Free Hybrid-Cloud-Observability sample questions

Correct answer: CLI polling credentials have not been configured for the node in SolarWinds.

SolarWinds HCO requires both SNMP and CLI (Telnet/SSH) access to poll detailed information from Cisco ASA firewalls, including VPN tunnel statistics, access lists, and failover status. While basic node health can be retrieved via SNMP alone, the richer contextual data is gathered through command-line interaction.

Correct answer: Deploy an Additional Polling Engine (APE) inside the VPC and assign the EC2 nodes to it.

Deploying an Additional Polling Engine (APE) within the AWS VPC is the correct architecture. The APE will initiate polling locally within the VPC, and only the summarized results will be sent back to the on-premises main Orion server. Security groups can be configured to allow polling from the APE's private IP, and the communication back to the main server can be tightly controlled, meeting the security requirement.

Correct answers: A trigger condition based on the 'Routing Neighbor' object.; A scope definition using a custom property to identify 'Core Routers'.

To create this specific alert, the trigger condition must be based on the 'Routing Neighbor' object, which contains the BGP state information. To ensure the alert only applies to core routers, the most scalable and manageable method is to use a custom property (e.g., 'DeviceRole = CoreRouter') to define the scope of the alert.

Correct answer: True

This statement is true. NetPath probes, which are the source of the path analysis traffic, can only be deployed on Windows-based main polling engines, additional polling engines, or other Windows machines running the SolarWinds agent. Linux agents do not support sourcing NetPath probes.

Correct answer: In NTA Settings, add a new application definition that maps TCP port 2575 to the 'EHR Application'.

The most direct and accurate way to classify custom application traffic in NetFlow Traffic Analyzer (NTA) is by defining it in the application and service port monitoring settings. By navigating to NTA Settings and adding a new application that maps TCP port 2575 to a friendly name like 'EHR Application', all future flow records matching this port will be correctly categorized.

Correct answer: PerfStack

PerfStack (Performance Analysis dashboards) is the ideal tool for this requirement. It allows users to drag and drop various metrics from different monitored entities (nodes, interfaces, applications, etc.) onto a common timeline. This provides a powerful, time-correlated view to troubleshoot and analyze performance issues across different parts of the infrastructure.

Correct answer: Load MIB -> Create Poller -> Assign to Nodes -> Add to View

The correct workflow is to first make SolarWinds aware of the vendor-specific OIDs by loading the MIB file into the MIB database. Once the MIB is loaded, you can create the Universal Device Poller and browse the MIB tree to select the correct OID. After the poller is defined, it must be assigned to the relevant nodes (the UPS devices). Finally, to visualize the collected data, you must add a resource like a chart or table to a view, such as the Node Details view.

Correct answer: Create a new NetPath probe from a different office location that uses a secondary ISP to the same application URL.

Creating a comparative path from a different location with a different ISP is the most powerful troubleshooting step. If the second path does not show the same packet loss and latency at the same point, it provides strong evidence that the issue is isolated to the primary ISP's network. This comparative data is crucial for efficiently resolving the issue with the provider.

Correct answer: In NTA Settings, configure different retention periods for the various types of flow data (e.g., Conversation data to 7 days, Endpoint data to 30 days).

SolarWinds NTA provides granular control over data retention. To meet the specified requirements, the administrator should navigate to NTA Settings and configure the retention periods for different data types. They can set the detailed 'Conversation' data to be kept for 7 days while setting longer retention periods for less granular, summarized data like 'Endpoint' or 'Application' traffic, thus meeting the one-year trend requirement while saving significant database space.

Correct answer: The SMTP server's firewall rules are configured to only allow connections from the primary server's IP address.

This is a common issue in HA setups. When the secondary server becomes active, it attempts to send emails from its own IP address. If the SMTP server or an intermediate firewall has rules that only permit connections from the primary server's IP, the emails will be blocked. The solution is to either use a shared virtual IP for the HA pool and allow that VIP, or to explicitly allow the IP addresses of both the primary and secondary servers on the SMTP relay.