Requirements for private Synthetic locations

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Ensure that the host you want to use for your private location complies with the following requirements.

End-of-support information

There are no new versions of Chromium for Red Hat/Oracle Linux/Rocky Linux 8 beyond version 133. For important security and stability reasons, we've decided to discontinue our support for installing Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate on Red Hat/Oracle Linux/Rocky Linux 8 after ActiveGate version 1.325.

To ensure the continuity and security of your synthetic monitors, we recommend migrating your Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate to one of the supported operating systems, for example, Red Hat/Oracle Linux/Rocky Linux 9.

ActiveGate version 1.325 is the last Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate supported on Red Hat/Oracle Linux/Rocky Linux 8.

Additionally, with Dynatrace version 1.326, we plan to introduce mechanisms preventing Synthetic-enabled ActiveGates on Red Hat/Oracle Linux/Rocky Linux 8 from being updated beyond version 1.325.

Additional support notes
  • Chromium development for Amazon Linux 2 stopped at version 126. For important security and stability reasons, we've decided to discontinue our support for installing Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate on Amazon Linux 2 after ActiveGate version 1.307. ActiveGate version 1.307 is the last Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate to support Amazon Linux 2. Additionally, with Dynatrace version 1.308, we have introduced mechanisms preventing Synthetic-enabled ActiveGates on Amazon Linux 2 from being updated beyond version 1.307.
  • Chromium development for Red Hat/CentOS 7 stopped at version 126. For important security and stability reasons, we've decided to discontinue our support for installing Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate on Red Hat/CentOS 7 after ActiveGate version 1.305. ActiveGate version 1.305 is the last Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate to support Red Hat/CentOS 7. Additionally, with Dynatrace version 1.306, we have introduced mechanisms preventing Synthetic-enabled ActiveGates on Red Hat/CentOS 7 from being updated beyond version 1.305.
  • Check the latest ActiveGate release notes for the oldest supported ActiveGate versions.

Operating system requirements

Antivirus and Anti-Malware software

Antivirus and anti-malware software can adversely affect Dynatrace Synthetic monitoring capabilities. The antivirus or anti-malware software might block the browser or Dynatrace processes responsible for executing synthetic monitors, cause Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate installation failures, interfere with network communication, and impact the reliability of measurements.

Please also note

To ensure proper stability and performance, consider adding the following directories and processes to the allowed list or excluding them from the policy:

Directories:

  • All directories with synthetic in their path. For an overview of directories in use, see ActiveGate directories.

Processes:

  • chrome
  • vucwrapper
  • java

This is the minimal list of processes and directories required for Dynatrace Synthetic to operate. It's not guaranteed that the service will function correctly with only these exclusions. Collaborate with your vendor to appropriately allow expected behaviors from Dynatrace.

Prior to contacting Dynatrace support to troubleshoot issues with your private synthetic locations make sure that antivirus or anti-malware software was excluded as a source of problems.

A freshly installed ActiveGate can run your private synthetic monitors (both HTTP and browser monitors) on the following operating systems.

Windows

Supported operating systems

Windows OSVersions
Windows Server2016, 2019, 2022

Browser versions on Windows

On Windows, the ActiveGate installer package includes the Chromium browser used to run browser monitors. The table below shows the Chromium versions that are bundled with the respective ActiveGate versions.

ActiveGate versionIncluded browser version
1.331143
1.329142
1.327141
1.325140
1.323139
1.321138
1.319138
1.317137
1.315136
1.313135
1.311134
1.309133
1.307132

Unsupported Windows versions for testing purposes only

If you only want to test private Synthetic locations on a non-production host, for example, your own desktop, you can install a Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate on unsupported Windows versions such as Windows 10 or Windows 11.

As of ActiveGate version 1.263+, Synthetic-enabled ActiveGates no longer work on Windows Server 2012 for testing purposes. Google has dropped support for Windows 2012 Server with Chromium 110, which is bundled with the ActiveGate version 1.263 installation package.

Linux

Supported operating systems

Linux distributionVersions
Red Hat Enterprise Linux19.2, 9.4, 9.6, 9.7
Ubuntu20.04, 22.04, 24.04
Amazon Linux2023
Oracle Linux29.6, 9.7
Rocky Linux39.7
1

The Synthetic installer can be installed on all minor releases of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9. However, we recommend using the versions listed in this table, as they have Extended Life-cycle Support (ELS) according to Red Hat Enterprise Linux Life Cycle.

2

The Synthetic installer can be installed on all minor releases of Oracle Linux 9. However, we recommend using the latest currently supported versions according to documentation for Oracle Linux 9.

3

The Synthetic installer can be installed on all minor releases of Rocky Linux 9. However, we recommend using the latest currently supported versions according to Rocky Linux Release and Version Guide.

Deprecated operating systems

Linux distributionVersions
Red Hat Enterprise Linux7.91
CentOS7.91
Amazon Linux22
Red Hat Enterprise Linux8.83
Red Hat Enterprise Linux8.103
Oracle Linux8.103
Rocky Linux8.103
1

ActiveGate version 1.305 is the last Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate to support Red Hat/CentOS 7.

2

ActiveGate version 1.307 is the last Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate to support Amazon Linux 2.

3

ActiveGate version 1.325 is the last Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate to support Red Hat/Oracle Linux/Rocky Linux 8.

Browser versions on Linux

We strongly recommend that you keep your Linux-based Synthetic-enabled ActiveGates and browser versions updated—Dynatrace supports browser versions that are no more than two versions behind the latest Dynatrace-supported version for a specific ActiveGate release. For example, if the latest supported browser version is 103, Dynatrace supports up to browser version 101. If the provided browser version is significantly older for a specific OS, we support only the provided version. See information on updating browser automatically and manually.

On Linux, the ActiveGate installer downloads the browser dependencies that are required by the Synthetic engine. On Red Hat and Rocky, you need to enable particular repositories from which the installer downloads the dependencies. The Dynatrace web UI provides you with all the required commands. For detailed instructions, see Create a private synthetic location.

When installing ActiveGate and the browser from a custom, local repository, you need to resolve all dependencies and enable repositories as required; the custom repository can be used only for browser packages, not their dependencies. Place the browser package archive and the signature file in the custom repository for installation. If your package archive file is https://synthetic-packages.s3.amazonaws.com/Chrome/chrome-for-testing-linux64/chrome-for-testing-linux64-143.0.7499.192.zip (Chrome for Testing 143 for Ubuntu on ActiveGate version 1.333), you can find the signature file by appending .sig to the URL: https://synthetic-packages.s3.amazonaws.com/Chrome/chrome-for-testing-linux64/chrome-for-testing-linux64-143.0.7499.192.zip.sig.

  • Chromium development for Red Hat/CentOS 7 and Amazon Linux 2 stopped at version 126.

Due to changes in libdav1d.so.6 packet availability Chromium versions older than 130 cannot be installed on Red Hat/Rocky Linux 9. Please refer to troubleshooting guide for details.

ActiveGate versionLatest supported Chromium version
Red Hat, CentOS, Oracle Linux 8
Latest supported Chrome for Testing version
Amazon Linux 2023, Ubuntu, Oracle Linux 9
1.3313143 Red Hat/Rocky Linux 9143
1

Introduced support for Ubuntu 24.

2

Introduced support for Oracle Linux 9.

3

Ubuntu Server 20.04 and 22.04 migrated to use Chrome for Testing.

File Access Policy Daemon framework (fapolicyd)

If not configured correctly, the File Access Policy Daemon (fapolicyd) can potentially affect Dynatrace Synthetic monitoring capabilities. Similarly to antivirus or anti-malware software, fapolicyd might block the browser or Dynatrace processes responsible for executing synthetic monitors.

To ensure proper stability and performance, consider adding directories and processes to the allowed list or excluding them from the policy. For more detailed information, refer to the Red Hat documentation on fapolicyd. Prior to contacting Dynatrace support to troubleshoot issues with your private synthetic locations, make sure that fapolicyd was excluded as a source of problems.

File Access Policy Daemon framework can be run in debug mode where all denials are logged, making tracking down missing rules and troubleshooting issues easier. For more detailed information about its debug mode, refer to the documentation on troubleshooting problems related to fapolicyd

Hardware requirements

General considerations

  • Note that a Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate has more demanding hardware and system requirements than a regular Environment or Cluster ActiveGate. We strongly recommend using a Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate exclusively for synthetic monitoring purposes.
  • Any additional component running on the host should be taken into account when planning resources provisioning. For instance, if the location is monitored by OneAgent or another deep monitoring solution, memory (RAM) requirements will increase.
  • You need to uninstall and reinstall your Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate to change its size, for example, after increasing the resources of your S-sized ActiveGate to meet the requirements for a size M. Reinstallation is required before you can make use of the updated resources for synthetic monitoring; otherwise, your ActiveGate will continue to show up as size S (Synthetic Node size) in Deployment Status and will be subject to the execution limits of size S.

Sizing guide

Based on the number of tests executed per hour, Synthetic-enabled ActiveGates need to meet the following hardware requirements.

Limit values

The estimated limits listed in the table below were determined in our internal tests. The actual values might vary depending on the complexity of your monitors.

XS node

While XS nodes can be used on Windows Server-based ActiveGates, they may not be the best fit due to the higher hardware demands of the browser. For optimal performance and to prepare for future enhancements, we recommend having at least 8 GB of RAM and 25 GB of free disk space.

On Linux systems with only 4 GB of RAM, the increasing resource requirements of the browser, combined with the installation of third-party tools on the host, may lead to occasional memory shortages. Upgrading to 8 GB of RAM is strongly recommended to help ensure a smoother and more reliable experience.

Node with browser monitor supportBrowserless node
Minimum CPUs2 vCPU1 vCPU
Minimum free disk space20 GB17 GB
Minimum RAM4 GB4 GB
Minimum free RAM3 GB2,7 GB
Minimum disk IOPS (Windows)100100
Estimated maximum number of HTTP monitor executions/h1300k300k
Estimated maximum number of high-resource HTTP monitor2 executions/h10k10k
Estimated maximum number of browser monitor executions/h300-
Estimated maximum number of NAM ICMP monitor packets/h3 5500k500k
Estimated maximum number of NAM TCP monitor requests/h4 61M1M
Estimated maximum number of NAM DNS monitor request/h4 7100k100k
Footnotes
1

Calculated as 5000 monitor executions (maximum for a single environment) run once every minute (maximum frequency).

2

These are HTTP monitors on private locations with any of: pre- or post-execution scripts, OAuth2 authorization, Kerberos authentication.

3

For NAM monitors using ICMP request type, capacity is related to number of ICMP echo requests (packets) that are being sent during monitors execution. As this number of packets-to-be-sent may significantly vary among defined monitors, using the number of monitor executions as a capacity limit would be inaccurate.

4

For NAM monitors using TCP and DNS request types, capacity is related to the number of network connections (requests) that are being sent during monitors execution. As this number of requests may significantly vary among defined monitors, using the number of monitor executions as a capacity limit would be inaccurate.

5

During load tests that helped to establish capacity limits, NAM ICMP monitors were exclusively scheduled on location; monitors had the following characteristic. Actual capacity may be different for other environments (for example, those where monitored targets respond slower or are failing to provide a response within timeout limit or other type of monitors are executed at the same time). Monitors were using default settings (including default timeouts settings and single packet per-request) and were scheduled every 1 minute. There were multiple target hosts used during tests; all of them were responding properly with average RTT around 200ms.

6

During load tests that helped to establish capacity limits, NAM TCP monitors were exclusively scheduled on location; monitors had the following characteristic. Actual capacity may be different for other environments (for example, those where monitored targets respond slower or are failing to provide a response within timeout limit or other type of monitors are executed at the same time). Monitors were using default settings (including default timeouts settings) and were scheduled every 1 minute. There were multiple target hosts and ports used during tests; all of them were responding properly with average TCP connection time around 200ms.

7

During load tests that helped to establish capacity limits, NAM DNS monitors were exclusively scheduled on location; monitors had the following characteristic. Actual capacity may be different for other environments (for example, those where monitored targets respond slower or are failing to provide a response within timeout limit or other type of monitors are executed at the same time). Please note that DNS server used during resolution should be able to handle incoming requests and may not consider the incoming traffic as a subject to throttling or rejection (for example, due to detection as bot-originated). Monitors were using default settings (including default timeouts settings and UDP as a transport) and were scheduled every 1 minute. There were multiple resolution targets used during tests; all of them were resolved properly with average DNS resolution time around 10ms. Publicly available DNS servers were used: Google (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4) and Cloudflare (1.1.1.1 and 1.1.1.2)

Storage and file system permissions

The table below shows the default installation locations (Linux and Windows) of various ActiveGate directories and the minimum size requirements. This information is compiled from details in ActiveGate directories.

1

For an XS ActiveGate—more space is required for execution logs on larger ActiveGates.

Permissions for /tmp

Synthetic-enabled ActiveGate requires write access to the /tmp directory during runtime. Its dependencies, including xvfb, utilize /tmp for storing temporary files and runtime data. Lack of write permissions to this directory may result in unexpected failures or degraded functionality. Ensure that the host environment provides sufficient access rights and available space in /tmp to support these operations reliably.

Related tags
Digital ExperienceSynthetic ClassicSynthetic Classic