Integrating with AppDynamics
The BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations AppDynamics connector collects events, metrics, and topology data from AppDynamics APM, DB and EUM.
You can view the collected data in various BMC Helix applications and derive the following benefits:
BMC Helix application | Type of data collected or viewed | Benefits |
|---|---|---|
| BMC Helix Operations Management | Events | Use a centralized event view to monitor and manage events, perform event operations, and filter events. Identify actionable events from a large volume of event data by processing events. For more information, see Monitoring events and reducing event noise. |
| BMC Helix Operations Management | Metrics | Use alarm and variate policies to detect anomalies and eliminate false positives for more accurate results while monitoring the health of your system. For more information, see Detecting anomalies by using static and dynamic thresholds. |
| BMC Helix Discovery | Topology | Collect all CIs from AppDynamicsin BMC Helix Discovery. Collect services from AppDynamicsin BMC Helix Discovery in a format that can be consumed by BMC Helix AIOps. For more information, see Managing your IT infrastructure. |
| BMC Helix AIOps | Situations (created from events) | Improve the mean time to resolve (MTTR) based on the situation-driven workflow. Lower the mean time to detect or discover (MTTD) and the time required for investigating tickets. For more information, see Monitoring situations |
| BMC Helix Dashboards | Metrics | Create dashboards to get a consolidated view of data collected from third-party products across your environment. Improve the efficiency of your system by monitoring the key performance metrics and respond to issues quickly to minimize the down time. For more information, see Creating and customizing dashboards. |
| BMC Helix AIOps | Services (created from topology) | Monitor the overall health of a service. When the service gets impacted by any factor, view the events generated because of the impact, analyze the causes of the impact, and quickly remediate those events to restore the health of the impacted service. For more information, see Monitoring services. |
Supported versions
BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations supports the following versions of AppDynamics for data collection:
- 26.1.0
- 25.10.x
- 25.7.x
- 25.1
- 24.7.0
Before you begin
Make sure you perform the following actions before you configure a connection with AppDynamics:
AppDynamics requirements
The user account with which you plan to connect to AppDynamics has the following roles assigned:
- Applications & Dashboards Viewer
- Dashboards Viewer
- DB Monitoring User
- Server Monitoring user
- Universal Agent User
- Workflow Executor
BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations prerequisites
- Depending on the location of the third-party product (SaaS, on-premises), choose one or more BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations deployment modes and review the corresponding port requirements. For information about various deployment modes and port requirements, see Deployment scenarios.
- Based on the deployment mode, use the BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations SaaS deployment or the BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations on-premises gateway or both. For more information about the gateway, see Deploying the BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations on-premises gateway.
- The on-premises gateway must be able to reach the third-party product on the required port (default is 443).
In the preceding list, third-party product refers to AppDynamics.
Task 1: To configure the connection with AppDynamics
- To access BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations, perform one of the following steps depending on your deployment mode:
- BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations SaaS – Log on to BMC Helix Portal, and click the BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations tile.
- BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations on-premises gateway – Use the following URL to access BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations: https://hostName:portNumber/swpui
- On the CONNECTORS tab, click
in the SOURCES panel. Click the AppDynamics APM, DB & EUM tile.
- Specify the following details for the source connection:
Specify a unique instance name.
- Specify the AppDynamics host name.
- Specify the AppDynamics HTTP or HTTPS port number, depending on the connection protocol (the default port number is 443).
Select the HTTPS option to use an HTTPS connection to the AppDynamics host.
- Specify the number of maximum concurrent REST API requests that should be executed during a collection schedule (default value is 5).
- Specify the AppDynamics account name.
- Use one of the following authentication methods :
- Specify user name and password. Ensure that the specified user has the roles assigned specified in the AppDynamics prerequisites section.
Select the Use oAuth2 option to specify client name and secret key. Ensure that the client name is registered as an API client in AppDynamics . For more information about generating the secret key, see AppDynamics documentation, Generate the Token through OAuth API.
- Click Proxy and specify whether you want to configure a proxy server. If yes, specify the host name and port number (default value is 8888).
- Click VALIDATE AND CREATE.
The specified connection details are validated and the corresponding source connection is created in the Source Connection list. Select the source connection that you created from the list if it is not selected already.
- Make sure that you select the options for the required data types to collect data.
Configure the collectors for the selected data types by clicking the respective data type in the Collectors section.
Click CREATE COLLECTORS to create the required collector streams for the selected data types.
Configure the distributors for the selected data types by clicking the respective data type in the Distributors section.
- Click CREATE DISTRIBUTORS to create the required distributor streams for the selected data types.
- Click VALIDATE AND CREATE and then click SAVE STREAM to save the stream.
After you save the stream, the connection that you just created is listed on the SOURCES panel. - (Optional) Perform the following steps if you want to collect and view the metrics data in a hierarchical manner. Otherwise, skip to step 14.
With the custom JSLT, each AppDynamics metric category is represented as a single monitor, with related metrics organized hierarchically beneath it, rather than being displayed as individual metrics as separate monitors. Otherwise, each metric is displayed as an individual monitor.- On the SOURCES panel, click Configure Mediator
for the source connection that you created and then expand APPDYNAMICS METRICS and navigate to the DISTRIBUTOR CONFIGURATION tab. - To view JSON in edit mode, click Edit JSON.
Search for the following line:
"jsltField": "//NO JSLT",Delete the existing value from the jsltField field; the result should look as follows:
"jsltField": "",- To disable the edit mode for JSON, click Edit JSON.
In the JSLT field, enter the following JSLT:
- Click SAVE & CLOSE.
- On the SOURCES panel, click Configure Mediator
On the SOURCES panel, move the slider to the right to start the data stream for the connector you created.
For more information about data streams, see Managing data streams.
Task 2: To verify the connection
In BMC Helix Intelligent Integrations, on the SOURCES panel, confirm that the data streams for the integration you created are running. Data streaming is indicated by moving colored arrows.

- A moving dark blue arrow (
) indicates that the event stream is running. Event data will be pushed according to the configured Collection Schedule interval. - A moving red arrow (
) indicates that the metric stream is running. Metric data will be pushed according to the configured Collection Schedule interval. - A moving light blue arrow (
) indicates that the topology stream is running. Topology data will be pushed according to the configured Collection Schedule interval.
Task 3: To view data in BMC Helix applications
View data collected from AppDynamics in multiple BMC Helix applications.
To view events in BMC Helix Operations Management
- In BMC Helix Operations Management, select Monitoring > Events.
- Filter the events by the AppDynamicEvent (for AppDynamics events) or AppDynamicHRVEvent (for AppDynamics Health Rule Violations) classes.

Incoming events from AppDynamics are processed in BMC Helix Operations Management through a set of deduplication rules to determine whether the incoming event is a duplicate event or a new event. For more information, see Event deduplication, suppression, and closure for reducing event noise.
For more information about events, see Monitoring and managing events.
To view metrics in BMC Helix Operations Management
The servers monitored by AppDynamics appear as devices and various metric categories in AppDynamics appear as monitors in BMC Helix Operations Management. You can view the metrics under these monitors.
- In BMC Helix Operations Management, select Monitoring > Devices.
- Click the link for the device for which you want to view metrics.
- On the Monitors tab, expand the monitor hierarchy, and click the metric for which you want to view data.
The Performance Overview tab shows the metric graph.
For information about metrics, see Viewing collected data.
To view the topology data in BMC Helix Discovery
In BMC Helix Discovery, select Explore > Data, and click <count> Import Records in the Miscellaneous section. The Import Record List page shows the CI records received from AppDynamics.
For information about records, see Managing your IT infrastructure.
To view services and situations in BMC Helix AIOps
Before you view services and situations in BMC Helix AIOps, create a Business Service model in BMC Helix Discovery. For information about creating models, see Managing models.
In BMC Helix AIOps, on the Overview page, view the services and situations for the event and topology data received from AppDynamics.
For information about services, see Monitoring services. For information about Situations, see Monitoring situations
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