Exchange Solution

The SiteScope Exchange Solution includes three solution templates that implement best practice monitoring for Microsoft Exchange messaging services. This includes solution templates for the following:

Exchange 5.5
Exchange 2000
Exchange 2003

You use these templates to deploy a set of monitors that test the health, availability, and performance of an Exchange server. Depending on the template chosen, this set includes monitors checking NT Event log entries, MAPI operations, system performance counters, and message system usage statistics. An in depth description of the Exchange Solution is available in SiteScope\docs\SiteScope_Exchange_Best_Practices.pdf. (Note: This is a password protected document. The password is provided along with the Exchange Solution license key from Mercury.)

After the template set is deployed the monitors created by the template will behave the same as other monitors in SiteScope. This means that they can be viewed, edited, and deleted like other monitors. Some of the monitor types deployed by the template can only be added by using the applicable solution template. See the section Solution Monitor Types for more information.

Usage Guidelines

Select the Exchange solution template that matches the version of Microsoft Exchange that you want to monitor. Deploy one solution template for each Exchange server in your environment.

Important: Each of the Exchange solutions make use of the SiteScope MAPI Monitor. Successful deployment of the this monitor type requires specific setup up configuration relating to the mailbox owners and the SiteScope service. See the MAPI Setup Prerequisites for the MAPI Monitor for the steps you need to perform before deploying an Exchange solution template.

Completing the Exchange Solution Template

To display the Exchange Solution Template Form, click the add a Solution Template link on a group's detail page and click the Exchange Solution link.

Complete the items on the Exchange Solution Template Form as follows. When the required items are complete, click the Submit button.

Server: Choose the Exchange server that you want to monitor. Click the choose server link to monitor services or processes on another server (may require that you define connections to other servers).
Mail User: Enter the NT account login name for the user for which e-mail round trip times will be tested using MAPI.
Mail Password: Enter the NT account login password for the user name entered above.
Mail Box: Enter the name (alias) of the mailbox to be used for testing e-mail round trip times using MAPI. This is often the e-mail account name but it may be a different name. It is recommended that you copy the mailbox name as it appears in the E-Mail Account properties for the e-mail account you will be using for this solution.
Mail Domain: Enter the domain to which both the owner of the mailbox being used and the Microsoft Exchange server belong.
Note: The owner of the mailbox to be used by this solution must also have administrative account privileges on the machine where SiteScope is running. SiteScope also needs user account access to the domain where the Microsoft Exchange server is running.
Authentication User (Exchange 2000 and 2003): Enter the username to use when querying the server for mailbox statistics. The statistics are gathered via WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation), so the username entered here must have permissions to read WMI statistics on the server from WMI namespace root\MicrosoftExchangeV2. If this field is left blank, the user that SiteScope is running as will be used.
Password (Exchange 2000 and 2003): Enter the password for the user entered above for gathering WMI statistics, or leave this blank if user field is left blank.

Verifying Monitor Values

Each monitor in the Solution template is now displayed in a table. The monitor type along with monitor name is displayed above the table. The first column shows the monitor's property name. The next column shows the value for that property. Values that contained variables are shaded with green. Values that are not affected by variables show no shading. The final column is for displaying errors that SiteScope has found while verifying the values. Errors are shaded in red. Errors should be corrected before proceeding to the next step, but SiteScope does not require it, however doing so may create monitors that do not function properly.

The following is an example section from the Property and Syntax Check page for an NT Event Log Monitor that is part of an Exchange solution template.

Property and Syntax Check for Exchange Solution

Monitor Type: NTEventLogMonitor Name: \\exch2k3.qa.freshwater.com - NT System Log

Property	Value	Property or Syntax Errors
_logName	System
_frequency	600
_eventType	Error
_machine	exch2k3.qa.freshwater.com
_monitorDescription	Looks for errors reported in the standard System log on the Exchange server
_alerting	once
_name	\\exch2k3.qa.freshwater.com - NT System Log

Solution

Once all the monitor values are acceptable, then select the Create Solution button to create the monitors.

Adding Monitors Based on the Solution Template

As SiteScope creates the monitors, the monitor type and name are displayed along with messages of any errors found. A "success" message is shown if the monitors are created successfully. The process does not run the monitor.

After they have been created, you can select the Return link to return the group detail page to view the status of the monitors.

Note: Errors detected during the creation of monitors using a solution template are independent of the status returned when the individual monitors are run. This means that the monitors may be created successfully but that the configuration settings may be incorrect or that the system being monitored is unavailable.

Note: Solution Templates do not configure any automated alerts for the monitors created. You must create and associate one or more alert definitions to the monitors or monitor groups created by solution templates.