Cost Anomaly Detection

This section guides you to configure the detection of cost anomalies in your cloud account using CoreStack.

Enabling Cost Anomaly for Cloud Accounts

CoreStack provides detailed insights about the cost anomalies identified in your cloud accounts. In order to fetch this information, the cost anomaly detector must be enabled for the cloud accounts in Account Governance dashboard. Cost anomalies can be detected only for the cloud accounts that has the cost anomaly detector enabled.

Perform the following steps to enable cost anomaly detector for a cloud account:

1. Navigate to Account Governance submenu under Governance in the Left navigation menu.
2. Click View option available in the Actions column of the required cloud account.
3. Select View Settings from the menu. The Cloud Account Details screen appears.
4. Select Governance Configuration from the left pane of the Cloud Account Details screen.
5. Click Cost tab in the right side.
6. Mark Enable Cost Anomaly checkbox.
7. Click Save & Apply.

The cost anomaly detector will be enabled for the selected cloud account. These steps must be repeated for all the cloud accounts for which the cost anomaly detector must be enabled. Notification settings can be enabled for an email address or webhook, where notifications related to cost anomalies are sent.

Navigation

After cost anomaly detectors are enabled for the required cloud accounts, relevant information and insights will be available in the following sections.

Click Cost in the Left navigation menu and select Cost Anomaly option to land in the Cost Anomaly screen. The Cost Anomaly screen provides a list of configured cost anomaly baseline settings, which can be viewed using different categories (refer the tabs explained below for categories and its views), along with cost overview such as total cost impact, total anomalies, peak anomaly day, peak anomaly account.

There will be 5 tabs available in the Cost Anomaly screen: Cloud Account, Resource Category, Tag, Product Category, and Resource Group.

• Cloud Account: This view lists the cost anomaly baseline settings configured using cloud account category and provides a cost overview of the associated cost anomalies.
• Resource Category: This view lists the cost anomaly baseline settings configured using resource category and provides a cost overview of the associated cost anomalies.
• Tag: This view lists the cost anomaly baseline settings configured using tag category and provides a cost overview of the associated cost anomalies.
• Product Category: This view lists the cost anomaly baseline settings configured using product category and provides a cost overview of the associated cost anomalies.
• Resource Group: This view lists the cost anomaly baseline settings configured using resource group category and provides a cost overview of the associated cost anomalies.

Configuring Baseline Settings for Cost Anomaly

Once the cost anomaly detector has been enabled for required cloud accounts, baseline settings must be configured for the cost anomaly in CoreStack by performing the following steps:

1. Click Settings optionand select Baseline Settings from the dropdown menu in the Cost Anomaly screen. The Cost Anomaly Baseline Settings screen will appear.
2. Click Add New Settings. The Create Settings screen appears.
3. Select the required boundary to define the area of influence for the cost anomaly settings: Tenant or Cloud Account.
   1. If Tenant is selected, select the required tenant from the Tenant dropdown list.
   2. If Cloud Account is selected:
      1. Select the required cloud provider from the Cloud Service dropdown list.
      2. Select the required cloud accounts listed in the Cloud Accounts dropdown list. Multiple cloud accounts can be selected.
4. Select and add the required categories to be configured for the cost anomaly from the Add Categories dropdown list. The options are: Cloud Account, Resource Category, Tag, Product Category, and Resource Group. Multiple categories can be selected. A table will be displayed below with the selected categories.
5. In the table, configure the following values for each category.
   1. Threshold: Specify the cost threshold (in percent value) to be set for a category for listing an anomaly under the specific category view in the Cost Anomaly screen.
   2. Anomaly Detection Span: Specify the frequency within which the cost anomaly must be considered for a category. The option are: Monthly, Quarterly, and Monthly&Quarterly.
   3. Category Count: Specify the count to be considered for a category.
6. Specify a daily cost threshold (in percent value) limit in the Threshold compared to previous day field of Daily Threshold section, which will be used to evaluate if cost anomaly can be detected for a day.
7. Specify a cost in the Minimum Cost Impact field of Daily Threshold section, which will be used to evaluate if cost anomaly exceeds this value when compared with the previous day.

Cost anomalies will be detected for a specific day only if the cost exceeds this threshold limit and the defined minimum cost impact in comparison with the previous day.

8. Click Save.

The baseline settings for a cost anomaly will be configured successfully and listed in the Cost Anomaly Baseline Settings screen. CoreStack starts detecting the anomalies using the configured details. You can configure multiple cost anomaly baseline settings with different combinations and settings.

A cost anomaly baseline setting can be modified by clicking the Update icon available in the Action column of a baseline setting listed in the Cost Anomaly Baseline Settings screen.

Integrating Jira with Cost Anomalies

Jira can be configured with the cost anomalies created and actions can be triggered. In order to use Jira along with these cost anomalies, the Jira account must be onboarded into CoreStack. Refer Jira Integration topic for more details.

To configure Jira for triggering actions based on cost anomalies, perform the following steps:

1. Click on the settings icon on the top left of CoreStack and select Tenants from the menu. Tenant Management screen appears.
2. Click required tenant from the left side table. Configurations for the selected tenant will be displayed on the right side.
3. Select Activity Queue Settings section.
4. Enable Alerts checkbox and select the required Jira account from the dropdown list.
5. Enable Policies checkbox and select the required Jira account from the dropdown list.
6. Click Save icon.

The activity queue settings will be saved, and actions will be triggered in the associated Jira account for the cost anomalies based on the cost anomaly baseline setting created.