Documentation forIpMonitor
Effective December 31, 2024, IpMonitor will reach its end of life and will no longer be available or supported. If you liked IpMonitor, consider trying another SolarWinds product.

Service monitor

The Service monitor uses remote procedure call (RPC) or SNMP communication to test whether a specified service is running. The service can be running on the local machine, a remote SNMP-enabled computer running Microsoft Windows Server, or a Unix-based operating system such as Linux, Solaris, HP-UX, and so on.

Use this monitor to:

  • Ensure that a critical service is not unexpectedly stopped
  • Monitor the state of dependency services that must be running for a critical service to function
  • Automatically take recovery actions to restart the service or reboot the computer in the event that a service is unexpectedly stopped

Create a Service monitor

The Service Monitor Wizard helps you configure a service monitor with the least amount of initial input. The wizard tests all parameters you enter along the way to make sure that the monitor runs as expected before going live in a production environment.

  1. Click Devices in the toolbar.
  2. Locate and click the targeted device you want to monitor.
  3. In the toolbar, click Add > Add New Monitor.
  4. In the Select Monitor page, click Service.

  5. Enter the details of the server you want to monitor.

    1. Enter the IP address or host name of the target server running the service you want to monitor.

    2. Select the Use SNMP checkbox if the monitor will communicate with an SNMP-enabled network device.

      An SNMP Agent and the SNMP Service must be running on the monitored device for SNMP communications.

    3. Select the SNMP version used by the device. ipMonitor and the target device or server must use the same SNMP version.
    4. (Optional) Select a credential for monitoring. When selected, ipMonitor uses the credential account and password information to authenticate to the target machine and test the service.

  6. Click Next.

    ipMonitor scans for a list of available services.

  7. Complete the wizard.

Windows recovery options for services

The Windows Control Panel / Administrative Tools / Services / Recovery dialog helps you set recovery options that automatically restart the service, run a file, or reboot the computer.

The purpose of the Windows recovery options for services is similar to the ipMonitor recovery alerts. There are some differences to consider:

  • ipMonitor can alert you by email or phone if the service stops, and escalate to automatic recovery actions if prior alerts are not handled.
  • ipMonitor can alert you if the recovery actions fail.
  • ipMonitor can alert you by email or phone during certain hours of the day or days of the week. At other times, recovery alerts could be scheduled to automatically take recovery actions.
  • ipMonitor alerts can be configured to process any number of notification, integration, and recovery actions concurrently.

If you are using the Windows recovery options for services, you can:

  • Use alert recovery messages to inform you when Windows performs a recovery action based on the Windows recovery timing parameters you specify.
  • Use the Event Log monitor to notify you when Windows takes recovery actions on behalf of a service.