How to match on null string (blanks) with Notification or Escalation filter in SMARTS

Products

• VMware

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:


How to match on null string (blanks) with Notification or Escalation filter in SMARTS.

Matching empty string (blanks) is not giving me the expected behavior.

Environment

VMware Smart Assurance - SMARTS

Resolution

Matching blanks on Notification or Escalation filter can be done by leaving matching criteria empty.

 

For example:

Matching all ticket ID that are empty:

Attribute: Ticket ID matches

 

Matching all ticket ID that are closed or empty:

Attribute: Ticket ID matches *CLOSED*|

 

The '|' (or) is needed to match on null string (blanks)

 

However, when trying to match blanks and using '~' and '|', There ~ filter out blanks as well.

 

Example:

Matching Element Name that are empty or not something:

Attribute: Element Name matches ~10.9.1.1|~moto-gw.smarts.com|

 

The '|' (or) is meaning less, it will filter out events with empty "Element Name", so when using ~ and still show events with "empty string" match, you will need to separate ~10.9.1.1 and ~moto-gw.smarts.com into two separate filter statements.