out.