|
|
Sentinel Features
- Configurable Display
-
The system views displayed are completely configurable. Monitored entities can be represented by a variety of pre-built shapes and graphics or by customer-provided images. Sentinel includes a powerful drawing tool which can be used to create any desired view of the monitored system. Sentinel drawings can be detailed enough to serve as documentation for a system flow or topology.
The action taken when a user clicks on objects on a view is configurable: it can zoom in' to a more detailed Sentinel view (see below)
- Events Visible Immediately
-
Failed components are graphically highlighted in real time so that faults can be quickly identified. Holding the mouse over a screen object displays the events pertinent to that object. The Sentinel display also includes a scrolling event log, so that the text description of recent events can be viewed.
- Zoom In
-
Sentinel views can represent either a high-level or detailed view of monitored entities. The objects shown on the screen can be either container' objects which will change state when an event occurs on one or more monitored objects
- Store demographic data
-
Objects on the display can be configured to display textual information about the object, such as rack location, circuit id, warranty information, technical contacts, etc. This allows the monitoring system to function as documentation, and provides the information in a handy place while troubleshooting a problem.
- Configurable Paging
-
Pages delivered by Sentinel can be targeted so that notifications go only to the appropriate personnel. We realize that over-paging' conditions people to ignore or turn off their pagers
- Maintenance Mode
-
Any monitored entity or group of entities can be put into "Maintenance" mode, which tells Sentinel to ignore future events. This is used when performing scheduled maintenance, so that unplugging a router, for instance, doesnt cause a flurry of pages to be sent.'
- Event History
-
All events are stored in a relational database. Sentinel includes a powerful reporting tool which can quickly be used to create custom event reports. The event database schema is provided with Sentinel so that customers can generate their own custom reports as well.
Event history can be used to analyze system uptime and downtime trends. This allows technicians to function proactively: they can utilize the event history to forecast and correct problems before they occur.
Sentinel reports can also be used to document vendor performance relative to service level agreements.
Reporting is compatible with database standards such as Sybase and Oracle. Event data is accessible through ODBC, so that custom reports can be generated with reporting packages such as Crystal Reports.
- Multi-platform Monitoring
-
Sentinel works across a wide variety of computing platforms, including Windows (NT, 95, 98, 2000, and XP) and Unix (Sun Solaris, Linux, AIX). Monitoring can be easily extended to other platforms through the use of the Sentinel API.
- Template-driven configuration
-
Monitoring rules can be controlled by templates. Similar machines can be monitored using the same set of rules so that each machine does not have to be configured individually.
- Track application use
-
Sentinel can be configured to monitor application frequency of use down to the individual workstation level. This allows administrators to determine whether costly proprietary applications are being used. This functionality can also be used to allocate cost based on actual use.
- Interface with other diagnostic tools
-
Sentinel views can be configured so that clicking on a screen object will invoke any web-based diagnostic utility.
|
|
Home 