Chroniker Getting Started

This getting started document is a walkthrough on how to define some basic monitoring metrics in different Chroniker modules,
and how BizWatch consolidates all the metrics in different business dashboards

Below are the instructions that will help you:

1. Monitor the availability of your servers, application ports, and network devices with NodeWatch
2. Monitor the response time of your most important tasks with TaskWatch
3. Manage the system performance of your critical servers with SystemWatch
4. Create a consolidated view of all your tests with BizWatch
5. Define Alerts and set up event thresholds
6. More Help

•  After you have installed and activated Chroniker, Click on "Launch Chroniker" button

•  The Chroniker home page will display the activated Chroniker modules.

NodeWatch

NodeWatch monitors the response time and availability of your servers, network devices, and any TCP Connect based application through ICMP/ping checks. To get started, auto-discover your network and then decide which servers you want to monitor.

•  From the Chroniker home page, click on the NodeWatch link

•  Once in NodeWatch, select "Auto-discover nodes on the network"

Note: to add individual nodes or import them from a CSV file,
please refer to Chapter 3: NodeWatch of the Chroniker User Guide

•  Click on Add / Delete Ports button if you want to add new ports to the preconfigured port list.

•  Enter the range of IP addresses

•  Check Get Hostnames if you want to get the hostnames of the nodes in your network.

•  Click Start button to auto-discover

•  Wait for few minutes for Chroniker to scan your network

•  Uncheck the nodes that you do NOT want to monitor

•  Select a Group from the drop-down list. (This can be changed easily later)

•  Click on the Add Selected Nodes button

•  Now you will see your nodes added in the NodeWatch page.

You can view the graph and statistics about a specific node by click on its alias.
You can also edit the node properties or manage your nodes from this page.

TaskWatch

TaskWatch monitors the response time of your Web Servers, Mail Servers, FTP, DNS, LDAP, and Active Directory servers, and Databases, etc. by running user defined tests. To get started, we will walk you through the steps to define: a Web Server Test, a DNS Server test, and a Mail Server Test.

Web Server Test

•  From NodeWatch, click on the Home button in the top menu bar.

•  Click on TaskWatch.

• Once in the Tasks Page, click on the Add Task button

• A menu will be displayed showing a list of tasks.

• Click on WebServer Test.

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• Click on the Group drop down menu button. Select a group from the list or create a new one. If you already have a group defined and do not need to create a new group, please proceed to the next step.

• Type a unique name in the Alias field.
            Example: Server Name “NRG_WEB”.  All spaces and symbols are permitted.

• Type in the URL of the page to download
            Example: http://www.nrgglobal.com 

• Enter a login name for a basic HTTP authentication (Optional)
            Example: John

• Enter a password for the login (Optional)
            Example: ********

• Enter the number of seconds before the test is considered a failure in the Connect Timeout (sec.) field.
            Note: Recommended value is 15-30.

• Check Use Proxy if you want to execute this task via a proxy server specified in the admin options

• Enter the Acceptable HTTP Response Code received from the web server
            Example: = 200 (web server checks out ok)

• In the Match Page Content field, enter a Match against the content (Case Sensitive) of the page.(Optional)
            Note: If the matched content is not found on the webpage, the task returns a down event

• Check Fetch All Content if you want to fetch all the images, css files or javascript files referenced in the page and get the complete response time for the page.

• Select WEB_Down_5min from the Down Event drop list.
            Note: Drop lists show pre-configured events, you can create your own events and apply them later.

• Click the Add button.

• You will be directed to Tasks page.

• Click Execute this task now button ( ) next to the task just added to execute the test immediately.

• A pop-up window will open listing all the components of the page that will be monitored.

DNS Server Test

• To add a DNS Server Test, click on Add Task button from Tasks page

• Once the menu is displayed, click on DNS Server Test

• The form below will be loaded.

• Click on the Group drop down menu button and select a group from this list or create a new one.
            Note: to create a new group, select <New> from the drop-down list and fill out the form shown the same way as we did for the Web Server Test.

• Enter a unique task Alias.
            Example: NRG DNS

• Enter the DNS Server Address.
            Example: 194.256.200.16

• Enter the Host Address
            Example: http://www.nrgglobal.com

• DNS query type: Select the DNS Query type from the drop down list.
            

• Match: Enter the comma separated list of IP addresses that are expected to be resolved from a given Host Name

• Select DNS_Down_5min from the Down Event drop list.
            Note: Drop lists show pre-configured events, you can create your own events and apply them later.

• Click the Add button at the bottom of the page to complete the creation of task. Or if you want to start over, click the Reset button to clear all fields. You may also click Cancel to abort the process.

Mail Server Test

• To add a Mail Server Test, click on Add Task from the Tasks page

• Click on Mail Server Test from the menu displayed

• Click on the Group drop down menu button and select a group from this list or create a new one.
            Note: to create a new group, select <New> from the drop-down list and fill out the form shown the same way we did in the Web Server Test.

• Enter a Unique Task Alias. Use whichever naming convention is most useful to you.
            Example:  Name of server and the e-mail address it is checking.

• Check the Use Global SMTP Server box if you would like it to default to Chroniker's SMTP server defined during the install/setup.
            Example:  You input the SMTP information upon installation. However, you can change the configuration through the setup menu. 

• Type the Sending Mail Server host name.
            Example: mail.yoursmtpserver.com 

• Type the Sending Mail Server User Name if it is a secure mail server.
            Example: John

• Type in a Sending Mail Server Password if it is a secure mail server.
            Example: ***********

• Type the From E-mail Address.
            Example:  Enter Development@nrgglobal.com

• Type the To E-mail Address. This is the e-mail address that will receive the test e-mail to see how long it takes to receive e-mails.
            Example:  Enter info2@nrgglobal.com

• Type in the Wait Time in seconds after the e-mail is sent, to see if it was received.
            Example:  The lowest time set to wait should be 30 (thirty) seconds.  We recommend 60-80.

• Select the Receiving Protocol from the drop down list.
            Example:  POP or IMAP.

• Enter the host name or IP of the Receiving Mail Server.
            Example: 194.256.12.65

• Enter the Receiving Mail Server User Name.
            Example: Admin
            Note: If your username and password keep defaulting back to admin, turn off your browser auto fill settings

• Enter the Receiving Mail Server Password.
            Example: **********

• Select Mail_Down_5min from the Down Event drop list.
            Note: Drop lists show pre-configured events. You can create your own events and apply them later.

• Click the Add button at the bottom of the page to complete the creation of task. Or if you want to start over, click the Reset button to clear all fields. You may also click Cancel to abort the process.

These were just a few examples to help you get started with TaskWatch. If you want to define other tasks, please refer to the TaskWatch How-to Documents found in: http://www.nrgglobal.com/walkthroughs/index.php

SystemWatch

SystemWatch monitors server performance metrics, such as CPU, memory, disk (or file systems), files, processes, and applications.

• From the top menu bar of Chroniker, click on Home button.

• Once the menu is displayed click on SystemWatch

Localhost is added by default. You can expand it by clicking on in the top left corner menu to see some of the metrics SystemWatch can monitor. To learn how to add new systems, follow the steps below:

• Once in SystemWatch page, click the Add New System icon. (The icon is plus sign over a computer tower)

•  Enter an alias for the system in the System Alias field.

• Select the appropriate Operating System from the Type drop list. Either Windows, Linux or Solaris.

•  Select Connection Method from the drop list.The options available depend on the selection made for the System Type. Most of these connection methods are agent-less, however, for certain system types like Windows, an agent based connection method is available. If you select an agent-based connection method, then please ensure that the appropriate agent is already installed and running on the target machine. For Oracle systems, please make sure that the appropriate client is installed on the machine where Chroniker is installed.

•  Enter the hostname or IP address in the Host/IP Address Name field.

•  Enter the Login name.

Note: The login name for a Windows machine is entered in the format DOMAIN_NAME\USERNAME. In some cases on a Windows machine, a login name may not be required. The login name for a Linux or Solaris machine is simply the USERNAME.

•  Enter the Password for the server, and repeat it in the Enter Again field.

•  Select a Profile from the drop list.

Note: If no profile is selected (the field reads "Select"), then monitoring will be 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

•  Enter the Top Process.

Note: For CPU Usage metric, it displays the top processes using the CPU at the time of the check. The value in the Top Process field specifies the number of processes that are going to be listed in the CPU graph.

•  Enter the Connection Timeout period in seconds.

•  Type a description in the Description field to help you and others know what the function of the server is and what metrics will be monitored.

•  Click the Add button at the bottom when finished.

•  When you click the Add button, a dialog box will pop-up asking you if you want SystemWatch to retrieve a list of standard performance metrics.
            • Click OK, if these metrics are of interest to you.
            • Click Cancel, if you only want user defined metrics for this system.

•  If you click OK, Chroniker SystemWatch will take a moment to create a list. When complete,
            • Check the boxes next to the metrics you want to monitor.
            • Check "Monitor Processes" and "Monitor Services" to view a list of processes and services
            • Click Continue
            • Select Processes and services you would like to monitor
            • Click Continue and you will see the new system added in the left pane. You can expand it to see the different metrics added.

BizWatch

Now that we have added a few tests in different Chroniker modules, let us get a customized and consolidated view of all those tests in one module, BizWatch.

•  From the SystemWatch screen, click on the Home button found in the Chroniker top menu bar.

•  Once in the Chroniker home page, click on the BizWatch link.

•  Click on the BizWatch Tools icon.

•  Select "Auto-initialize a new dashboard" from the Menu.

•  Click New Dashboard checkbox.

•  Type in the Dashboard Name.

•  Click on one of the Sharing radio buttons.

• Select Set Default or Overwrite Panels.

•  Click on the Add button.

•  A Chroniker Systems Dashboard will be created organized by servers being monitored in different Chroniker modules.

Defining Alerts

To setup alerts that will be triggered when your monitored object, such as a node, task, system, or application, goes down or its response time exceeds a certain threshold, you need to:

• Define a Reaction. Reactions are enacted when thresholds are exceeded.
  1. In the module's page, for example NodeWatch, click on the Reactions button in the top menu bar
  2. Click on "Add New Reaction" and select the type of reaction you want to define: email, custom, numerical page, restart, or SNMP trap.
  3. Fill out the form.
     Click here to learn more about reactions.

• Define an Event that the reaction will be applied to. Events will launch your predefined reactions when conditions you define are met. You can assign up to 2 reactions per event.
  1. In the module's page, click on the events button in the top menu bar
  2. Click on the "Add New Event" button and fill out the form.
     Click here to learn more about events.

• Apply this event to your object(s):
  1. In the event page, click on the “Apply Event” button which is the first button to the left of the event you want to apply
  2. Select your object(s) from the list
  3. Click “Apply”

Note: you can also apply a predefined event to an object by clicking on the edit button next to it in the module's page.

More Help

For other Getting Started and How-To documents, please refer to the Walkthroughs page available at NRG Global's website: http://www.nrgglobal.com/walkthroughs/index.php

For detailed help about each Chroniker module, please refer to the Chroniker User Guide included in the software.
You can access the user guide by clicking on the Help button located in Chroniker's top menu bar