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Estate Wave: An Interactive Node View Inside SolarWinds

i_like_eggs

Recently, I wondered whether I could make particles form a moving wave inside a SolarWinds dashboard.

That idea got slightly out of hand 😅

This view turns all 2,069 eligible nodes into an interactive particle field. Each particle represents one monitored node, retains its own identity and uses its reported Orion status colour as the wave moves.

The estate can be filtered by service, location or reported status, with the totals and particle field updating to match the selected scope.

Hover over a particle to identify the node. Select it to inspect CPU, memory, response time and packet loss, with a link through to its normal Node Details page. Click the empty space and the wave carries on.

The scene can also be rotated, paused and reformed.

One important boundary is that a particle’s position or proximity to another particle has no operational meaning. This is not a topology, dependency or health model. The wave is the presentation layer; the node identity, reported Orion status and returned metrics are the underlying data.

The data extraction is SELECT-only, with self-contained HTML, CSS and browser-side JavaScript handling the visualisation and interaction directly inside SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted.

It started as an experiment to see whether I could make particles move inside SolarWinds. It ended up becoming a completely different way to explore the monitored estate.

I’ve probably spent longer watching the shimmer than I should admit.

Node names and location labels have been replaced with fictional values for the demonstration

✌️

PART 2: Estate Gravitation: When CPU Load Shapes the Landscape - THWACK

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SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted

Comments

i_like_eggs

You nailed it, John 😊 The aim is to make it visually engaging and operationally useful, something engineers have a reason to return to in their day-to-day work.

Being able to filter the estate, select a node and inspect its metrics gives it that practical value. Keeping node identity and reported Orion status intact while exploring a different presentation is exactly the balance I’ve been trying to get right

i_like_eggs

Haha, I’ll take the Sheldon Cooper comparison 😂 Thank you @jaspiedad

It grew out of the custom dashboard work I’ve been experimenting with inside SolarWinds and sharing with the community.

It really started with “could I create a sphere of nodes and have them move around it?” From there, one idea led to another, and eventually we had a wave 😅

A dashboard like this can take up to a couple of weeks, with a lot of the work happening outside working hours. It’s very much a hobby for me at this point..

There are plenty of iterations along the way, especially getting the movement right while keeping the individual nodes selectable and useful :)

jaspiedad

This is so cool! I didnt know this could be done inside the dashboard.

Feels like it could be something Sheldon Cooper would do 😁

I'm curious how you discovered this and how long it took you to make that wave @i_like_eggs

JOEDPEREIRA

SO cool to see this representation

John.Summers

This is such a creative way to explore a monitored estate. Turning 2,069 nodes into an interactive particle field while preserving node identity, Orion status, filtering, and access to key performance metrics makes the experience both visually engaging and genuinely useful. I especially appreciate the clear distinction between the presentation layer and the underlying operational data. Great example of pushing dashboard design in a practical direction!

vidulakhanna

Really interesting way to visualize the environment! @i_like_eggs

mariefab

So cool @i_like_eggs!

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