The disclosed embodiments provide a system that facilitates the processing of network data. During operation, the system causes for display a graphical user interface (GUI) for configuring the generation of time-series event data from network packets captured by one or more remote capture agents. Next, the system causes for display, in the GUI, a first set of user-interface elements for managing one or more event streams containing the time-series event data, wherein managing the one or more event streams includes enabling the generation of a set of statistics from an event stream without subsequently storing and processing at least a first portion of the event stream by one or more components on a network. The GUI then updates the configuration information based on input received through the first set of user-interface elements.