Mar

7

Demo version

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In the previous posts I wrote about main features of the Server Supervisor product and even published couple screen shots to give you an idea of what it looks like in practice. Of course, any descriptions and still pictures do not provide same impression as an experience with a really working product. That is why from the very beginning we planned to provide access to a demo version of the product for everyone interested. The time has come. We have a version to show:

https://softlogica.vpscustomer.com
(use “admin” as the login name and leave the password field blank)

As usual I have to say that what you can see there is a kind of incomplete version. Some features may not work. I will not give you a list of them, because it can become obsolete in a week. We are going to update that demo version as we move on with the development of the product, so you can check for changes from time to time.

We had to add couple “safety features” to that demo, because we made it publicly available. Minimum polling interval for all monitors is 60 seconds. This means that you can’t check resources too frequently. Another limitation is that you can’t edit properties of the “admin” account. However you can create new accounts, if you want.

Since all users login to the same instance of the system, they all will share same configuration of monitors. If you would like to have your own separate instance, please leave a comment, and we will set up it for you.

Any comments, suggestions and bug reports are very welcome.

Feb

4

Introduction

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We are happy to announce that several months ago SoftLogica started the development of Server Supervisor product. In short, it will be a server monitoring tool. While we are still working on the GUI design and the exact feature set, we would like to share with you our ideas to hear your comments and suggestions. We will try to take in account all your thoughts, because the more people contribute to the process, the more suitable for their actual needs the product will be.

Before we go to some technical details let me say who will probably need this product and why…

Almost any company has some IT infrastructure with a number of network resources including both external and internal ones. There can be several web servers, data base servers, etc. Usually it is important to guarantee that some essential resources are absolutely reliable and available for employees and/or customers 24/7. If this is the case for some company, then it is likely that sooner or later it will have to face and solve the following three problems.

Fast notification about any problem with a network server resource.
If something goes wrong, the corresponding system administrators should be notified immediately. But the problem will not cry about itself. So, you need to find a way to monitor the availability, performance and correct work of the essential resources permanently.

Resolution of a problem and investigation of its source.
After the notification is received by the proper person, it is crucial to provide a detailed view on the situation, so that the problem can be easily identified and resolved. As soon as it is done, the next step is to make sure that the system has come to its normal state. Finally, the most important question is what was the actual problem? You should find the answer to make sure that it will never take place again. To investigate the problem someone would need to have the ability to view the information about each monitored parameter for any time period in some easily perceivable visual form.

Resource monitoring and management.
Even while everything is working fine and there is no need to mend something immediately, a good system administrator would want to take a view of the situation from time to time. It is a good practice to get a report for last 24 hours daily. Such report would include a summary of the state of the monitored parameters. Another good idea is to get a more strategic view on the evolution of the system and predict its further development. It is better to know about coming problems in advance. You can find system bottlenecks and improve its architecture or make upgrades on time. For this purpose the reports should be generated for any time periods and supplemented with comparison graphs.

Server Supervisor GUI

P.S.: In the next posts I am going to tell what features of our product will help businesses solve each of these problems. I will be really happy to hear any comments from anyone who is familiar with the area or anyone who feels that our new product can be of any use.