# Incident automation

In the [previous article](https://docs.statuspal.io/monitoring-and-automation/out-of-the-box-monitoring), we've explained how to automate incident reporting from a StatusPal-monitored service.

This article explains how to configure incident automation from an external monitoring service like Pingdom, Datadog, Newrelic, etc.

### Setup

Enable incident automation from an external monitoring service on any service in your StatusPal status page by editing or creating a new service, then select <mark style="background-color:green;">Inbound</mark> or <mark style="background-color:green;">Webhook</mark> under the "Monitoring and incident automation" section.

We support two ways of integrating external monitoring checks in StatusPal:

### Incoming Webhook

Webhook is our newer and more reliable method for integrating external monitoring services.

This is a more reliable method because services that support sending webhook events don't normally change the format of their webhook payloads without prior notice. Furthermore, webhooks don't require a confirmation step and implement retrial mechanisms.

We're slowly migrating over to support incoming webhooks with most monitoring services, and we hope to eventually fully deprecate "Inbound" in favor of the more reliable incoming webhooks.

#### Webhook configuration

Upon selecting the "Webhook" option, you'll see a "Monitoring service" dropdown, from which you can select some supported services like StatusCake and UptimeRobot, as well as Custom JSONPath for any other services not listed.

Upon selecting one of these options and clicking on Update, you'll see a `Webhook URL` that you can configure in your monitoring service.

<figure><img src="https://4061983002-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FgIMm5p2V7PNx3dS7vwKE%2Fuploads%2FwlaxwmrJrMQODutfpqRv%2FScreenshot%202024-01-12%20at%2016.27.30.png?alt=media&#x26;token=2f40f1df-1660-4dd0-b7a3-6617ad80a24f" alt="status page incident automation with incoming webhook"><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

To set up Zabbix as a monitoring service, follow the instructions from

{% content-ref url="../platform/integrations/zabbix" %}
[zabbix](https://docs.statuspal.io/platform/integrations/zabbix)
{% endcontent-ref %}

#### Custom JSONPath

If the service you want to automate your status page's incident reporting from is not available in the list, no worries, simply select the "Custom JSONPath" option, and you should be able to get any external monitoring working with StatusPal.

<figure><img src="https://4061983002-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FgIMm5p2V7PNx3dS7vwKE%2Fuploads%2FdWmSSY9OEah52tKhILDF%2FScreenshot%202024-05-15%20at%2014.45.08.png?alt=media&#x26;token=88d9f064-53cb-443c-a924-09281535d92a" alt=""><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

All you need to know is the format of the webhook payloads that the external monitoring service will send to StatusPal, and enter the above settings accordingly.

You can even enter a "Test Payload" to see what the result of the JSONPath evaluation will look like before having to trigger a real-life event in your external monitoring service.

### Inbound email address

When selecting this option, we provide you with an inbound email address that you can configure as an alert recipient within your external monitoring service.

While this method is very flexible, it's proven to be a little unreliable since monitoring email notifications is prone to change and sometimes requires initial email confirmation, which we attempt to forward to you but don't always achieve.


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