IT Automation: How to auto-remediate issues in Google Cloud

IT Automation is the auto-remediation suite of Site24x7.

Coupled with Google Cloud monitoring, IT Automation streamlines and automates routine tasks associated with managing GCP VM instances. By integrating these automations within Site24x7, you can significantly reduce manual intervention, enhance operational efficiency, and ensure that your cloud resources are well managed.

Supported IT Automation actions for GCP VM monitoring

Site24x7 provides the following automations for GCP VM instances (Compute Engine):

• Start VM: Automatically start a GCP VM instance.
• Stop VM: Automatically stop a GCP VM instance.
• Reset VM: Automatically reset a GCP VM instance.
• Create Instance Snapshot: Automatically create a snapshot of a GCP VM instance.

These automated actions can help streamline resource management, ensure uptime, and maintain effective backup practices.

Prerequisites

• Google Cloud VM monitor: Your Google Cloud VMs must be monitored by a Site24x7 account with permissions to access IT Automation.

Instructions to enable IT Automation for a Google Cloud monitor

Step 1: Creating the IT Automation template

1. Log in to Site24x7 .
2. Click Admin > IT Automation Templates > Add Automation Templates .
3. In the Add Automation Templates window that opens, select GCP VM Instance Actions in the Type field.
4. In the Choose the Action to be Automated field, select the auto-remediation action to be performed in case of a threshold breach.
5. In the Destination Monitors drop-down, select the VM Instances for which this IT Automation template is applicable for.
6. If desired, toggle Yes to receive the result of the IT Automation action via email.
7. Click Save .

Step 2: Associate the IT Automation template to the appropriate GCP VM monitor

1. Navigate to Cloud > GCP and select the GCP VM monitor that you'd like to apply the created IT Automation template to.
2. Click the hamburger icon () next to the monitor name.
3. Under the Configuration Profiles section, select the appropriate IT automation profile in the IT Automation Templates field.
4. Click Save .

Best practices

Here are some best practices to get the most out of GCP monitoring with IT Automation:

• Periodically review automation actions by navigating to Admin > Operations > IT Automation Logs to ensure they align with your current business objectives and workloads. This also helps you troubleshoot any failed actions or unexpected outcomes promptly.
• Use the Create Instance Snapshot automation regularly to maintain current backups of your VMs.
• Before deploying automations in production, test them in a non-production environment to verify functionality and prevent disruptions.
  • To do a test run of an IT Automation action, click the play icon in the Test column from the IT Automation Templates page.
• If your cloud requires repetitive actions to be automated, you can try scheduling IT Automation .

Features of GCP monitoring

To learn more about Site24x7's GCP monitoring platform, see the following links:

• Service View : Dashboard listing all active GCP resource types.
• Infrastructure Dashboard : NOC view of all your GCP monitors.
• Inventory Dashboard : Inventory of all your active resources in GCP.
• Management Actions : Console for managing GCP resources.
• Guidance Report : Industry best practices to improve your GCP setup.
• Service quotas monitoring : Balance optimum cloud resources allocation with Google Cloud quotas monitoring.

Learn more in our Google Cloud monitoring help document .