Installing a managed location

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A managed location uses an Instana‑hosted Point of Presence (PoP). On Instana SaaS, Instana provides and hosts this PoP, and it automatically registers with the Instana backend as a managed location.

Note: The managed location is supported only on Instana SaaS. It's not supported on Instana self-hosted.
Instana deploys, maintains, and manages the PoP to run tests. It is an add-on to your Instana license with additional fees. You can use a managed location to monitor applications that are publicly available.

To request a managed location (Instana-hosted PoP), you need an add-on to your Instana SaaS license. Contact the IBM sales representative to include the add-on in the license for the tenant units where you want to use an Instana-hosted PoP. You must share the types of Synthetic tests you want to run by using the Instana-hosted PoP and their frequency with the IBM sales representative

To use an Instana-hosted PoP, complete the following steps:
  1. Update your license. Contact IBM Sales to update the license.
  2. After the license is updated, go to Synthetic Monitoring and initiate a request to deploy an Instana-hosted PoP for using with your tenant unit.
  3. Complete the steps that are covered in Using an Instana-hosted PoP.
After a PoP is deployed either by you or by Instana, you can check the Locations tab in the Instana UI to confirm that the PoP location is successfully registered. You can also use the Open APIs to confirm whether the PoP location is registered.It might take a few minutes for each queued activation request to process before the managed location appears. If the location does not appear after 10 minutes, contact IBM Support to investigate the status of the deployment.After the location is registered, you are ready to create Synthetic tests. You can either click Add > Add Synthetic Test in the Instana UI or use the Open APIs to create your Synthetic tests. Creation of the Synthetic test includes specifying how frequently the test will run and the location where it runs.For more information about how to write scripted API (HTTPScript) tests, see the API Script documentation.For more information about how to write a scripted browser test, see the Browser Script document.For more information about the Open APIs for Synthetic monitoring, see the Synthetic Monitoring section of the Open API documentation. All the views that you can see that in the Instana UI can also be retrieved by using the Open APIs.

After the license update is complete, users with the canConfigureSyntheticLocations permission can access the Create Location button on the Synthetic Monitoring page. To create a managed location, complete the following steps:

  1. On the Synthetic Monitoring page, click Create Location.

  2. Click Managed.
    Note: If your Instana license does not support this add-on, you cannot click Managed. Contact the IBM sales representative for assistance.
  3. Click Next.

  4. Select a datacenter.
  5. Click Activate.

The datacenters in the preceding screenshot are examples. The supported datacenters are in the following geographies:

  • Asia Pacific Northeast: Tokyo
  • USA East: Northern Virginia
  • Europe Central: Frankfurt
  • South America East: Sao Paulo

After you select a datacenter and select Activate, a confirmation dialog appears with information about the name of your Managed location and the expected delay before deployment is complete.

After the deployment is complete, the PoP is registered and the managed location appears on the Locations tab. Users with the Owner role can create or modify tests and assign them to run at this managed location.

In the datacenter list, one of the following statuses appears in the Activation Status column:

  • Inactive: Instana-hosted PoP is not yet deployed. Select one or more datacenters and click Activate.
  • Pending: The deployment is still in process.
  • Active: An Instana-hosted PoP is deployed; a location is listed on the Locations tab.
  • Error: The deployment failed. The deployment is retried automatically after 30 minutes. If the status is still Error after the deployment is retried, contact IBM Support.

Deleting managed location

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Users with the Configuration of synthetic locations permission can access the Action menu for a managed location on the Locations tab on the Synthetic Monitoring page.

To disable a managed location, complete the following steps:

  1. Deactivate the location to deprovision the PoP resources.
  2. Delete the location when its status changes to Offline.

The action that is listed in the Action menu changes based on the location status. To deactivate a managed location that is online, in the Actions column, click the ellipsis and click Deactivate. To delete a managed location that is offline, in the Actions column, click the ellipsis and click Delete locatio.

To disable a managed location, complete the following steps:

  1. In the Locations tab, click the ellipsis in the Action column and click Deactivate:

    A confirmation dialog is displayed.

  2. Click Deactivate to disable the location or click Cancel to leave the location enabled.

To completely stop using this managed location, delete the location. If you want to reuse the location and retain the history of your Synthetic test results associated with the location, do not delete the location. You can activate the Instana-hosted PoP again with the same location.

To activate a managed location again, the location status must be Offline. Click the ellipsis in the Action column and click Activate. Activating provisions the Instana-hosted PoP again and the location status becomes Online. Synthetic tests that were previously assigned to this managed location start to be run again after the PoP retrieves the list of tests. During reactivation, a confirmation dialog appears.

To delete a location, after the status of the managed location changes to Offline, click the ellipsis in the Action column and click Delete.

The "Delete Location" dialog is displayed. Click Delete Location.