OBSERVERTC / Concepts
Detector evaluation and issue lifecycles
Understand when evidence becomes an active condition.
A detector checks a particular condition using available measurements and state. Some detectors report observations; others open an issue and later resolve it. Their output is evidence about that condition, not a universal diagnosis of the call.
Evaluate sustained evidence
Many conditions need several observations to distinguish a persistent problem from a short fluctuation. Detection windows collect recent values; recovery windows help determine when a condition has settled. Other detectors use explicit elapsed-time thresholds or immediate state transitions.
Changing collection cadence changes how much time a window covers. It does not necessarily change every detector’s independent timer. See configuration for window sizes and tuning consequences.
Follow a stateful issue
Eligible observations → condition confirmed → keyed issue raised
↓
evidence updated
↓
recovery confirmed
↓
issue resolvedThe issue key identifies the active occurrence. Several tracks can have the same issue type, so the type alone is not a unique key. One-off issue records do not have this ongoing lifecycle.
Distinguish absent evidence
If required statistics are unavailable, or the application intentionally pauses a track, evaluation can be gated. An inactive detector or missing input is not equivalent to a healthy measurement. Read each detector’s guards and limitations before treating its output as a guarantee.
Use monitor issues for lifecycle handling and server ingestion for mirrored client issues.