Configuring a web page for monitoring

Some content is unavailable due to permissions.

This task describes how to add a URL of a web page to be monitored.

To add a URL of a web page to be monitored

1. Access the menu commands for the server instance icon.
2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. In the operation field, select Add.
4. Click Perform Action.
5. Type the URL that you want to monitor in the URL field.
6. (Optional) Type a label that identifies this URL to display in the PATROL Console.
7. From the HTTP Method list box, select the HTTP method type you want to use for your URL request.
8. If your network is slow, increase the Timeout: Seconds setting to accommodate the HTTP response time.
9. Select any of the following buttons, as appropriate, to change and verify the URL monitoring configurations.
   • HTTP Response Code. See 95439.
   • Authentication code. See 25584.
   • Content Check. See 26748.
   • Cookie. See 96008.
   • Referrer. See 63347.
   • User Agent. See 98591.
   • HTTP Form Fields. See 46574.
   • Link Check. See 18896.
10. After changing the configuration in the dialog boxes, click the Accept button to return to the Add/Edit URL Configuration dialog box. You can then select a different dialog box by clicking the appropriate button.

11. Click Done in the URL Monitoring dialog box to save the current entries and close the dialog box.

    Note

    BMC PATROL for Internet Servers does not validate the credentials that you specify for URL monitoring. Therefore, before you enter credentials, ensure that they are valid. For example, before specifying the credentials of a domain account, ensure that the account is properly defined on the domain controller or Active Directory Server.

Defining HTTP response codes

This section describes how to add or modify HTTP response codes, which indicate Ok, warning and alarms states, for your web page.

To define the HTTP response codes:

1. Access the menu commands for the INET_Web_Server application instance icon.

   Note

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).
4. Select a URL to edit, then select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. Click HTTP Response Codes.
7. Type the status code ranges you want to consider as OK in the OK Status Code Ranges field (for example, 200-299).

8. Type the status codes ranges you want to consider as a warning in the WARNING Status Code Ranges field (for example, 1-199, 300-999).

   Note

   Any values omitted in the OK Status Code Range and Warning Status Code Range fields are considered alarms. For example, if you enter your warning status at 1-199, 200-299, and 300-399 for the OK range, then over 399 will have alarms set for specified response codes for your URL page.

9. Click Accept.
10. Click Accept.
11. Click Done to save the current entries and close the dialog box.

Verifying authentication

This task describes how to provide authentication credentials for your URL request. Supported authentication methods are Basic, Digest (Windows only), and Windows Challenge-Response/NTLM (Windows systems only).

To provide authentication credential for a URL request, complete the following steps

1. Access the menu commands for the server instance icon.

   Note

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).
4. Select a URL to edit, then select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. Click Authentication.
7. Type the username associated with your URL request, or a domain or computer name followed by the username (for example, MYDOMAIN\myuser ), if your URL uses NTLM authentication.
8. Type the password associated with the username.
9. Re-type the password for verification.
10. Click Accept.
11. Click Accept.
12. Click Done to save the entry and close the dialog box.

 Editing content checking

This task describes how to add or modify content checking for your URL request. Content checking checks the source code of the web page pointed to by the URL. The text string (referred to as single line or multi-line content expression) can be different in the source from what is displayed on a web browser due to rendition. You must enter the text string in the source for content checking.

To add or modify content checking for your URL request

1. Access the menu commands for the server instance icon (INET_Servers).

   Note

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).
4. Select a URL to edit, then select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. Click Content Check.
7. Enter the expression you want to look for using one of the following methods:
   • For a single line expression, enter the content in the Single Line Content Expression field.
   • For a larger expression, enter the full path to a file containing the expression to be checked in the Multiple Line Expression field.

   • To include Unix-style regular expressions inside the content expression you specify (either single-line or multi-line), select the Evaluate Unix-style regular expressions check box.

     Note

     If both content expression areas are filled in, the multiple-line expression is used.

8. Check the Case Sensitive option if you want to check for case-sensitive matches.
9. Select whether the web page result should or should NOT match your content expression.
10. Use the pull-down menu to indicate whether the application should alarm if the contents match or do not match the content expression.
11. Click Accept.
12. Click Accept.
13. Click Done to save the current entries and close the dialog box.

 Defining a cookie

This section describes how to define static cookies that will be sent with a URL request. If you have enabled dynamic cookies, the static cookies you define here will be merged with cookies obtained dynamically. See Adding-servers-for-monitoring for information about dynamic cookies.

To define a cookie

1. Access the menu commands for the server instance icon as described.

   Tip

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).).
4. Select a URL to edit, the select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. From the Add/Edit URL Configuration Dialog Box, click Cookie.

7. To directly edit the Cookie sent with the URL request, type the name in the Cookie field.
    The exact value for COOKIE_NAME and COOKIE_VALUE are specific to the Web server and application. For example, you can type Customer="customer_name";. Address="customer_address";

   Note

   You can enter more than one Cookie at a time. However, the name value must begin and end with a quote (") and the string must end with a semicolon(😉️.

8. Click Accept.
9. Click Accept.
10. Click Done to save the entry and close the dialog box.

Editing a referrer

This task describes how to edit a referrer page for your URL request. A referrer indicates the URL of a page that links to the given page.

To edit a referrer page

1. Access the menu commands for the server application instance icon.

   Note

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).
4. Select a URL to edit, then select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. Click Referrer.

7. Type the fully qualified path of the referring URL page in the Referrer field.

   Note

   You must enter the entire path name, for example, *http://mydomain.com/htmdocs/index.htm.*

8. Click Accept.
9. Click Accept.
10. Click Done to save the entry and close the dialog box.

Defining a user agent

This task describes how to add or modify a user agent for your URL request. User Agents identify the browser that is requesting the page.

To define a user agent

1. Access the menu commands for the server instance icon.

   Note

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).
4. Select a URL to edit, then select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. Click User Agent.
7. Type the name that identifies the user agent to the Web server and application.
    The default identifies the user agent as PATROL; however, you may need to change the user agent for some Web applications.
8. Click Accept.
    The user agent dialog box appears.
9. Click Accept.
    The basic configuration dialog box appears.
10. Click Done to save the entry and close the dialog box.

Defining HTTP form fields

This section describes how to define HTTP Form Fields to be sent with your URL request.

To define HTTP form fields

1. Access the menu commands for the server instance icon.

   Note

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).
4. Select a URL to edit, then select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. In the HTTP Form Fields section, select the action that applies to your URL request: Done, Add plaintext, Add encrypted*, Delete,* and Edit.
7. Click Accept. The HTTP Form Fields Dialog Box appears.

8. Type or edit the form fields you want to check for your URL request in the Field Name and Field Value fields.
    You can type names associated with the form fields on a web page (for example, name, address, or account number).
   If you chose the Add encrypted option ( 19286) from the HTTP Form Field area, the field value you enter will not be displayed as you type and it will not be visible on the screen. This encrypted value will be stored in your agent configuration and cannot be seen outside of the PATROL agent process.

   Note

   The fields you type here appear in the HTTP Form Fields text box on the Add/Edit URL Configuration dialog box.

9. Click Accept.
10. Click Accept.
11. Click Done to save the current entries and close the dialog box.

Configuring link checking

This section describes how to configure link checking.

To configure link checking

1. Access the menu commands for the server instance icon.

   Note

   You can edit a URL directly by right-clicking the URL instance and choosing the Edit command.

2. Select PATROL Admin > Configure > Basic.
3. Enter basic information for the server instance (see Adding-servers-for-monitoring).
4. Select a URL to edit, then select Edit in the Operation field.
5. Click Accept.
6. Click Link Check.
7. Check the box to enable link checking for the specified URL.
    If the box is not checked, no link checking will be done, but none of the settings will change. Checking the box activates all the settings for link checking.
8. Use the mouse to move the slide bar to change the number of seconds between each request.
    If you move the slide bar to '0,' there will be no delay between requests. The maximum delay is 180 seconds.
9. In the Link Check Depth field, enter a number in the box to indicate how many levels of links will be checked, or check Unlimited depth box to check all link levels. For example, entering '3' indicates that three levels of links from the current URL will be checked. In all cases, only one level of external links will be checked.
10. In the Maximum Number of Links field, enter the maximum number of links to be checked, or check the Unlimited box, which indicates no maximum.
11. In the Maximum Run Time field, enter the maximum hours and minutes to run link checking, or check Unlimited run time to specify no time limit.
12. In the First Run Time field, enter a time or use the arrows to specify when link checking will run.
13. In the Run Frequency field, enter the hours and minutes between each link checking operation.
14. Click Accept.
15. Click Accept.
16. Click Done to save the changes and close the dialog box.