Root Cause Analysis
Automatic Root Cause Analysis — From Alert to Diagnosis in Seconds
Most monitoring tools tell you something is broken. Sitewatch tells you why. Every incident is automatically classified into a cause family with a confidence score and grounded evidence — so you skip the investigation and go straight to fixing.
- 10 cause families covering infrastructure, application, and content delivery
- Confidence scoring so you know how certain the diagnosis is
- Evidence-grounded — every classification is backed by check data
01The difference
Generic alerts vs. root cause diagnosis
| Scenario | Generic monitoring alerts | Sitewatch root cause analysis |
|---|---|---|
| Alert content | "Site is down" or "check failed" | Specific cause family with evidence |
| Investigation time | 15-60 minutes of manual debugging | Seconds — diagnosis is automatic |
| Fix guidance | None — figure it out yourself | Stack-aware fix playbooks |
| Confidence level | Unknown — is it real? | Confidence score with each diagnosis |
| Configuration | Rules and thresholds to maintain | Zero config — works out of the box |
Alert content
- Generic monitoring alerts:
- "Site is down" or "check failed"
- Sitewatch root cause analysis:
- Specific cause family with evidence
Investigation time
- Generic monitoring alerts:
- 15-60 minutes of manual debugging
- Sitewatch root cause analysis:
- Seconds — diagnosis is automatic
Fix guidance
- Generic monitoring alerts:
- None — figure it out yourself
- Sitewatch root cause analysis:
- Stack-aware fix playbooks
Confidence level
- Generic monitoring alerts:
- Unknown — is it real?
- Sitewatch root cause analysis:
- Confidence score with each diagnosis
Configuration
- Generic monitoring alerts:
- Rules and thresholds to maintain
- Sitewatch root cause analysis:
- Zero config — works out of the box
02Why root cause analysis
Stop guessing. Start diagnosing.
10 cause families
Every incident is classified into a specific cause family — from DNS resolution failures to deployment artifact issues. No ambiguity.
Confidence scoring
Each diagnosis includes a confidence percentage based on evidence strength. High confidence means act now; lower confidence means investigate the top candidates.
Evidence-grounded
Classifications are backed by what the check actually saw — what each request returned, what kind of file came back, and how long it took. Not guesswork.
Zero configuration
Root cause analysis works out of the box. No rules to configure, no patterns to define. Sitewatch classifies automatically based on check evidence.
Plain-English output
Every diagnosis now includes a human-readable headline and user impact description — not just technical classification. Share root cause summaries with non-technical stakeholders without translation.
03What gets classified
10 cause families across three categories
Infrastructure
- DNS resolution failure — domain not resolving or pointing to wrong IP
- Origin server error — your hosting provider returning errors
- SSL/TLS certificate issue — expired, misconfigured, or mismatched certificates
- Network connectivity — timeouts, connection refused, or routing issues
Application
- Deployment artifact missing — JS/CSS bundles deleted or not built
- Application error — framework-level crashes or runtime exceptions
- Configuration drift — environment variables, feature flags, or routing misconfigured
Content delivery
- CDN cache misconfiguration — stale content, wrong file types, or errors at the edge
- Third-party dependency failure — external scripts or APIs returning errors
- Redirect misconfiguration — loops, chains, or incorrect destinations
04What you get
Outcomes, not a feature list.
Start with the diagnosis, not the investigation.
Knowing something broke is the easy part. Sitewatch reads the evidence from the check itself — what each request returned, what came back instead, how long it took — and names the most likely cause, so you skip straight to fixing.
10
Root cause families
23
Tech stacks detected
90%
Maximum confidence score
05FAQ
Frequently asked questions
When Sitewatch detects an incident, it analyses what the check actually saw — what each request returned, what kind of file came back, timing data, and asset fingerprints — to classify the most likely root cause. The classification is matched against known cause patterns across 10 families.
Cause families are categories of root causes grouped by domain: infrastructure (DNS, origin server, SSL, network), application (deployment artifacts, app errors, config drift), and content delivery (CDN cache, third-party dependencies, redirects). Each incident is classified into the most likely family.
Confidence scores range from low to 90% maximum. The score reflects how strongly the check evidence matches a known cause pattern. High-confidence diagnoses (70%+) are very reliable. Lower scores indicate multiple possible causes — Sitewatch ranks them so you can investigate the most likely first.
No. Root cause analysis works automatically based on check evidence. There are no rules to set up, no patterns to define, and no training period. It starts classifying from your first incident.
Yes. Every root cause classification links back to the specific evidence that informed it — including what each request returned, what kind of file came back, and timing information. The evidence is included in incident reports and Slack/email alerts.
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