Splunk SPLK-3002 Splunk IT Service Intelligence Certified Admin Exam Exam Practice Test

In Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), when using multiple event management policies, it is important to understand that policy processing is applied in a defined order. This order is crucial because it determines how events are processed and aggregated, and which rules are applied to events first. The order of policies can be customized, allowing administrators to prioritize certain policies over others based on the specific needs and operational logic of their IT environment. This feature provides flexibility in event management, enabling more precise control over event processing and ensuring that the most critical events are handled according to the desiredprecedence. This structured approach to policy processing helps in maintaining the efficiency and effectiveness of event management within ITSI.

Throttling applies to any correlation search alert type, including notable events and actions (RSS feed, email, run script, and ticketing).

In the Notable Events Review dashboard within Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), when working with a notable event group, users can set or adjust certain attributes at the individual event level or at the group level. These attributes include:

• Severity:The importance or impact level of the notable event or group, which can be adjusted to reflect the current assessment of the situation.
• Status:The current state of the notable event or group, such as "New," "In Progress," or "Resolved," indicating the progress in addressing the event or group.
• Owner:The user or team responsible for managing and resolving the notable event or group.

These settings allow for effective management and tracking of notable events, ensuring that they are appropriately prioritized, acted upon, and resolved by the responsible parties.

Deep dives in Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI) allow for an in-depth analysis of services and their KPIs over time, providing a detailed view of the operational health and performance trends. One of the powerful actions that can be performed with a deep dive is the creation of a Multi-KPI alert from the deep dive's current state. This functionality enables users to define alerts based on the complex conditions observed during the deep dive analysis, allowing for the early detection of similar situations in the future. By configuring a Multi-KPI alert directly from a deep dive, ITSI users can leverage their insights and observations to proactively monitor for patterns or conditions that may indicate potential service degradation or failure, enhancing the overall responsiveness and effectiveness of the IT monitoring strategy.

For Entity Cohesion anomaly detection in Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), the minimum number of entities a KPI must be split by is 2. Entity Cohesion as a method of anomaly detection focuses on identifying anomalies based on the deviation of an entity's behavior in comparison to other entities within the same group or cohort. By requiring a minimum of only two entities, ITSI allows for the comparison of entities to detect significant deviations in one entity's performance or behavior, which could indicate potential issues. This method leverages the idea that entities performing similar functions or within the same service should exhibit similar patterns of behavior, and significant deviations could be indicative of anomalies. The low minimum requirement of two entities ensures that this powerful anomaly detection feature can be utilized even in smaller environments.

In Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), when a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) aggregate value is calculated, thetstatsfunction is often called. Thetstatsfunction in Splunk is used for rapid statistical queries over large volumes of data, which is particularly useful in ITSI for efficiently calculating aggregate values of KPIs across potentially vast datasets. This function allows for quick aggregation and summarization of indexed data, which is essential for monitoring andanalyzing the performance metrics that KPIs represent in ITSI. Unlike thestatscommand, which operates on already retrieved events,tstatsworks directly on indexed data, providing faster performance especially when dealing with high volumes of data typical in an IT environment. Thetstatscommand is therefore fundamental in the backend processing of ITSI for calculating aggregate values of KPIs, enabling real-time and historical analysis of service health and performance.

Among the anomaly detection algorithms included within Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), "Entity Cohesion" is a notable option. The Entity Cohesion algorithm is designed to detect anomalies by comparing the behavior of one entity against the collective behavior of a group of similar entities. This approach is particularly useful in scenarios where entities are expected to exhibit similar patterns of behavior under normal conditions. Anomalies are identified when an entity's metrics deviate significantly from the group norm, suggesting a potential issue with thatspecific entity. This method leverages the concept of cohesion among similar entities to enhance the accuracy and relevance of anomaly detection within ITSI environments.

To automatically create ServiceNow incidents when a Multi-KPI alert triggers in Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), the following approaches can be used:

C.By creating a notable event aggregation policy with a ServiceNow (SNOW) incident action:ITSI allows the creation of notable event aggregation policies that can specify actions to be taken when certain conditions are met. One of these actions can be the creation of an incident in ServiceNow, directly linking the alerting mechanism in ITSI with incident management in ServiceNow.

D.By editing the associated correlation search and specifying an alert action:Correlation searches in ITSI are used to identify patterns or conditions that signify notable events. These searches can be configured to include alert actions, such as creating a ServiceNow incident, whenever the search conditions are met. This direct integration ensures that incidents are automatically generated in ServiceNow, based on the specific criteria defined in the correlation search.

Options A and B are not standard practices for integrating ITSI with ServiceNow for automatic incident creation. The configuration typically involves setting up actionable alert mechanisms within ITSI that are specifically designed to integrate with external systems like ServiceNow.

To identify that a memory usage KPI is going critical, an analyst can leverage multiple views within Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), each offering a different perspective or level of detail:

A.Memory KPI in a glass table:A glass table can display the current status of the memory usage KPI, along with other related KPIs and services, providing a high-level overview of system health.

B.Memory panel of the OS Host Details view in the Operating System module:This specific panel within the OS Host Details view offers detailed metrics and trends related to memory usage, allowing for in-depth analysis.

C.Memory swim lane in a Deep Dive:Deep Dives allow analysts to visually track the performance and status of KPIs over time. A swim lane dedicated to memory usage can highlight periods where the KPI goes critical, along with the context of other related KPIs.

D.Service & KPI tiles in the Service Analyzer:The Service Analyzer provides a comprehensive overview of all services and their KPIs. The tiles related to memory usage can quickly alert analysts to critical conditions through color-coded indicators.

Each of these views contributes to a comprehensive monitoring strategy, enabling analysts to detect and respond to critical memory usage conditions from various analytical perspectives.

Search results are processed, created, and written to the itsi_summary index via an alert action. 

SA-IndexCreation is required on all indexers. For non-clustered, distributed environments, copy SA-IndexCreation to $SPLUNK_HOME/etc/apps/ on individual indexers.

In the context of troubleshooting KPI search performance in Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI), the search names in the job activity that identify base searches typically follow the pattern "Indicator - Shared - xxxx - ITSI Search." These base searches are fundamental components of the KPI calculation process, aggregating and preparing data for further analysis by KPIs. Identifying these base searches in the job activity is crucial for diagnosing performance issues, as these searches can be resource-intensive and impact overall system performance. Understanding the naming convention helps administrators and analysts quickly pinpoint the base searches related to specific KPIs, facilitating more effective troubleshooting and optimization of search performance within the ITSI environment.

ITSI Saved Search Scheduling is a feature that allows you to schedule searches that run periodically to populate the data for your KPIs. You can configure various settings for your scheduled searches, such as the search frequency, the time range, the cron expression, and so on. One of the settings is realtime_schedule, which controls the way the scheduler computes the next execution time of a scheduled search. The statement that is accurate about this configuration is:

• B. If this value is set to 0, the scheduler bases its determination of the next scheduled search on the last search execution time. This is called continuous scheduling. If set to 0, the scheduler never skips scheduled execution periods. However, the execution of the saved search might fall behind depending on the scheduler’s load. Use continuous scheduling whenever you enable the summary index option.

The other statements are not accurate because:

• A. If this value is set to 0, the scheduler bases its determination of the next scheduled search execution time on the current time. This is not true because this is what happens when the value is set to 1, not 0.
• C. If this value is set to 0, the scheduler may skip scheduled execution periods. This is not true because this is what happens when the value is set to 1, not 0.
• D. If this value is set to 0, the scheduler might skip some execution periods to make sure that the scheduler is executing the searches running over the most recent time range. This is not true because this is what happens when the value is set to 1, not 0.

References: Create KPI base searches in ITSI, Rrealtime_schedule in SavedSearches.conf

By default, notable event metadata is archived after six months to keep the KV store from growing too large.

Time policies are user-defined threshold values to be used at different times of the day or week to account for changing KPI workloads. Time policies accommodate normal variations in usage across your services and improve the accuracy of KPI and service health scores. For example, if your organization’s peak activity is during the standard work week, you might create a KPI threshold time policy that accounts for higher levels of usage during work hours, and lower levels of usage during off-hours and weekends. The statement that applies when configuring time policies for KPI thresholds is:

• B. They are great if you expect normal behavior at 1:00 to be different than normal behavior at 5:00. This is true because time policies allow you to define different thresholdvalues for different time blocks, such as AM/PM, work hours/off hours, weekdays/weekends, and so on. This way, you can account for the expected variations in your KPI data based on the time of day or week.

The other statements do not apply because:

• A. A person can only configure 24 policies, one for each hour of the day. This is not true because you can configure more than 24 policies using different time block combinations, such as 3 hour block, 2 hour block, 1 hour block, and so on.
• C. If a person expects a KPI to change significantly through a cycle on a daily basis, don’t use it. This is not true because time policies are designed to handle KPIs that change significantly through a cycle on a daily basis, such as web traffic volume or CPU load percent.
• D. It is possible for multiple time policies to overlap. This is not true because you can only have one active time policy at any given time. When you create a new time policy, the previous time policy is overwritten and cannot be recovered.

References: Create time-based static KPI thresholds in ITSI

An adaptive time threshold in the context of Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI) refers to the capability of dynamically adjusting threshold values for Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) based on historical data trends and patterns. This feature allows thresholds to evolve as the 'normal' behavior of KPIs changes over time, ensuring that alerts remain relevant and reduce the likelihood of false positives or negatives. The advantage of this approach is that it accommodates for natural fluctuations in KPI values that may occur due to changes in business operations, seasonality, or other factors, without requiring manual threshold adjustments. This makes the monitoring system more resilient and responsive to actual conditions, improving the overall effectiveness of IT operations management.

D is the correct answer because teams allow you to restrict access to service content in UI views such as service analyzers, glass tables, deep dives, and episode review. Teams alsocontrol access to services and KPIs for editing and viewing purposes. Teams do not affect the ability to search against the itsi_summary index, restrict notable event alert actions, or restrict searches against the itsi_notable_audit index. References: Overview of teams in ITSI

 D is the correct answer because ITSI provides multiple ways to delete multiple duplicate entities. You can use a CSV upload to overwrite existing entities with new or updated information, or delete them by setting the action field to delete. You can also use the entity lister page to select multiple entities and delete them in bulk. Alternatively, you can use a search command called | deleteentity to delete entities that match certain criteria. References: Create and update entities using a CSV file in ITSI, Delete entities in bulk in ITSI, Delete entities using the | deleteentity command in ITSI

You might need to increase the hardware specifications of your own Enterprise Security deployment above the minimum hardware requirements depending on your environment.

Install Splunk Enterprise Security on a dedicated search head or search head cluster.

The Splunk platform uses indexers to scale horizontally. The number of indexers required in an Enterprise Security deployment varies based on the data volume, data type, retention requirements, search type, and search concurrency.