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From the Device Editor Main, select to Add or Modify an entry.

The Network TCP/IP Type entry is used to perform standard TCP/IP Connection to remote hosts on standard or non-standard ports.  Use this type of entry for HTTP, SMTP, POP3, FTP, ECHO, PING, and other types of monitoring where a direct port connect can be used with minimal overhead.

After selecting "Network TCP/IP" on the Type selector, you will have access to the following fields for configuration.

Editing Network/TCP/IP Entry Types

IPSentry standard network device configuration

Network Type Specific Entries

IP Address
Enter the IP Address or FQDN of the remote host you will be monitoring.  Using the IP Address is the recommended entry in order to avoid potential delays and problem issues with DNS, WINS, NBNS, etc...   By using the IP Address, you avoid failures resulting from name lookup errors as well as confirm that the time to process the entry does not include time to perform name lookups.

Port
The port setting (combined with Data To Send  and Data To Receive) is what makes IPSentry very flexible in basic TCP/IP Connection Availability monitoring. You may either select one of IPSentry's pre-configured well-known ports in the drop-down list (these are well-known ports such as HTTP, SMTP, POP3, NNTP, etc..) or you can enter your own port number for more customized entry. (See the How-To section for more information on custom port uses.)

Note: Special (non-standard) Port Numbers
If you are using non-standard ports for some of the standard protocols such as HTTP, ECHO, TELNET, etc. You can select the port type HTTP, ECHO, etc.. - click 'Use Pre-Defined Send/Recv and then change the port to the back to non-standard port number you are using (such as 8080 for HTTP).

** Variations on port types
While the majority of TCP/IP ports will function the same, there are two exceptions to the fields and timing.

** ICMP-PING

IPSentry network Ping configuration using ICMP

When you select ICMP-PING as the port type, you will notice that Data to Send and Data to Receive will be removed and the timeout value will be specified in milliseconds rather than seconds.

With ICMP-PING you will have the following additional options:

Retry Count
This is the number of ping requests that will be attempted in order to obtain a response within the defined timeout threshold.  The system default is 4 and the recommended values is greater than 1.   If you specify 1 as the retry count, you risk more alerts due to routing updates and other spurious delays that occur during first ping packet sends.  In many cases during ping, the first ping packet will have a slower response than the remainder.

Packet Size
You can adjust the size of the PING request packet if a packet size other than the default 32 is desired or required.  Under most circumstances, you need not change this value.

TTL (Time To Live)
This value represents that maximum number of hops that can be traversed during the packet path.  The default of 255 is recommended and should not be changed unless you know the specifics and ramifications of altering this value that relate specifically to your routing expectations.

Use ICMP.DLL
This option makes use of the Windows ICMP.DLL rather than Winsock ping. 
Make sure this option is checked when running on Windows Vista.

** WEB PAGE

IPSentry basic web page monitoring configuration

The "WEB PAGE" option is similar to the HTTP option except that it allows you to enter a basic URL in the IP Address field and the internal pre-configuration logic will generate the data to send/receive information to accommodate the URL that was entered.  This functionality if for very basic web page connectivity and testing.  For more advanced web server monitoring, the HTTP/s Enhanced Web Monitor is highly recommended.

Data to Send
After IPSentry makes a connection to the server at IP Address on the specified Port, IPSentry will attempt to send the data contained in this field. (i.e. Standard HTTP Data To Send: GET / HTTP/1.0~^~^ will send a GET request for the default page)

There are a couple special characters that are transformed in this field and you must be aware.
They are:
^ = Converted to a Line Feed (x0A, Dec:10)
~ = Converted to a Carriage Return (x0D, Dec:13)

If you require specific symbols or characters to be sent to the remote host (such as high ASCII or nulls), you can use the HEX translation sequence of &Hxx to send binary data to the remote host.
i.e. &H0A would be converted the same as using the special character ^.
If you need to send one of the two special characters, you can use &H5E for ~, and &H7E for ^.

Data to Receive
After IPSentry connects and any data in the Data To Send field is successfully sent to the remote host, IPSentry will await the arrival of the contents of this field. This is case-sensitive and incorporates the same character rules as the Data To Send field. If you are unsure of the data that will be received, but you know that something will be received, you can use '*'. If any data is received and the Data To Receive field is set to *, IPSentry will consider this as a success. (See the How-To section for more information on custom port uses.)

Timeout
Enter to number of seconds that IPSentry should wait for the completion of Connect, Send, or Receive.

** When using ICMP-Ping / UDP / DNS, this value is represented in milliseconds rather than seconds in order to give you finer control over acceptable network speeds. Remember to set this value accordingly (1000 = 1 Second) We recommend setting this value to 1000 or greater for ICMP-Ping and then adjust accordingly based on results of ping testing.

Auto Retry
If you select this option, IPSentry will perform retry the operation the number of times specified in the "Count" field before returning the final status. 

Count
If you enable the Auto Retry option, enter the maximum number of attempts that should be made to return a successful result before returning the status as failed.

Return Received Data
Enable this option to return the data that was received in the result for use with the %%mach.resultinfo%% keyword.

Use Predefined Send/Recv
IPSentry comes pre-configured with several standard protocol options (HTTP, NNTP, SMTP, FTP, etc..). When using one of the pre-configured ports, you may click this button to automatically configure the Data To Send and Data To Receive fields with the appropriate information as outlined in the protocols respective RFC of initial response.

For example, if you have selected HTTP as your port, IPSentry will set the following:
Data To Send: GET / HTTP/1.0
Data To Recv: HTTP/1.

While receipt of HTTP/1. does not guarantee anything more than the web server sending a response, it is the most basic response to insure the server is accessible.

Note: HTTP/1. will appear in the header of any response from the server, so if the response is a "Document Not Found" or one of many other errors, that will not be detected.

If you want to insure that the page is being delivered, you must set the Data To Recv field to text that will only appear in the results (HTML Source) normally received by a browser.

COMMON TO ALL MONITOR TYPE ENTRIES

Type
Select from the 6 category types of monitoring entry you wish to edit.

RGE currently provides 6 primary categories with many sub types within each entry category creating a well rounded arsenal of monitoring functionality. 
The categories and types of entries, with their sub-types are as follows:

Group / Template
This entry type does not perform any actions or monitoring tasks on it's own.   The Group/Template type is used for grouping of entry items as well as configuration of standardized templates, schedules, and alerting configurations.
[ Details ]

Network TCP/IP
This entry type allows for TCP/IP based connection and data send/receive capabilities. There are currently 16 pre-configured standard ports and the option to utilize custom port numbers for the host entry.  This is one of the most often used types of monitors within IPSentry.
[ Details ]

WEB PAGE
Telnet
SMTP
RADIUS * Deprecated - use the UDP/DNS/RADIUS Add-In
daytime
DNS-TCP * Deprecated - use the UDP/DNS/RADIUS Add-In
DNS-UDP * Deprecated - use the UDP/DNS/RADIUS Add-In
echo
finger
ftp
http
https * Deprecated - use the HTTP/s Web Monitor
ICMP-PING
nntp
POP
POP3
Custom Port

Service Monitor
This entry type will query local and remote system services to insure they are running.  You may specify one or more services to be monitored within a single entry.  However, you should be aware that if you are monitoring 5 services and one fails, the entry will be reported as failed.  While detail information will be available as to the service that caused the failure, all alerts will be performed as a single failure.
[ Details ]

Drive Space Monitor
This entry provides local and remote drive space monitoring to insure that drive space remains above the user-defined low-water mark.  In the event free space falls below your defined threshold, the defined alerts would be triggered.   For monitoring multiple volumes, you should utilize the Performance Monitoring Add-in to monitor logical drive space percentages available.
[ Details ]

Back-Reference Monitor
The back-reference allows you create an entry whose result is based on the state of one or more other entries in the system.  You define the importance of each entry to be referenced (a weight) and define the maximum weight value that is acceptable.   Thus, you can effectively create an entry that triggers alerts if (x) number of items are in a failure state.
[ Details ]

Command Monitor
The command monitor allows you have IPSentry launch an external command, process, or application and optionally evaluate the run time, exit code, or both.  This allows you create your own external scripts and commands to be launched by IPSentry.
[ Details ]

Add-In Monitoring Component
The Monitoring style add-ins currently being shipped with the IPSentry Installer are as follows
[ Details ]:

Database Connection and Query Monitor
Monitor databases and data sources for connectivity and query result capabilities.

DNS/RADIUS/UDP Monitor
Monitor DNS, RADIUS, and other UDP based servers.

Event Log Monitor
Monitor local and remote event logs for event messages of interest.

File & Directory Monitor
Monitor files, folders, sizes, counts, etc..

File Content Monitor
Evaluate file contents and trigger alerts when data is found.

HTTP/s Enhanced Web Monitor
Provides enhanced web server monitoring capabilities.

IT Environmental Monitor
Monitor Sensatronics environmental monitoring equipment.

Mail Transaction Monitor
Monitor mail delivery from relay host to mailbox for slow or non-delivery issues.

Modem Connection Monitor
Monitor ability to connect to remote dialup systems via modem.

MRTG Counter Value Monitor
Monitor MRTG HTML counter data values for critical levels.

Network Time Monitor
Monitor and Synchronize local time with network time servers.

Performance Counter Monitor
Monitor local and remote windows performance data counters for critical levels.

POP3 Mail Queue Monitor
Monitor POP3 mailboxes for message wait times and message content.

Scripted TCP/IP Network Monitor
Advanced network monitoring using scripted SEND/RECV Scripting

SNMP Object Monitor
Monitor SNMP compliant devices and systems for critical values, changes, etc.

SSL Certificate Monitor
Monitor SSL Certificates for changes, expirations, and validity to be alerted to critical issues regarding your ssl certificate usage.

 

Normal state is [Failure]
If this entry is checked, then IPSentry will expect that the result is intended to be Critical.   This is intended where you require a CRITICAL state to be returned for the entry to be successful.   For example, let's say that you are scanning a file using the file content monitoring and want to be notified if it does not see the text "OK" in the file.  By default, the file content monitor returns CRITICAL when it finds the expected text.  In your case, you only want to be critical if it doesn't find that text.  This would be a good case for enabling this option.  Thus, configured alerts would only be triggered when the text was NOT found.  

Name
Enter a unique device name for this entry.  The recommended device name entry should be brief yet descriptive. This name will be used in the statistics reporting, graphing output (if enabled), as well as textual alerts and notification where configured with the %%mach.name%% keyword.

Description
Enter a meaningful description of the entry providing additional information about what and why the entry is being used and perhaps what is expected.

Schedule
Click this button to modify the entry availability schedule.

Notes
Click this button to modify the entry notations.

Attributes
Click this button to modify the entry custom attributes.

Depends On
This field shows the item upon which this entry is dependent in order to run.  If the dependent item is in a Critical state, this entry (and by reference - it's children) will not be monitored.   This is useful in group scheduling functions as well as avoiding monitoring of items that you know will be un reachable.  For example, if you have 5 web servers on the other side of ROUTER A, you would set each of the servers dependent upon ROUTER A.  If ROUTER A is down, it may be futile to try and connect to the web servers since we already know the link has an issue.  Thus, ROUTER A would trigger it's alerts as the failing point, and the children would be skipped.

Required State
Use to define the require state of the parent entry before this entry will be processed. run (Normal or Critical). 
The default parent required state is normal such that when a parent is in critical state, it's children will not be evaluated. 

Synchronize Dependency Counters
In some cases, you may want the failure counters of child entries to reflect those of the parent.  As in the above scenario, you may want to show that the 5 web servers dependent on the router have also failed.  While the actual state of the web servers themselves is unknown, it is known that access to those servers is unavailable and perhaps this failure should count against them just as it does the router.  Selecting this option is only used for basic statistical purposes and is not reflected in graphing details.   Within the graphing details, if the item was not monitored, there will be no data for that time period.

Suspend / Resume Monitoring
Click this option to suspend (or resume) the current entry.  When suspending a device, you will be presented the option of the duration for which the device should be suspended.  You can enter the duration in DAYS:HOURS:MINUTES to suspend for a specific duration at which point monitoring of the selected entry will resume.   If you leave the duration field blank or set to 0:0:0, the entry will be suspended indefinitely.

When suspending indefinitely, you must Resume the entry manually.

 IPSentry Suspend Item Dialogue

If you click the Select button at this point, you will be given the option to enter a specific date and time on which the entry should resume.
Shedule Time Window

Normal Poll Frequency
This value represents the number of IPSentry cycles that must occur before the item is polled.  The value is useful for monitoring items that may not need to be checked with as often as other items.  For instance, connectivity to a network device such as a web server may need to be checked every 15 seconds where as checking drive space or scanning for an event log may only need to be performed every 5 minutes.  In this case, you can set your sentry cycle interval to 15 seconds and set the poll frequency on your drive space monitor entry to 20.

Critical Poll Frequency
This value represents the number of IPSentry cycles that must occur before the item is polled when it is in a CRITICAL state.  This is useful for entries that have a high poll frequency under normal situations, but may have a tendency to auto-correct within just a couple of cycles thereby becoming stable.  Setting this value to a lower value than the normal poll frequency allows for notification or recovery actions to be performed more quickly.

Copy From
Click this button to copy the configuration settings from another entry.  You will be presented with a list of existing devices from which you can copy the complete configuration.
 
IPSentry Copy device configuration from.

Copy To
Click this button to copy configuration specific settings from this entry to multiple entries.  You will be presented with the Copy To dialogue in order to select the configuration properties to copy and a list of entries to which to copy the selected settings. 

Order Alerts
Click this button to set the preferred order of alert/notification.  In some cases, you may want your email notifications sent before the pager notifications or vice-versa.

Simple highlight the alerting method and click the up/down buttons to reorganize the alerting sequence.
 
Order Alerts for Entry

Test
Click this button to test the configuration as it would run during a normal cycle.  Note that this will not trigger alerts - rather, it will simply tell you the result of the configuration settings.

The result of the test will be displayed in the testing results dialogue.
 
IPSentry device test results dialogue

 



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