Network Monitor

The SiteScope Network Monitor provides an easy way for you to track network statistics for server where SiteScope is running. Information provided by this monitor can help you track down performance problems related to the network interface on the SiteScope server.

Each time the Network Monitor runs, it returns a reading and a status message and writes them in the SiteScope monitor logs.

Usage Guidelines

What to monitor

SiteScope performance is impacted by the network interface on the server. The actual number of bytes being passed in and out of your server as well as the number of packets in error are all critical measures of a server's performance and are tracked by the Network Monitor. In addition, active connections are tracked.

About scheduling this monitor

In most environments, scheduling the Network Monitor to run every 10 minutes should be sufficient. You use the error and warning thresholds to have SiteScope notify you if network traffic on the server gets too high.

Common Problems and Solutions

Packet Errors measure the number of packets that failed to reach the destination IP address. This can indicate a faulty network interface or media. If the problem shows up on several servers that are topologically close, it is likely the media. If this condition occurs on only one isolated server, you can suspect the interface.

Throughput indicators let you know how fully utilized your network interface is. For instance, if you are running on a conventional ethernet interface and you see numbers approaching 10 megabits / sec., the interface is nearly saturated.

Connections is the count of open ports on your network interface. This measure should settle at some some predictable level. Continuous climbing of the connection count indicates an error condition or run-away condition that will eventually slow the server due to resource constraints.

Status

The reading is the current value of the monitor, such as 40% saturated. The status is logged as either OK, warning, or error. A warning status is returned if the bytes out per second is more than 80% full. Full is defined as a fully saturated standard ethernet bandwidth or 10 megabits / sec. An error status is returned if bytes out per second is more than 90% saturation.

Completing the Network Monitor Form

To display the Network Monitor Form, either click the name of an existing Network Monitor in a monitor table, or click the Add a new Monitor to this Group link on a group's detail page and click the Add Network Monitor link.

Complete the items on the Network Monitor Form as follows. When the required items are complete, click the Update Monitor button.

Update every: Select how often the monitor should check this interface. The default interval is to run or update the monitor once every 10 minutes. Use the drop-down list to the right of the text box to specify another update interval in increments of seconds, minutes, hours, or days. The update interval must be 15 seconds or longer.
Title: Enter a title text for this monitor. This text is displayed in the group detail page, in report titles, and other places in the SiteScope interface. If you do not enter a title text, SiteScope will create a title based on the host, server, or URL being monitored.

Advanced Options

The Advanced Options section presents a number of ways to customize monitor behavior and display. Use this section to customize error and warning thresholds, disable the monitor, set monitor-to-monitor dependencies, customize display options, and enter other monitor specific settings required for special infrastructure environments. The options for this monitor type are described below. Complete the entries as needed and click the Add or Update button to save the settings.

Disable

Check this box to temporarily disable this monitor and any associated alerts. To enable the monitor again, clear the box.

Verify Error

Check this box if you want SiteScope to automatically run this monitor again when it detects an error.

Update Every (on error)

You use this option to set a new monitoring interval for monitors that have registered an error condition. For example, you may want SiteScope to monitor this item every 10 minutes normally, but as often as every 2 minutes if an error has been detected. Note that this increased scheduling will also affect the number of alerts generated by this monitor.

Schedule

By default, SiteScope monitors are enabled every day of the week. You may, however, schedule your monitors to run only on certain days or on a fixed schedule. Click the Edit schedule link to create or edit a monitor schedule. For more information about working with monitor schedules, see the section on Schedule Preferences for Monitoring.

Monitor Description

Enter additional information about this monitor. The Monitor Description can include HTML tags such as the <BR> <HR>, and <B> tags to control display format and style. The description will appear on the Monitor Detail page.

Report Description

Enter an optional description for this monitor that will make it easier to understand what the monitor does. For example, network traffic or main server response time. This description will be displayed on with each bar chart and graph in Management Reports and appended to the tool-tip displayed when you pass the mouse cursor over the status icon for this monitor on the monitor detail page.

Depends On

To make the running of this monitor dependent on the status of another monitor or monitor group, use the drop-down list to select the monitor on which this monitor is dependent. Select None to remove any dependency.

Depends Condition

If you choose to make the running of this monitor dependent on the status of another monitor, select the status condition that the other monitor or monitor group should have in order for the current monitor to run normally. The current monitor will be run normally as long as the monitor on which it depends reports the condition selected in this option.

List Order

By default, new monitors are listed last on the Monitor Detail page. You may use this drop-down list to choose a different placement for this monitor.

Error if

Set the Error threshold for this monitor. By default SiteScope reports an error condition if any packet errors occur. You can change this to be dependent upon packet errors per second, the number of active connections, bytes per second received, or bytes per second sent. Choose the option you want from the drop-down list, select a comparison value symbol, and enter the threshold number in the text box. You must enter a whole number.

For example, if you want SiteScope to report an error condition if your packed error count exceeds 5 errors per second, you need to choose errorsPerSecond >= from the drop-down lists and then enter 5 in the text box.

Warning if

Set the warning threshold for this monitor. By default SiteScope reports a warning condition if your bytes out per second is more than 50000. You can change this to be dependent upon packet errors per second, the number of active connections, bytes per second received, or bytes per second sent.

For example, if you want to change the warning threshold to 10000, choose outBytesPerSecond > from the drop-down lists and then enter 10000 in the text box.

Good if

By default SiteScope assumes a good status. You can change this to be dependent upon packet errors per second, the number of active connections, bytes per second received, or bytes per second sent.