Automated Root Cause Analysis: Finding Diamonds in Mountains of Logs

We’ve all been there at one time or another in our careers: a business-critical service failed, and the emergency recovery clock starts ticking with a vengeance. Not just ticking; it’s a blaring siren and a firehose of inquiry from concerned application owners and executives. Worse, both your customers and your team are frustrated. Customers because an app they depend on has brought them to a halt, and your team because resources are diverted to fix the crisis. And perhaps the most perennial of troubleshooting resource drains during application outages is the manual analysis of dozens or hundreds of logs, and millions or billions of messages.

It would be easy to think that by now ops teams would have access to powerful analytic tools to make quick work of automating root cause discovery. To be fair, both vendors and open-source have delivered log aggregation and query platforms that at least simplify the first-order log problem- making log data easier to access. But they still require admins with talent and deep understanding of applications to spot a never-ending list of novel failures deep within application frameworks. Fortunately, machine learning and artificial intelligence are now being combined to assist operators in quickly identifying the root cause of issues and begin resolution right away. ScienceLogic Zebrium AI Log Analysis is a great example.

Automated Analysis Begins With Automated Learning 

Step one in supercharging incident response is the automatic ingestion and processing of millions or even billions of log messages in real-time. However, that function must be truly automatic. Overloaded human admins do not have time to train yet another tool. ScienceLogic Zebrium AI Log Analysis automatically learns how to understand log messages, including what data is significant, which messages are unusual, which are noisy, and even how to decode the details in previously unseen log formats. This unsupervised machine learning typically begins delivering results within 24 hours of exposure to new logs. Better, it can result in a tenfold faster resolution process.

Untangling Unknown Unknowns  

Modern applications are complex, and the novel nature of many errors makes understanding what broke a daunting task. This is why logs remain the gold standard for troubleshooting issues. Well-understood failure modes send alerts or event messages clearly indicating the issue and providing context for repair. However, most critical outages result from issues never previously encountered, and the only evidence might be an obscure, single message among millions of lines of noise. Zebrium correlates unusual behavior with recent changes and performance metrics, helping you understand potential business service impacts before they become full-blown incidents. 

Fluent Klingon Not Required  

You're not alone if reading logs feels like deciphering a foreign language. Each log has its own unique syntax and vocabulary, making troubleshooting challenging. That challenge is multiplied for each new log that must be manually investigated. Zebrium AI Log Analysis automatically translates arcane formats and fragmented details into plain language that’s easy for the whole team to understand, naturally.

Generative AI Summary and Details

Going beyond identifying which log lines are related to the cause of issues, Zebrium’s AI engine explains issue details in plain language. Its natural language model goes further to generate root cause summaries that describe the systems involved and the relationships between application elements. It also visualizes the most critical keywords from related log messages. When teams immediately recognize application details, they can trust the accuracy of automated analysis.

Ready, Set, Analyze!  

If you’re ready to transform your log analysis and incident resolution process or are simply curious about how automated root cause analysis might streamline your troubleshooting effectiveness, you can request a free trial of ScienceLogic Zebrium AI Log Analysis today. It’s SaaS-hosted and easy to get up and running in minutes. Experience the next level of incident troubleshooting today and get back to doing what you love- delivering great service for your customers.