System Center Blog by Russ Slaten

URL Monitoring Part IV–Getting More Advanced

2010-12-14T22:13:00Z

This entry is a continuation of the following series:
URL Monitoring Part I – The Design
URL Monitoring Part II – The Classes and Discoveries
URL Monitoring Part III – The Monitors

After my initial posts on URL monitoring I received various feedback but there are two questions that I continually receive, so I decided to address those.

Is there a way to only alert if the website has been down for a specified amount of time?
I don’t want to have to administer all of the settings in the registry of the watchers, can I just use a spreadsheet or database instead?

I addressed both of these questions in a new example management pack. The new MP is designed to discover websites, along with the configuration settings you specify, based on a CSV file. The configuration settings that are possible in the CSV are as follows:

The URL you want to monitor (one row per instance)
The Watcher Node you want to monitor this URL
A string you want to look for on the website
The maximum response time that you find acceptable
How often you want to check this website (in seconds)
The number of times you want to check this website before turning the monitor critical
The time window in which you want to look for consecutive failures
- Example: You check a website every 30 seconds. You want to alert if it is deemed “Slow”, ”Down”, or ”Missing Content” after 2 minutes. You would specify 30 seconds for your check interval, 4 for the number of times you want to check the site, and 120 seconds for your time window.

To Test this Management Pack in your lab:

Copy the attached CSV file to a share that all the watcher’s computer accounts can access or change the website discovery to use a runas account that has access to that share. Three of the URLs in the CSV are meant to turn critical so keep this in mind when you import if you use what I’ve provided for testing. For your reference, here is the format of the CSV file: URL,WatcherFQDN,ContentMatchString,MaxResponseTime,MonitoringIntervalInSeconds,AttemptsBeforeTurningRed,TimeWindowInSeconds
Open the attached management pack in the authoring console or your favorite XML editor and change the “Discover Websites Discovery” UNCPathToCSVFile property to the correct path of the CSV file.
Add the HKLM\Software\WebsiteWatcher registry KEY (not value) to the registry of the machines that you want to be watcher nodes.
Modify the CSV to use the FQDN of the watchers you want to test with (they should be the same ones you modified the registry on).
Import the Management Pack into your lab.

I will cover each part of the MP design below:

Classes

There are two classes in this management pack. One is just for the watcher nodes and the other is for the websites. There is also a relationship to make the watchers host the websites.

Discoveries

The watcher discovery targets all Windows Servers and looks for a registry key (HKLM\Software\WebsiteWatcher). If that key exists then an instance of the website watcher class is created. The website discovery is targeted at the website watcher class. This discovery is script based and reads a CSV and based on what it finds it creates instances of the Website class hosted by the applicable watcher.

Data Sources

There are 4 data sources: One for the website discovery and 3 for each type of website monitoring you want to do (up/down, content, and response time). I will admit that I could likely use a single data source and make these 3 requests cook down but I was limited on time so I created 3 separate data sources. If the watcher needs to scale to a large amount of websites then I would suggest attempting the single data source route and investigating cook down. One note, if a website is down then the content and response monitors will stay healthy so only one alert will be generated.

Monitor Types

There are 3 monitor types, one for each data source. The monitor types contain the consolidator module which is used to provide the “don’t turn red until x number of failures have occurred in x amount of time” functionality.

Monitors

There are 3 monitors, one for each monitor type. All of the configuration for these is provided from discovered data.

**If you find any issues with the MP or have any feedback please let me know so I can update this example.

The XML of the MP:

<ManagementPack ContentReadable="true" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
<Manifest>
    <Identity>
      <ID>Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher</ID>
      <Version>1.0.0.0</Version>
    </Identity>
    <Name>Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher</Name>
    <References>
      <Reference Alias="SC">
        <ID>Microsoft.SystemCenter.Library</ID>
        <Version>6.1.7221.0</Version>
        <PublicKeyToken>31bf3856ad364e35</PublicKeyToken>
      </Reference>
      <Reference Alias="Web">
        <ID>Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.Library</ID>
        <Version>6.0.6278.0</Version>
        <PublicKeyToken>31bf3856ad364e35</PublicKeyToken>
      </Reference>
      <Reference Alias="Windows">
        <ID>Microsoft.Windows.Library</ID>
        <Version>6.1.7221.0</Version>
        <PublicKeyToken>31bf3856ad364e35</PublicKeyToken>
      </Reference>
      <Reference Alias="Health">
        <ID>System.Health.Library</ID>
        <Version>6.1.7221.0</Version>
        <PublicKeyToken>31bf3856ad364e35</PublicKeyToken>
      </Reference>
      <Reference Alias="System">
        <ID>System.Library</ID>
        <Version>6.1.7221.0</Version>
        <PublicKeyToken>31bf3856ad364e35</PublicKeyToken>
      </Reference>
    </References>
</Manifest>
<TypeDefinitions>
    <EntityTypes>
      <ClassTypes>
        <ClassType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" Accessibility="Public" Abstract="false" Base="System!System.Perspective" Hosted="true" Singleton="false">
          <Property ID="URL" Type="string" Key="true" CaseSensitive="false" Length="512" MinLength="0" />
          <Property ID="ContentMatchString" Type="string" Key="false" CaseSensitive="false" Length="255" MinLength="0" />
          <Property ID="MaxResponseTime" Type="decimal" Key="false" CaseSensitive="false" Length="38" MinLength="0" />
          <Property ID="MonitoringIntervalInSeconds" Type="int" Key="false" CaseSensitive="false" Length="256" MinLength="0" />
          <Property ID="TimeWindowInSeconds" Type="int" Key="false" CaseSensitive="false" Length="256" MinLength="0" />
          <Property ID="AttemptsBeforeTurningRed" Type="int" Key="false" CaseSensitive="false" Length="256" MinLength="0" />
        </ClassType>
        <ClassType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.WebsiteWatcher" Accessibility="Public" Abstract="false" Base="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.LocalApplication" Hosted="true" Singleton="false" />
      </ClassTypes>
      <RelationshipTypes>
        <RelationshipType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Relationship.WebsiteWatcherHostsWebsite" Accessibility="Public" Abstract="false" Base="System!System.Hosting">
          <Source>Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.WebsiteWatcher</Source>
          <Target>Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website</Target>
        </RelationshipType>
      </RelationshipTypes>
    </EntityTypes>
    <ModuleTypes>
      <DataSourceModuleType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.DiscoverWebsites" Accessibility="Public" Batching="false">
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IntervalInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="UNCPathToCSVFile" type="xsd:string" />
        </Configuration>
        <ModuleImplementation Isolation="Any">
          <Composite>
            <MemberModules>
              <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="System!System.Scheduler">
                <Scheduler>
                  <SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                    <Interval>$Config/IntervalInSeconds$</Interval>
                  </SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                  <ExcludeDates />
                </Scheduler>
              </DataSource>
              <ProbeAction ID="Probe" TypeID="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.ScriptDiscoveryProbe">
                <ScriptName>DiscoverWebsites.vbs</ScriptName>
                <Arguments>$Config/UNCPathToCSVFile$</Arguments>
                <ScriptBody><![CDATA[
'Arg1 = UNC Path to CSV file
'CSV Format:
'URL,WatcherFQDN,ContentMatchString,MaxResponseTime,MonitoringIntervalInSeconds,AttemptsBeforeTurningRed,TimeWindowInSeconds

Set oArgs = Wscript.Arguments
sCSV = UCase(oArgs(0))

WScript.Echo "Creating Discovery Data"
Set oAPI = CreateObject("MOM.ScriptAPI")
Set oDiscoveryData = oAPI.CreateDiscoveryData(0,"$MPElement$", "$Target/Id$")

WScript.Echo "Opening CSV"
Set oFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
Set oCSV = oFSO.OpenTextFile(sCSV)

WScript.Echo "Reading CSV"
Do While Not oCSV.AtEndOfStream
aRow = split(oCSV.ReadLine, ",")

'Read the watcher column to see if it matches
If ucase(aRow(1)) = ucase("$Target/Host/Property[Type='Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer']/PrincipalName$") Then
WScript.Echo "We have a match, creating discovery data"
Set oWebsite = oDiscoveryData.CreateClassInstance("$MPElement[Name='Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website']$")
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website']/URL$", aRow(0)
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer']/PrincipalName$", "$Target/Host/Property[Type='Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer']/PrincipalName$"
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website']/ContentMatchString$", aRow(2)
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website']/MaxResponseTime$", aRow(3)
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website']/MonitoringIntervalInSeconds$", aRow(4)
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website']/TimeWindowInSeconds$", aRow(6)
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website']/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$", aRow(5)
oWebsite.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='System!System.Entity']/DisplayName$", aRow(0)
oDiscoveryData.AddInstance(oWebsite)
End If
Loop

Call oAPI.Return(oDiscoveryData)
    ]]></ScriptBody>
                <TimeoutSeconds>300</TimeoutSeconds>
              </ProbeAction>
            </MemberModules>
            <Composition>
              <Node ID="Probe">
                <Node ID="DS" />
              </Node>
            </Composition>
          </Composite>
        </ModuleImplementation>
        <OutputType>System!System.Discovery.Data</OutputType>
      </DataSourceModuleType>
      <DataSourceModuleType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsiteAvailability" Accessibility="Public" Batching="false">
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IntervalInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="URL" type="xsd:string" />
        </Configuration>
        <ModuleImplementation Isolation="Any">
          <Composite>
            <MemberModules>
              <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="System!System.Scheduler">
                <Scheduler>
                  <SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                    <Interval>$Config/IntervalInSeconds$</Interval>
                  </SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                  <ExcludeDates />
                </Scheduler>
              </DataSource>
              <ProbeAction ID="Probe" TypeID="Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.UrlProbe">
                <Proxy />
                <ProxyUserName />
                <ProxyPassword />
                <ProxyAuthenticationScheme>None</ProxyAuthenticationScheme>
                <CredentialUserName />
                <CredentialPassword />
                <AuthenticationScheme>None</AuthenticationScheme>
                <FollowRedirects>true</FollowRedirects>
                <RetryCount>0</RetryCount>
                <RequestTimeout>60</RequestTimeout>
                <Requests>
                  <Request>
                    <RequestID>1</RequestID>
                    <URL>$Config/URL$</URL>
                    <Verb>GET</Verb>
                    <Version>HTTP/1.1</Version>
                    <HttpHeaders>
                      <HttpHeader>
                        <Name>User-Agent</Name>
                        <Value>Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)</Value>
                      </HttpHeader>
                    </HttpHeaders>
                    <Body />
                    <CheckContentChange>false</CheckContentChange>
                    <ContentHash>00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000</ContentHash>
                    <Depth>0</Depth>
                    <ThinkTime>0</ThinkTime>
                    <CheckInternalLinks>false</CheckInternalLinks>
                    <CheckExternalLinks>false</CheckExternalLinks>
                    <CheckResources>true</CheckResources>
                    <RequestEvaluationCriteria>
                      <StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>
                      <StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>
                      <BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria>
                          <NumericCriteriaExpressions>
                            <NumericCriteriaExpression>
                              <NumericRequestMetric>BasePageData/StatusCode</NumericRequestMetric>
                              <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
                              <Value>400</Value>
                            </NumericCriteriaExpression>
                          </NumericCriteriaExpressions>
                        </ErrorCriteria>
                      </BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
                      <LinksEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria>
                          <StatusCodeCriteria>
                            <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
                            <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
                            <Value>400</Value>
                          </StatusCodeCriteria>
                        </WarningCriteria>
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </LinksEvaluationCriteria>
                      <ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria>
                          <StatusCodeCriteria>
                            <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
                            <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
                            <Value>400</Value>
                          </StatusCodeCriteria>
                        </WarningCriteria>
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
                      <WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
                      <DepthEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </DepthEvaluationCriteria>
                    </RequestEvaluationCriteria>
                    <FormsAuthCredentials />
                  </Request>
                </Requests>
              </ProbeAction>
            </MemberModules>
            <Composition>
              <Node ID="Probe">
                <Node ID="DS" />
              </Node>
            </Composition>
          </Composite>
        </ModuleImplementation>
        <OutputType>Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.WebApplicationData</OutputType>
      </DataSourceModuleType>
      <DataSourceModuleType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsiteContent" Accessibility="Public" Batching="false">
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IntervalInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="URL" type="xsd:string" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="ContentMatchString" type="xsd:string" />
        </Configuration>
        <ModuleImplementation Isolation="Any">
          <Composite>
            <MemberModules>
              <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="System!System.Scheduler">
                <Scheduler>
                  <SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                    <Interval>$Config/IntervalInSeconds$</Interval>
                  </SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                  <ExcludeDates />
                </Scheduler>
              </DataSource>
              <ProbeAction ID="Probe" TypeID="Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.UrlProbe">
                <Proxy />
                <ProxyUserName />
                <ProxyPassword />
                <ProxyAuthenticationScheme>None</ProxyAuthenticationScheme>
                <CredentialUserName />
                <CredentialPassword />
                <AuthenticationScheme>None</AuthenticationScheme>
                <FollowRedirects>true</FollowRedirects>
                <RetryCount>0</RetryCount>
                <RequestTimeout>60</RequestTimeout>
                <Requests>
                  <Request>
                    <RequestID>1</RequestID>
                    <URL>$Config/URL$</URL>
                    <Verb>GET</Verb>
                    <Version>HTTP/1.1</Version>
                    <HttpHeaders>
                      <HttpHeader>
                        <Name>User-Agent</Name>
                        <Value>Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)</Value>
                      </HttpHeader>
                    </HttpHeaders>
                    <Body />
                    <CheckContentChange>false</CheckContentChange>
                    <ContentHash>00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000</ContentHash>
                    <Depth>0</Depth>
                    <ThinkTime>0</ThinkTime>
                    <CheckInternalLinks>false</CheckInternalLinks>
                    <CheckExternalLinks>false</CheckExternalLinks>
                    <CheckResources>false</CheckResources>
                    <RequestEvaluationCriteria>
                      <StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>
                      <StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>
                      <BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria>
                          <ContentMatchCriteria>
                            <RegExOperator>DoesNotContainSubstring</RegExOperator>
                            <Value>$Config/ContentMatchString$</Value>
                          </ContentMatchCriteria>
                        </ErrorCriteria>
                      </BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
                      <LinksEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria>
                          <StatusCodeCriteria>
                            <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
                            <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
                            <Value>400</Value>
                          </StatusCodeCriteria>
                        </WarningCriteria>
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </LinksEvaluationCriteria>
                      <ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria>
                          <StatusCodeCriteria>
                            <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
                            <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
                            <Value>400</Value>
                          </StatusCodeCriteria>
                        </WarningCriteria>
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
                      <WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
                      <DepthEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </DepthEvaluationCriteria>
                    </RequestEvaluationCriteria>
                    <FormsAuthCredentials />
                  </Request>
                </Requests>
              </ProbeAction>
            </MemberModules>
            <Composition>
              <Node ID="Probe">
                <Node ID="DS" />
              </Node>
            </Composition>
          </Composite>
        </ModuleImplementation>
        <OutputType>Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.WebApplicationData</OutputType>
      </DataSourceModuleType>
      <DataSourceModuleType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsitePerformance" Accessibility="Public" Batching="false">
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IntervalInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="URL" type="xsd:string" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="MaximumResponseTime" type="xsd:decimal" />
        </Configuration>
        <ModuleImplementation Isolation="Any">
          <Composite>
            <MemberModules>
              <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="System!System.Scheduler">
                <Scheduler>
                  <SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                    <Interval>$Config/IntervalInSeconds$</Interval>
                  </SimpleReccuringSchedule>
                  <ExcludeDates />
                </Scheduler>
              </DataSource>
              <ProbeAction ID="Probe" TypeID="Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.UrlProbe">
                <Proxy />
                <ProxyUserName />
                <ProxyPassword />
                <ProxyAuthenticationScheme>None</ProxyAuthenticationScheme>
                <CredentialUserName />
                <CredentialPassword />
                <AuthenticationScheme>None</AuthenticationScheme>
                <FollowRedirects>true</FollowRedirects>
                <RetryCount>0</RetryCount>
                <RequestTimeout>60</RequestTimeout>
                <Requests>
                  <Request>
                    <RequestID>1</RequestID>
                    <URL>$Config/URL$</URL>
                    <Verb>GET</Verb>
                    <Version>HTTP/1.1</Version>
                    <HttpHeaders>
                      <HttpHeader>
                        <Name>User-Agent</Name>
                        <Value>Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)</Value>
                      </HttpHeader>
                    </HttpHeaders>
                    <Body />
                    <CheckContentChange>false</CheckContentChange>
                    <ContentHash>00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000</ContentHash>
                    <Depth>0</Depth>
                    <ThinkTime>0</ThinkTime>
                    <CheckInternalLinks>false</CheckInternalLinks>
                    <CheckExternalLinks>false</CheckExternalLinks>
                    <CheckResources>false</CheckResources>
                    <RequestEvaluationCriteria>
                      <StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>
                      <StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>
                      <BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria>
                          <NumericCriteriaExpressions>
                            <NumericCriteriaExpression>
                              <NumericRequestMetric>BasePageData/TotalResponseTime</NumericRequestMetric>
                              <Operator>Greater</Operator>
                              <Value>$Config/MaximumResponseTime$</Value>
                            </NumericCriteriaExpression>
                          </NumericCriteriaExpressions>
                        </ErrorCriteria>
                      </BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
                      <LinksEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria>
                          <StatusCodeCriteria>
                            <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
                            <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
                            <Value>400</Value>
                          </StatusCodeCriteria>
                        </WarningCriteria>
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </LinksEvaluationCriteria>
                      <ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria>
                          <StatusCodeCriteria>
                            <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
                            <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
                            <Value>400</Value>
                          </StatusCodeCriteria>
                        </WarningCriteria>
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
                      <WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
                      <DepthEvaluationCriteria>
                        <WarningCriteria />
                        <ErrorCriteria />
                      </DepthEvaluationCriteria>
                    </RequestEvaluationCriteria>
                    <FormsAuthCredentials />
                  </Request>
                </Requests>
              </ProbeAction>
            </MemberModules>
            <Composition>
              <Node ID="Probe">
                <Node ID="DS" />
              </Node>
            </Composition>
          </Composite>
        </ModuleImplementation>
        <OutputType>Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.WebApplicationData</OutputType>
      </DataSourceModuleType>
    </ModuleTypes>
    <MonitorTypes>
      <UnitMonitorType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsiteAvailability" Accessibility="Public">
        <MonitorTypeStates>
          <MonitorTypeState ID="WebsiteUp" NoDetection="false" />
          <MonitorTypeState ID="WebsiteDown" NoDetection="false" />
        </MonitorTypeStates>
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IntervalInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="URL" type="xsd:string" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="AttemptsBeforeTurningRed" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="TimeWindowInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
        </Configuration>
        <MonitorImplementation>
          <MemberModules>
            <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsiteAvailability">
              <IntervalInSeconds>$Config/IntervalInSeconds$</IntervalInSeconds>
              <URL>$Config/URL$</URL>
            </DataSource>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDUp" TypeID="System!System.ExpressionFilter">
              <Expression>
                <SimpleExpression>
                  <ValueExpression>
                    <XPathQuery Type="UnsignedInteger">RequestResults/RequestResult[@Id=1]/BasePageData/ErrorCode</XPathQuery>
                  </ValueExpression>
                  <Operator>Equal</Operator>
                  <ValueExpression>
                    <Value Type="UnsignedInteger">0</Value>
                  </ValueExpression>
                </SimpleExpression>
              </Expression>
            </ConditionDetection>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDDown" TypeID="System!System.ExpressionFilter">
              <Expression>
                <SimpleExpression>
                  <ValueExpression>
                    <XPathQuery Type="UnsignedInteger">RequestResults/RequestResult[@Id=1]/BasePageData/ErrorCode</XPathQuery>
                  </ValueExpression>
                  <Operator>NotEqual</Operator>
                  <ValueExpression>
                    <Value Type="UnsignedInteger">0</Value>
                  </ValueExpression>
                </SimpleExpression>
              </Expression>
            </ConditionDetection>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDConsolidate" TypeID="System!System.ConsolidatorCondition">
              <Consolidator>
                <ConsolidationProperties />
                <TimeControl>
                  <WithinTimeSchedule>
                    <Interval>$Config/TimeWindowInSeconds$</Interval>
                  </WithinTimeSchedule>
                </TimeControl>
                <CountingCondition>
                  <Count>$Config/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</Count>
                  <CountMode>OnNewItemTestOutputRestart_OnTimerSlideByOne</CountMode>
                </CountingCondition>
              </Consolidator>
            </ConditionDetection>
          </MemberModules>
          <RegularDetections>
            <RegularDetection MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteUp">
              <Node ID="CDUp">
                <Node ID="DS" />
              </Node>
            </RegularDetection>
            <RegularDetection MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteDown">
              <Node ID="CDConsolidate">
                <Node ID="CDDown">
                  <Node ID="DS" />
                </Node>
              </Node>
            </RegularDetection>
          </RegularDetections>
        </MonitorImplementation>
      </UnitMonitorType>
      <UnitMonitorType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsiteContent" Accessibility="Public">
        <MonitorTypeStates>
          <MonitorTypeState ID="ContentFound" NoDetection="false" />
          <MonitorTypeState ID="ContentNotFound" NoDetection="false" />
        </MonitorTypeStates>
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IntervalInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="ContentMatchString" type="xsd:string" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="URL" type="xsd:string" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="AttemptsBeforeTurningRed" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="TimeWindowInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
        </Configuration>
        <MonitorImplementation>
          <MemberModules>
            <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsiteContent">
              <IntervalInSeconds>$Config/IntervalInSeconds$</IntervalInSeconds>
              <URL>$Config/URL$</URL>
              <ContentMatchString>$Config/ContentMatchString$</ContentMatchString>
            </DataSource>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDFound" TypeID="Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.OKCriteriaMatch">
              <DataItemEvaluationQuery>RequestResults/RequestResult[@Id=1]/BasePageData/ResponseBodyEvalResult</DataItemEvaluationQuery>
            </ConditionDetection>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDNotFound" TypeID="Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.ErrorCriteriaMatch">
              <DataItemEvaluationQuery>RequestResults/RequestResult[@Id=1]/BasePageData/ResponseBodyEvalResult</DataItemEvaluationQuery>
            </ConditionDetection>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDConsolidate" TypeID="System!System.ConsolidatorCondition">
              <Consolidator>
                <ConsolidationProperties />
                <TimeControl>
                  <WithinTimeSchedule>
                    <Interval>$Config/TimeWindowInSeconds$</Interval>
                  </WithinTimeSchedule>
                </TimeControl>
                <CountingCondition>
                  <Count>$Config/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</Count>
                  <CountMode>OnNewItemTestOutputRestart_OnTimerSlideByOne</CountMode>
                </CountingCondition>
              </Consolidator>
            </ConditionDetection>
          </MemberModules>
          <RegularDetections>
            <RegularDetection MonitorTypeStateID="ContentFound">
              <Node ID="CDFound">
                <Node ID="DS" />
              </Node>
            </RegularDetection>
            <RegularDetection MonitorTypeStateID="ContentNotFound">
              <Node ID="CDConsolidate">
                <Node ID="CDNotFound">
                  <Node ID="DS" />
                </Node>
              </Node>
            </RegularDetection>
          </RegularDetections>
        </MonitorImplementation>
      </UnitMonitorType>
      <UnitMonitorType ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsitePerformance" Accessibility="Public">
        <MonitorTypeStates>
          <MonitorTypeState ID="WebsiteFast" NoDetection="false" />
          <MonitorTypeState ID="WebsiteSlow" NoDetection="false" />
        </MonitorTypeStates>
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IntervalInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="URL" type="xsd:string" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="MaximumResponseTime" type="xsd:decimal" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="AttemptsBeforeTurningRed" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="TimeWindowInSeconds" type="xsd:integer" />
        </Configuration>
        <MonitorImplementation>
          <MemberModules>
            <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsitePerformance">
              <IntervalInSeconds>$Config/IntervalInSeconds$</IntervalInSeconds>
              <URL>$Config/URL$</URL>
              <MaximumResponseTime>$Config/MaximumResponseTime$</MaximumResponseTime>
            </DataSource>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDFast" TypeID="Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.OKCriteriaMatch">
              <DataItemEvaluationQuery>RequestResults/RequestResult[@Id=1]/BasePageData/TotalResponseTimeEvalResult</DataItemEvaluationQuery>
            </ConditionDetection>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDSlow" TypeID="Web!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.ErrorCriteriaMatch">
              <DataItemEvaluationQuery>RequestResults/RequestResult[@Id=1]/BasePageData/TotalResponseTimeEvalResult</DataItemEvaluationQuery>
            </ConditionDetection>
            <ConditionDetection ID="CDConsolidate" TypeID="System!System.ConsolidatorCondition">
              <Consolidator>
                <ConsolidationProperties />
                <TimeControl>
                  <WithinTimeSchedule>
                    <Interval>$Config/TimeWindowInSeconds$</Interval>
                  </WithinTimeSchedule>
                </TimeControl>
                <CountingCondition>
                  <Count>$Config/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</Count>
                  <CountMode>OnNewItemTestOutputRestart_OnTimerSlideByOne</CountMode>
                </CountingCondition>
              </Consolidator>
            </ConditionDetection>
          </MemberModules>
          <RegularDetections>
            <RegularDetection MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteFast">
              <Node ID="CDFast">
                <Node ID="DS" />
              </Node>
            </RegularDetection>
            <RegularDetection MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteSlow">
              <Node ID="CDConsolidate">
                <Node ID="CDSlow">
                  <Node ID="DS" />
                </Node>
              </Node>
            </RegularDetection>
          </RegularDetections>
        </MonitorImplementation>
      </UnitMonitorType>
    </MonitorTypes>
</TypeDefinitions>
<Monitoring>
    <Discoveries>
      <Discovery ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Discovery.DiscoverWebsites" Enabled="true" Target="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.WebsiteWatcher" ConfirmDelivery="true" Remotable="true" Priority="Normal">
        <Category>Discovery</Category>
        <DiscoveryTypes>
          <DiscoveryClass TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" />
        </DiscoveryTypes>
        <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.DiscoverWebsites">
          <IntervalInSeconds>86400</IntervalInSeconds>
          <UNCPathToCSVFile>\\myfileserver\myopenfileshare\URLMonitoringList.CSV</UNCPathToCSVFile>
        </DataSource>
      </Discovery>
      <Discovery ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Discovery.DiscoverWebsiteWatchers" Enabled="true" Target="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Server.OperatingSystem" ConfirmDelivery="true" Remotable="true" Priority="Normal">
        <Category>Discovery</Category>
        <DiscoveryTypes>
          <DiscoveryClass TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.WebsiteWatcher" />
        </DiscoveryTypes>
        <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.FilteredRegistryDiscoveryProvider">
          <ComputerName>$Target/Host/Property[Type="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer"]/NetworkName$</ComputerName>
          <RegistryAttributeDefinitions>
            <RegistryAttributeDefinition>
              <AttributeName>isWatcher</AttributeName>
              <Path>Software\WebsiteWatcher</Path>
              <PathType>0</PathType>
              <AttributeType>0</AttributeType>
            </RegistryAttributeDefinition>
          </RegistryAttributeDefinitions>
          <Frequency>86400</Frequency>
          <ClassId>$MPElement[Name="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.WebsiteWatcher"]$</ClassId>
          <InstanceSettings>
            <Settings>
              <Setting>
                <Name>$MPElement[Name="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer"]/PrincipalName$</Name>
                <Value>$Target/Host/Property[Type="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer"]/PrincipalName$</Value>
              </Setting>
              <Setting>
                <Name>$MPElement[Name="System!System.Entity"]/DisplayName$</Name>
                <Value>$Target/Host/Property[Type="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer"]/PrincipalName$</Value>
              </Setting>
            </Settings>
          </InstanceSettings>
          <Expression>
            <SimpleExpression>
              <ValueExpression>
                <XPathQuery Type="String">Values/isWatcher</XPathQuery>
              </ValueExpression>
              <Operator>Equal</Operator>
              <ValueExpression>
                <Value Type="String">true</Value>
              </ValueExpression>
            </SimpleExpression>
          </Expression>
        </DataSource>
      </Discovery>
    </Discoveries>
    <Monitors>
      <UnitMonitor ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteAvailability" Accessibility="Public" Enabled="true" Target="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" ParentMonitorID="Health!System.Health.AvailabilityState" Remotable="true" Priority="Normal" TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsiteAvailability" ConfirmDelivery="true">
        <Category>Alert</Category>
        <AlertSettings AlertMessage="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteAvailability_AlertMessageResourceID">
          <AlertOnState>Error</AlertOnState>
          <AutoResolve>true</AutoResolve>
          <AlertPriority>Normal</AlertPriority>
          <AlertSeverity>Error</AlertSeverity>
          <AlertParameters>
            <AlertParameter1>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/URL$</AlertParameter1>
            <AlertParameter2>$Data/Context/Context/DataItem/RequestResults/RequestResult["1"]/BasePageData/ErrorCode$</AlertParameter2>
            <AlertParameter3>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MonitoringIntervalInSeconds$</AlertParameter3>
            <AlertParameter4>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/TimeWindowInSeconds$</AlertParameter4>
            <AlertParameter5>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</AlertParameter5>
          </AlertParameters>
        </AlertSettings>
        <OperationalStates>
          <OperationalState ID="WebsiteUp" MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteUp" HealthState="Success" />
          <OperationalState ID="WebsiteDown" MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteDown" HealthState="Error" />
        </OperationalStates>
        <Configuration>
          <IntervalInSeconds>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MonitoringIntervalInSeconds$</IntervalInSeconds>
          <URL>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/URL$</URL>
          <AttemptsBeforeTurningRed>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</AttemptsBeforeTurningRed>
          <TimeWindowInSeconds>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/TimeWindowInSeconds$</TimeWindowInSeconds>
        </Configuration>
      </UnitMonitor>
      <UnitMonitor ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteContent" Accessibility="Public" Enabled="true" Target="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" ParentMonitorID="Health!System.Health.ConfigurationState" Remotable="true" Priority="Normal" TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsiteContent" ConfirmDelivery="true">
        <Category>Alert</Category>
        <AlertSettings AlertMessage="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteContent_AlertMessageResourceID">
          <AlertOnState>Error</AlertOnState>
          <AutoResolve>true</AutoResolve>
          <AlertPriority>Normal</AlertPriority>
          <AlertSeverity>Error</AlertSeverity>
          <AlertParameters>
            <AlertParameter1>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/URL$</AlertParameter1>
            <AlertParameter2>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/ContentMatchString$</AlertParameter2>
            <AlertParameter3>$Data/Context/Context/DataItem/RequestResults/RequestResult["1"]/BasePageData/ResponseBodyEvalResult$</AlertParameter3>
            <AlertParameter4>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MonitoringIntervalInSeconds$</AlertParameter4>
            <AlertParameter5>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/TimeWindowInSeconds$</AlertParameter5>
            <AlertParameter6>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</AlertParameter6>
          </AlertParameters>
        </AlertSettings>
        <OperationalStates>
          <OperationalState ID="ContentFound" MonitorTypeStateID="ContentFound" HealthState="Success" />
          <OperationalState ID="ContentNotFound" MonitorTypeStateID="ContentNotFound" HealthState="Error" />
        </OperationalStates>
        <Configuration>
          <IntervalInSeconds>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MonitoringIntervalInSeconds$</IntervalInSeconds>
          <ContentMatchString>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/ContentMatchString$</ContentMatchString>
          <URL>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/URL$</URL>
          <AttemptsBeforeTurningRed>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</AttemptsBeforeTurningRed>
          <TimeWindowInSeconds>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/TimeWindowInSeconds$</TimeWindowInSeconds>
        </Configuration>
      </UnitMonitor>
      <UnitMonitor ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsitePerformance" Accessibility="Public" Enabled="true" Target="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" ParentMonitorID="Health!System.Health.PerformanceState" Remotable="true" Priority="Normal" TypeID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsitePerformance" ConfirmDelivery="true">
        <Category>Alert</Category>
        <AlertSettings AlertMessage="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsitePerformance_AlertMessageResourceID">
          <AlertOnState>Error</AlertOnState>
          <AutoResolve>true</AutoResolve>
          <AlertPriority>Normal</AlertPriority>
          <AlertSeverity>Error</AlertSeverity>
          <AlertParameters>
            <AlertParameter1>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/URL$</AlertParameter1>
            <AlertParameter2>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MaxResponseTime$</AlertParameter2>
            <AlertParameter3>$Data/Context/Context/DataItem/TransactionResponseTime$</AlertParameter3>
            <AlertParameter4>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MonitoringIntervalInSeconds$</AlertParameter4>
            <AlertParameter5>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/TimeWindowInSeconds$</AlertParameter5>
            <AlertParameter6>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</AlertParameter6>
          </AlertParameters>
        </AlertSettings>
        <OperationalStates>
          <OperationalState ID="WebsiteFast" MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteFast" HealthState="Success" />
          <OperationalState ID="WebsiteSlow" MonitorTypeStateID="WebsiteSlow" HealthState="Error" />
        </OperationalStates>
        <Configuration>
          <IntervalInSeconds>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MonitoringIntervalInSeconds$</IntervalInSeconds>
          <URL>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/URL$</URL>
          <MaximumResponseTime>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/MaxResponseTime$</MaximumResponseTime>
          <AttemptsBeforeTurningRed>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/AttemptsBeforeTurningRed$</AttemptsBeforeTurningRed>
          <TimeWindowInSeconds>$Target/Property[Type="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website"]/TimeWindowInSeconds$</TimeWindowInSeconds>
        </Configuration>
      </UnitMonitor>
    </Monitors>
</Monitoring>
<Presentation>
    <StringResources>
      <StringResource ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteAvailability_AlertMessageResourceID" />
      <StringResource ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteContent_AlertMessageResourceID" />
      <StringResource ID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsitePerformance_AlertMessageResourceID" />
    </StringResources>
</Presentation>
<LanguagePacks>
    <LanguagePack ID="ENU" IsDefault="true">
      <DisplayStrings>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher">
          <Name>Website Watcher Example</Name>
          <Description>Example MP that discovers URLs from a spreadsheet and monitors them.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website">
          <Name>Website</Name>
          <Description>Websites monitored by OpsMgr</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" SubElementID="AttemptsBeforeTurningRed">
          <Name>Attempts Before Turning Red</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" SubElementID="ContentMatchString">
          <Name>Content Match String</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" SubElementID="MaxResponseTime">
          <Name>Max Response Time</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" SubElementID="MonitoringIntervalInSeconds">
          <Name>Monitoring Interval In Seconds</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.Website" SubElementID="TimeWindowInSeconds">
          <Name>Time Windows In Seconds</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Class.WebsiteWatcher">
          <Name>Website Watcher</Name>
          <Description>Agents used to monitor certain websites for availability and performance.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.DiscoverWebsites">
          <Name>Discover Websites Data Source</Name>
          <Description>Contains the code required to read a CSV file and discover websites.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsiteAvailability">
          <Name>Website Availability Data Source</Name>
          <Description>Monitors the website to see if it is up or down.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsiteContent">
          <Name>Website Content Data Source</Name>
          <Description>Checks for a phrase on a website.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.DataSource.WebsitePerformance">
          <Name>Website Performance Data Source</Name>
          <Description>Monitors the response time of a website.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Discovery.DiscoverWebsites">
          <Name>Discover Websites Discovery</Name>
          <Description>Discovers websites from CSV file.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Discovery.DiscoverWebsiteWatchers">
          <Name>Discover Website Watchers Discovery</Name>
          <Description>Discovers which agents will be Website Watchers.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteAvailability">
          <Name>Website Availability Monitor</Name>
          <Description>Monitors whether a website is up or down.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteAvailability" SubElementID="WebsiteUp">
          <Name>WebsiteUp</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteAvailability" SubElementID="WebsiteDown">
          <Name>WebsiteDown</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteAvailability_AlertMessageResourceID">
          <Name>Website Unavailable</Name>
          <Description>URL: {0}

Error Code: {1}

Monitoring Interval In Seconds: {2}

Time Window In Seconds: {3}

Attempts Before Turning Red: {4}</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteContent">
          <Name>Website Content Monitor</Name>
          <Description>Checks for a string in the response from an http request.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteContent" SubElementID="ContentNotFound">
          <Name>ContentNotFound</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteContent" SubElementID="ContentFound">
          <Name>ContentFound</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsiteContent_AlertMessageResourceID">
          <Name>Website Content Not Found</Name>
          <Description>URL: {0}

Content String: {1}

Status Code: : {2}

Monitoring Interval: {3}

Time Window: {4}

Attempts Before Turning Red: {5}</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsitePerformance">
          <Name>Website Performance Monitor</Name>
          <Description>Monitors the Performance of a Website.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsitePerformance" SubElementID="WebsiteFast">
          <Name>WebsiteFast</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsitePerformance" SubElementID="WebsiteSlow">
          <Name>WebsiteSlow</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Monitor.WebsitePerformance_AlertMessageResourceID">
          <Name>Website Performance Slow</Name>
          <Description>URL: {0}

MaxResponseTime: {1}

Last Response Time: {2}

Monitoring Interval In Seconds: {3}

Time Window In Seconds: {4}

Attempts Before Alerting: {5}</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsiteAvailability">
          <Name>Website Availability Monitor Type</Name>
          <Description>Monitors the availability of a website.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsiteContent">
          <Name>Website Content Monitor Type</Name>
          <Description>Checks a website for specific content.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.MonitorType.WebsitePerformance">
          <Name>Website Performance Monitor Type</Name>
          <Description>Monitors the response time of a website.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Example.WebsiteWatcher.Relationship.WebsiteWatcherHostsWebsite">
          <Name>WebsiteWatcher Hosts Website Relationship</Name>
          <Description>Ties the discovered website to the watcher.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
      </DisplayStrings>
    </LanguagePack>
</LanguagePacks>
</ManagementPack>

Preferred Cluster Node Detection MP

2010-06-25T21:42:00Z

I wrote an MP last year that I thought might be useful for the community. Of course this is just an example and needs some work (error handling, testing, etc…). The purpose of the MP is to alert when a resource is not on its preferred cluster node.

This MP supports both Windows Server 2003 and 2008.

How it works:

A rule is targeted to the Microsoft.Windows.Cluster.VirtualServer Class
The rule runs a script every x minutes (currently 5 minutes) and the script detects if a group is on its preferred node
If it isn’t on its preferred node after x number of iterations (currently 2) then an alert is fired
The alert contains the information about the cluster configuration

***Update***
I made some changes to the MP.
The changes are the following:
1. I changed the script to cookdown so it only runs once per agent
a. I create a property bag for each cluster group
b. I modified the data source so it accepts 0 arguments
c. I discover the server name within the script and use it to connect to WMI
d. I added a condition detection for the data source so it can match each property bag to the right instance

A good method to test out the MP:

Configure the rule in the MP for the intervals you would like to test with
Use the MP Simulator in a lab and test the following scenarios
- Set an active group in a cluster to a preferred node and fail it over to the non-preferred node – ensure the simulator sees the problem
- Fail it back, ensure the simulator doesn’t see the problem anymore
- On 2008, set an active group to several preferred nodes – ensure the simulator doesn’t see a problem
- Fail the active group over to a non-preferred node – ensure the simulator sees the problem

Import the MP into the lab
- See what alerts you get, validate that they are accurate
- Set an active group in a cluster to a preferred node and fail it over to the non-preferred node – ensure the simulator sees the problem
- Fail it back, ensure the simulator doesn’t see the problem anymore
- On 2008, set an active group to several preferred nodes – ensure the simulator doesn’t see a problem
- Fail the active group over to a non-preferred node – ensure the simulator sees the problem

If any bugs in the script are found fix them (and please let me know :-))

Add error checking to the script where I commented it should be added and turn on ‘on error resume next’ where I specified.

Enjoy!

'Input = Pass the name of the virtual cluster into this script
'Output = Property Bag:
'Stacking = True or False <required>
    'If False, just return this value in the property bag
    'If True, then populate the following (optional):
   'PhysicalNode = <string>
   'ActiveGroupName = <string>
   'ActiveGroupDescription = <string> or NULL
   'PreferredNode = <string>

'Globals
Dim sVirtualClusterName, oWMI, oAPI, oBag, bStacking, bFound, sAlertDescription
Dim oClusterNode, colClusterNodes
Dim oActiveGroup, colActiveGroups
Dim oPreferredNode, colPreferredNodes

'Get arguments passed into script
sVirtualClusterName = GetArgs()
'WScript.Echo "Virtual Name: " & sVirtualClusterName

'Create OpsMgr Script API object
Set oAPI = GetMOMScriptAPI()
'Call oAPI.LogScriptEvent("NodeStacking.vbs",9989,4,"Script Started")

'Connect to WMI on the cluster
Set oWMI = GetMSClusterWMIObject(sVirtualClusterName)

'Query WMI for physical cluster nodes
Set colClusterNodes = GetCollection("Select * from MSCluster_Node")

'Loop through the collection of physical cluster nodes
For Each oClusterNode in colClusterNodes
Wscript.Echo " Physical Node: " & oClusterNode.Name

'Get the Active Group for each node
Set colActiveGroups = GetCollection("ASSOCIATORS OF {MSCluster_Node='" & oClusterNode.Name & "'} WHERE AssocClass=MSCluster_NodeToActiveGroup")

'Loop through each Active Group
For Each oActiveGroup in colActiveGroups
'Create a Property Bag for storing the data we find
    Set oBag = GetPropertyBag(oAPI)

    bStacking = false
    If oActiveGroup.Description <> "" or oActiveGroup.Description = NULL Then
      WScript.Echo "    Active Group: " & oActiveGroup.Name
      WScript.Echo "      Description: " & oActiveGroup.Description
    Else
      WScript.Echo "    Active Group: " & oActiveGroup.Name
    End If

WScript.Echo " Group State: " & GetState(oActiveGroup.State)

    'Now get the preferred node for this Active Group. If there isn't one we just skip this because we can't detect stacking.
    Set colPreferredNodes = GetCollection("ASSOCIATORS OF {MSCluster_ResourceGroup='" & oActiveGroup.name & "'} WHERE AssocClass=MSCluster_ResourceGroupToPreferredNode")
    bFound = false

'Loop through this first to determine if this Active Group is on a preferred node because there can be multiple preferred nodes in 2008
For Each oPreferredNode in colPreferredNodes
   sPreferredNode = oPreferredNode.name 'Needs to be an array, but this complicates the property bag
   If UCase(oPreferredNode.name) = UCase(oClusterNode.name) Then
  WScript.Echo "      Preferred Node: " & oPreferredNode.name & " <- Good"
  bFound = True
   End If
    Next

'If we aren't on a preferred node create a property bag. Note this will submit only 1 of the preferred nodes if there are multiple.
If Not bFound AND colPreferredNodes.count <> 0 Then
  WScript.Echo "      Preferred Node: " & sPreferredNode & " <- Stacking Detected"
  bStacking = true

  oBag.AddValue "PhysicalNode", oClusterNode.Name
  oBag.AddValue "ActiveGroupName", oActiveGroup.Name
  oBag.AddValue "ActiveGroupDescription", oActiveGroup.Description
  oBag.AddValue "PreferredNode", sPreferredNode

  'Populate a property to use for the alert description
  sAlertDescription =    " Physical Node = " & oClusterNode.Name & vbCrLf & _
       "    Active Group = " & oActiveGroup.Name & vbCrLf & _
       "      Active Group Description = " & oActiveGroup.Description & vbCrLf & _
       "      Preferred Node = " & sPreferredNode
  oBag.AddValue "AlertDescription", sAlertDescription
End If

'Create the required field in the property bag
If bStacking = true Then
   oBag.AddValue "Stacking", true
   oAPI.AddItem oBag
Else
   oBag.AddValue "Stacking", false
   oAPI.AddItem oBag
End If
Next
Next

'Return property bags to OpsMgr
oAPI.ReturnItems

'Exit
Bailout

'Functions
Function GetArgs()
'On Error Resume Next
Dim m_sVirtualClusterName
'm_sVirtualClusterName = UCASE(WScript.Arguments(0))
'If Err <> 0 Then
'Need to add error handling here
'End If
Set pc = CreateObject("Wscript.Network")
m_sVirtualClusterName = pc.ComputerName
'If Err <> 0 Then
'Need to add error handling here
'End If
'Changed script to support cookdown
GetArgs = m_sVirtualClusterName
End Function

'Converts the state of an Active Cluster Group from an integer to a string.
'Pass an int from -1 through 4 and get the associated string returned
Function GetState(i)
Select Case i
    Case -1
      GetState = "STATE_UNKNOWN"
    Case 0
      GetState = "ONLINE"
    Case 1
      GetState = "OFFLINE"
    Case 2
      GetState = "FAILED"
    Case 3
      GetState = "PARTIAL_ONLINE"
    Case 4
      GetState = "PENDING"
    Case Else
      GetState = "Error Getting State"
End Select
End Function

'Connects to WMI and returns the WMI object 'Pass the name of the virtual cluster
Function GetMSClusterWMIObject(s)
'On Error Resume Next
Dim m_oWMI
Set m_oWMI = GetObject("winmgmts:{impersonationLevel=impersonate," _
& "authenticationLevel=pktPrivacy}!\\" & s & "\root\mscluster")
If Err <> 0 Then
'Need to add error handling here
End If
Set GetMSClusterWMIObject = m_oWMI
Set m_oWMI = Nothing
End Function

'Queries WMI and returns a collection
'Pass in the WMI query you want
Function GetCollection(s)
'On Error Resume Next
Set GetCollection = oWMI.ExecQuery(s)
If Err <> 0 Then
'Need to add error handling here
End If
End Function

'Returns a MOM Script API object
Function GetMOMScriptAPI()
'On Error Resume Next
Dim m_oAPI
Set m_oAPI = CreateObject("MOM.ScriptAPI")
If Err <> 0 Then
'Need to add error handling here
End If
Set GetMOMScriptAPI = m_oAPI
Set m_oAPI = Nothing
End Function

'Returns a property bag
'Pass in the MOM Script API object
Function GetPropertyBag(o)
'On Error Resume Next
Dim m_oBag
Set m_oBag = o.CreatePropertyBag()
If Err <> 0 Then
'Need to add error handling here
End If
Set GetPropertyBag = m_oBag
Set m_oBag = Nothing
End Function

'Closes out any open objects
Sub Bailout
Set colPreferredNodes = Nothing
Set colActiveGroups = Nothing
Set colClusterNodes = Nothing
Set oWMI = Nothing
Set oBag = Nothing
Set oAPI = Nothing
End Sub
]]></ScriptBody>
                <TimeoutSeconds>60</TimeoutSeconds>
              </DataSource>
              <ConditionDetection ID="CD" TypeID="System!System.ExpressionFilter">
                <Expression>
                  <SimpleExpression>
                    <ValueExpression>
                      <XPathQuery Type="String">Property[@Name='ActiveGroupName']</XPathQuery>
                    </ValueExpression>
                    <Operator>Equal</Operator>
                    <ValueExpression>
                      <Value Type="String">$Config/ActiveGroupName$</Value>
                    </ValueExpression>
                  </SimpleExpression>
                </Expression>
              </ConditionDetection>
            </MemberModules>
            <Composition>
              <Node ID="CD">
                <Node ID="ScriptDS" />
              </Node>
            </Composition>
          </Composite>
        </ModuleImplementation>
        <OutputType>System!System.PropertyBagData</OutputType>
      </DataSourceModuleType>
      <ConditionDetectionModuleType ID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection.ConditionDetection" Accessibility="Public" Batching="true" Stateful="true" PassThrough="false">
        <Configuration>
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="IterationsBeforeAlerting" type="xsd:integer" />
          <xsd:element minOccurs="1" name="WithinTimePeriod" type="xsd:integer" />
        </Configuration>
        <ModuleImplementation Isolation="Any">
          <Composite>
            <MemberModules>
              <ConditionDetection ID="ExpressionFilter" TypeID="System!System.ExpressionFilter">
                <Expression>
                  <SimpleExpression>
                    <ValueExpression>
                      <XPathQuery Type="Boolean">Property[@Name='Stacking']</XPathQuery>
                    </ValueExpression>
                    <Operator>Equal</Operator>
                    <ValueExpression>
                      <Value Type="Boolean">true</Value>
                    </ValueExpression>
                  </SimpleExpression>
                </Expression>
              </ConditionDetection>
              <ConditionDetection ID="Consolidator" TypeID="System!System.ConsolidatorCondition">
                <Consolidator>
                  <ConsolidationProperties />
                  <TimeControl>
                    <WithinTimeSchedule>
                      <Interval>$Config/WithinTimePeriod$</Interval>
                    </WithinTimeSchedule>
                  </TimeControl>
                  <CountingCondition>
                    <Count>$Config/IterationsBeforeAlerting$</Count>
                    <CountMode>OnNewItemTestOutputRestart_OnTimerSlideByOne</CountMode>
                  </CountingCondition>
                </Consolidator>
              </ConditionDetection>
            </MemberModules>
            <Composition>
              <Node ID="Consolidator">
                <Node ID="ExpressionFilter" />
              </Node>
            </Composition>
          </Composite>
        </ModuleImplementation>
        <OutputType>System!System.ConsolidatorData</OutputType>
        <InputTypes>
          <InputType>System!System.PropertyBagData</InputType>
        </InputTypes>
      </ConditionDetectionModuleType>
    </ModuleTypes>
</TypeDefinitions>
<Monitoring>
    <Rules>
      <Rule ID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection.Rule" Enabled="true" Target="MicrosoftWindowsClusterLibrary!Microsoft.Windows.Cluster.VirtualServer" ConfirmDelivery="true" Remotable="true" Priority="Normal" DiscardLevel="100">
        <Category>Alert</Category>
        <DataSources>
          <DataSource ID="DS" TypeID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection.Script">
            <IntervalSeconds>300</IntervalSeconds>
            <ActiveGroupName>$Target/Property[Type="MicrosoftWindowsClusterLibrary!Microsoft.Windows.Cluster.VirtualServer"]/GroupName$</ActiveGroupName>
          </DataSource>
        </DataSources>
        <ConditionDetection ID="CD" TypeID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection.ConditionDetection">
          <IterationsBeforeAlerting>2</IterationsBeforeAlerting>
          <WithinTimePeriod>630</WithinTimePeriod>
        </ConditionDetection>
        <WriteActions>
          <WriteAction ID="Alerter" TypeID="Health!System.Health.GenerateAlert">
            <Priority>2</Priority>
            <Severity>2</Severity>
            <AlertMessageId>$MPElement[Name="AlertMessageID37465c8ef079455c871583295f0f45a7"]$</AlertMessageId>
            <AlertParameters>
              <AlertParameter1>$Target/Property[Type="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer"]/DNSName$</AlertParameter1>
              <AlertParameter2>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='PhysicalNode']$</AlertParameter2>
              <AlertParameter3>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='ActiveGroupName']$</AlertParameter3>
              <AlertParameter4>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='ActiveGroupDescription']$</AlertParameter4>
              <AlertParameter5>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='PreferredNode']$</AlertParameter5>
            </AlertParameters>
            <Suppression>
              <SuppressionValue>$Target/Property[Type="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer"]/DNSName$</SuppressionValue>
              <SuppressionValue>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='ActiveGroupName']$</SuppressionValue>
            </Suppression>
            <Custom1>$Target/Property[Type="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer"]/DNSName$</Custom1>
            <Custom2>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='PhysicalNode']$</Custom2>
            <Custom3>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='ActiveGroupName']$</Custom3>
            <Custom4>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='ActiveGroupDescription']$</Custom4>
            <Custom5>$Data/Context/DataItem/Property[@Name='PreferredNode']$</Custom5>
            <Custom6 />
            <Custom7 />
            <Custom8 />
            <Custom9 />
            <Custom10 />
          </WriteAction>
        </WriteActions>
      </Rule>
    </Rules>
</Monitoring>
<Presentation>
    <StringResources>
      <StringResource ID="AlertMessageID37465c8ef079455c871583295f0f45a7" />
    </StringResources>
</Presentation>
<LanguagePacks>
    <LanguagePack ID="ENU" IsDefault="true">
      <DisplayStrings>
        <DisplayString ElementID="AlertMessageID37465c8ef079455c871583295f0f45a7">
          <Name>A Cluster Active Group is not on the Preferred Node</Name>
          <Description>A Cluster Active Group is not on one of its configured preferred nodes. If the cluster resource configuration is currently correct then please modify the preferred nodes so that they correspond to the current node that this Active Group resides on.

Virtual Node: {0}
Physical Node: {1}
    Active Group: {2}
      Description: {3}
      Preferred Node: {4}</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection">
          <Name>Custom Preferred Node Detection MP</Name>
          <Description>This MP detects whether a cluster group is not on its preferred node.</Description>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection.ConditionDetection">
          <Name>Preferred Node Condition Detection</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection.Rule">
          <Name>Preferred Node Detection Rule</Name>
        </DisplayString>
        <DisplayString ElementID="Custom.Cluster.PreferredNodeDetection.Script">
          <Name>Preferred Node Detection Data Source</Name>
          <Description />
        </DisplayString>
      </DisplayStrings>
    </LanguagePack>
</LanguagePacks>
</ManagementPack>

Where are my Registered Servers?

2010-06-25T21:29:59Z

I have a customer with multiple OpsMgr management groups and they don't like to type in the name of the RMS of other management groups when they want to connect through the console. They want to use the Registered Servers option but nothing appears when they click on it.

Here is what it should look like:

I did some research and found that they are members of a different domain then their RMS's reside. I checked out the code and wrote a PowerShell script that makes the same call that the console does:

$s = new-object directoryservices.directorysearcher
$s.filter = "(&(objectClass=serviceConnectionPoint)(keywords=MOMSdkSCP))"
$s.findall()

Of course in their case nothing is returned - but I thought this might be helpful for folks that might be having the same issue troubleshoot why.

The Challenges with Manual Reset Monitors

2010-06-25T21:24:45Z

Recently some of my peers were discussing issues that their customers are encountering with manual reset monitors. I thought the main points of the discussion were worth sharing.

What is a Manual Reset Monitor?

It is a type of monitor that detects an error condition, turns “red”, and generates an alert. What it does not do is detect the corresponding “success” condition, therefore someone must manually go into the OpsMgr console and reset the state of the monitor that went red back to “green” or healthy. A more useful type of monitor is one that goes “red” when an error occurs and then “green” when the error is no longer occurring – and this is what most well written monitors do.

What challenges do they present?

For administrators that rarely use the OpsMgr Console:

Many administrators do not live in the OM console. Often they forward OpsMgr alerts through a product connector to another ticketing system. The scenario is that a manual reset monitor turns red, because of an error condition being found, and an alert gets generated. The alert gets sent up through the product connector to a ticketing system and a ticket gets generated for the appropriate administrator (Exchange for example). The Exchange admin may not even have access to the OpsMgr console, they only have the ticket which contains the data from the OpsMgr alert. They use that information to resolve the problem and close the ticket. The product connector closes the alert on the OpsMgr side, but of course in OpsMgr 2007 R2 the alert is disconnected from the manual reset monitor so the monitor NEVER goes back to green. The next day the problem recurs but no alert gets generated because the monitor is still red and therefore no ticket gets generated.

For administrators that do use the OpsMgr Console:

For administrators that do live in the console they still must know that an alert came from a manual reset monitor in order to reset it. Many administrators won't realize this, solve the problem, and close the alert. Maybe the problem recurs the next day and then they don't get alerted.

What are an MP author’s alternatives?

The top priority in a monitoring product is generally to notify the appropriate administrator of a problem when an issue occurs. Health state (and therefore monitors) are great and add value, but this should generally not come at the expense of failing to notify/alert on an error condition or recurrence of an error condition. There are several alternatives available to an MP author that require little additional MP development time.

Use auto resolving or timer reset monitors instead of manual reset monitors. This ensures that the administrator will eventually get re-alerted at some point. If this isn’t possible then you can use one of the other 3 solutions below.
Modify the manual reset monitors so they don't alert and create alert generating rules (with suppression), targeted at the same class, that look at the same criteria. This ensures that you have a health model, and if the administrator chooses can still reset the health when necessary. It also ensures that the administrator will get re-alerted if the problem recurs. If you must have manual reset monitors this is the best of both worlds because you can ensure alerting will happen on the recurrence of an issue and you still maintain the health model that monitors provide.
Create rules and manual reset monitors for you error conditions that require them. Disable one or the other out of the box and document this. This way the administrator only needs to create overrides to use either one.
Replace the manual reset monitors with rules. You don't get the health model but you can ensure that your MP alerts the administrator of a potential problem.

What realistic workarounds are available after an MP has been developed which contains manual reset monitors?

You can disable the manual reset monitors with overrides and create their own MP that contains rules to watch for the same error condition.
Use a tool, like GreenMachine from Tim Helton, to reset the health of monitors on a regular basis. The result of this is that you may get re-alerted on issues that you are currently working on and the overhead / time required of resetting monitors in bulk can be significant. http://blogs.technet.com/b/timhe/archive/2009/01/15/announcing-the-greenmachine-utility-for-operationsmanager-rtm-sp1-and-r2.aspx

URL Monitoring Part III – The Monitors

2009-07-08T00:22:00Z

This entry is part of the following series:
URL Monitoring Part I – The Design
URL Monitoring Part II – The Classes and Discoveries
URL Monitoring Part III – The Monitors

Creating the monitors was by far the most complex part of this solution because monitors do not use data sources directly. Instead, they use Monitor Types which in turn use data sources. This is because data sources don’t understand the difference between what is considered healthy and what isn’t.

Again, I will use the System Center Configuration Manager Management Point monitor for this example since the other scenarios are built in the same way.

Step 1 – Creating the web page up/down data source. This custom data source is generic and can be used for any URL but its primary function is to return whether or not a web page returns with or without error.

I use the System.Scheduler and Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.UrlProbe modules so this MP does take a dependency on the Web Application Library MP. Make sure this is added as a reference under File\Management Pack Properties before continuing.

The System.Scheduler module is used for kicking off the URL Probe on a dynamic interval which in my example ends up being every 15 seconds. This is a parameter that is passed at the monitor level.

The Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.URLProbe module is very complex so I pasted the configuration below:

<ProbeAction ID="Probe" TypeID="MicrosoftSystemCenterWebApplicationLibrary!Microsoft.SystemCenter.WebApplication.UrlProbe">
<Proxy />
<ProxyUserName />
<ProxyPassword />
<ProxyAuthenticationScheme>None</ProxyAuthenticationScheme>
<CredentialUserName />
<CredentialPassword />
<AuthenticationScheme>None</AuthenticationScheme>
<FollowRedirects>true</FollowRedirects>
<RetryCount>0</RetryCount>
<RequestTimeout>0</RequestTimeout>
<Requests>
    <Request>
      <RequestID>1</RequestID>
      <URL>$Config/URLPath$</URL>
      <Verb>GET</Verb>
      <Version>HTTP/1.1</Version>
      <HttpHeaders>
        <HttpHeader>
          <Name>User-Agent</Name>
          <Value>Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)</Value>
        </HttpHeader>
      </HttpHeaders>
      <Body />
      <CheckContentChange>false</CheckContentChange>
      <ContentHash>00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000</ContentHash>
      <Depth>0</Depth>
      <ThinkTime>0</ThinkTime>
      <CheckInternalLinks>false</CheckInternalLinks>
      <CheckExternalLinks>false</CheckExternalLinks>
      <CheckResources>false</CheckResources>
      <RequestEvaluationCriteria>
        <StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfWarningCriteriaIsMet>
        <StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>false</StopProcessingIfErrorCriteriaIsMet>
        <BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
          <WarningCriteria />
          <ErrorCriteria>
            <NumericCriteriaExpressions>
              <NumericCriteriaExpression>
                <NumericRequestMetric>BasePageData/TotalResponseTime</NumericRequestMetric>
                <Operator>Greater</Operator>
                <Value>$Config/ResponseTime$</Value>
              </NumericCriteriaExpression>
            </NumericCriteriaExpressions>
          </ErrorCriteria>
        </BasePageEvaluationCriteria>
        <LinksEvaluationCriteria>
          <WarningCriteria>
            <StatusCodeCriteria>
              <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
              <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
              <Value>400</Value>
            </StatusCodeCriteria>
          </WarningCriteria>
          <ErrorCriteria />
        </LinksEvaluationCriteria>
        <ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
          <WarningCriteria>
            <StatusCodeCriteria>
              <ListNumericRequestMetric>StatusCode</ListNumericRequestMetric>
              <Operator>GreaterEqual</Operator>
              <Value>400</Value>
            </StatusCodeCriteria>
          </WarningCriteria>
          <ErrorCriteria />
        </ResourcesEvaluationCriteria>
        <WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
          <WarningCriteria />
          <ErrorCriteria />
        </WebPageTotalEvaluationCriteria>
        <DepthEvaluationCriteria>
          <WarningCriteria />
          <ErrorCriteria />
        </DepthEvaluationCriteria>
      </RequestEvaluationCriteria>
      <FormsAuthCredentials />
    </Request>
</Requests>
</ProbeAction>

This is passed to another data source in the Web Application Library which uses internal libraries to do the actual HTTP request.

The Configuration Schema tab contains the parameters which are passed to this data source. Currently it only accepts the URL and the interval at which the URL is to be watched.

This Data Source should output WebApplicationData.

Step 2 – Creating the Monitor Type. The Monitor Type takes parameters from the Monitor and passes them onto the data source. It also evaluates the data source to help the monitor determine what criteria equals healthy versus unhealthy.

For States just enter something that makes sense for the type of monitor you will be using.

The Member Modules start with the data source we just created. The Condition Detections are used to evaluate the results of the data source and the Probe Action is used to recalculate the state of the monitor manually.

The configuration of the data source module is fairly simple in that we are accepting parameters from the monitor (which we haven’t created yet) and are just re-passing them to the data source.

The first expression filter evaluates the web page as down.

The second expression filter evaluates the web page as up.

The OnDemandReset Probe Action does not contain any custom configuration information.

Next we have to specify what order the modules will be executed for the regular detection when there is a failure.

Next we have to specify what order the modules will be executed for the regular detection when there is not a failure.

For On Demand we just use the ErrorCodeOK state.

The Configuration Schema defines what parameters this Monitor Type accepts.

Step 3 – Create the Monitor. The monitor is a custom monitor which uses the monitor type we just created. It is also targeted to the SCCMMP class which we created in Part II of this series.

The Configuration is how often we want to query the URL and the URL itself. In this case we want the URL to be the registry value(s) that we discovered in the SCCMMP class. This is how one monitor can be used to watch thousands of websites.

We must tell the monitor which state means Critical and which means Healthy.

I set the example monitor to not alert but this can obviously be configured. Also, in the final solution for my customer we sealed the data sources and monitor types and used a different MP for the classes, discoveries, relationships, and monitors.

To test out this solution the MP you just created can be imported and if the agent from Part II still exists the discovered inventory should look like this:

I don’t have a website with this name so it shows as critical. This is what Health Explorer looks like:

If you want to do some more testing add some real URLs to the SCCMMP registry key and add that key to some more watcher nodes. Also, open the MP attached to Part I and look at the other classes and data sources to understand how the text parsing and response time solutions work.

If you have any questions about this series please let me know.

URL Monitoring Part II – The Classes and Discoveries

2009-07-08T00:14:00Z

This entry is part of the following series:
URL Monitoring Part I – The Design
URL Monitoring Part II – The Classes and Discoveries
URL Monitoring Part III – The Monitors

Each of the 3 web applications has its own class. The applicable discovery queries a registry key and based on the values in that key creates an instance of the proper web application’s class. Also, each web application can contain multiple URLs if necessary.

I will use the class I created to monitor System Center Configuration Manager Management Points for this example because they are all built the same way.

Step 1 - The first thing I did was create a new custom class in the authoring console. The base class is System.Perspective. Notice that one of the attributes is “Hosted”. Do not worry about checking this yet because once we add a relationship it will be checked automatically. Also, I always make what I create “Public”. This is important if you decide to seal the MP and want to access the class from a separate management pack.

I added an attribute called “URL” and made it a key value. When the instance of this class is created the “URL” attribute will contain the URL we will be monitoring.

Step 2 – Next I created a relationship so that the URL we are monitoring is tied to the Watcher Node. I made this a hosting relationship and made it public.

Step 3 – I then created a new custom data source that the discovery will end up using to create instances of the SCCM MP Class in addition to the other classes I use in the solution.

I use the System.Scheduler and Microsoft.Windows.ScriptDiscoveryProbe modules in this data source

The System.Scheduler module takes a parameter which is passed to the data source by the discovery itself. This parameter is the interval at which the discovery should be run in seconds.

The Microsoft.Windows.ScriptDiscoveryProbe module is used to run a script that returns discovery data.

The Microsoft.Windows.ScriptDiscoveryProbe module is a bit more complex so I will paste the configuration below:

<ProbeAction ID="DiscoveryProbe" TypeID="Windows!Microsoft.Windows.ScriptDiscoveryProbe">
<ScriptName>WatcherDiscovery.vbs</ScriptName>
<Arguments>$Config/FQDN$ $Config/SourceID$ $Config/ManagedEntityID$ $Config/Class$ $Config/Property$ $Config/URLRegKey$</Arguments>
<ScriptBody><![CDATA['Arg1 = FQDN of Watcher Node
'Arg2 = SourceID (MPElement)
'Arg3 = ManagedEntityID (Target/Id)
'Arg4 = Class ID
'Arg5 = Property ID
'Arg6 = URL Watcher reg key off hklm

Set oArgs = Wscript.Arguments
sFQDN = UCase(oArgs(0))
sSourceID = oArgs(1)
sManagedEntityID = oArgs(2)
sClassID = oArgs(3)
sPropertyID = oArgs(4)
sURLRegKey = oArgs(5)

Set oAPI = CreateObject("MOM.ScriptAPI")
Set oDiscoveryData = oAPI.CreateDiscoveryData(0,sSourceID, sManagedEntityID)

'Determine if this is a Watcher Node
const HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE = &H80000002
bIsWatcher = False

Set oReg = GetObject("winmgmts:root\default:StdRegProv")
oReg.EnumValues HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, sURLRegKey, arrValues
If isarray(arrValues) Then
bIsWatcher = True
End If

If bIsWatcher Then
   For Each sValue in arrValues
      oReg.GetStringValue HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, sURLRegKey, sValue, sURL
      Set oWatcher = oDiscoveryData.CreateClassInstance(sClassID)
      oWatcher.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='Windows!Microsoft.Windows.Computer']/PrincipalName$",sFQDN
      oWatcher.AddProperty sPropertyID,sURL
      oWatcher.AddProperty "$MPElement[Name='System!System.Entity']/DisplayName$",sURL
      oDiscoveryData.AddInstance(oWatcher)
   Next
End If
Call oAPI.Return(oDiscoveryData)]]></ScriptBody>
<TimeoutSeconds>240</TimeoutSeconds>
</ProbeAction>

As you can see this is a vbscript that takes 5 arguments. The script queries a registry key and if the key is found returns discovery data that is used by the discovery to create instances of the applicable class. This is the reason we only need to create a handful of monitors to watch thousands of URLs.

The Configuration Tab of the data source contains all the parameters that are passed into the data source by the discovery, which we will create next.

The Data Types tab should show that this data source outputs discovery data.

Step 4 – Now I need to create the discovery that will use this data source. I target the discovery to Microsoft.Windows.Computer because any computer can be a watcher. The way the data source identifies a watcher is by the registry key we pass it.

Next I added the discovered types. We are discovering instances of the SCCM MP Class so we just add that along with the appropriate attributes we will be populating.

Next I choose the data source we just created and plug in the appropriate parameters. Notice the interval is set to every 24 hours and the URLRegKey is HKLM by default – Software\URLWatcher\SCCMMP. So if the data source finds this registry key it will read the values underneath it. The value should contain a URL like “http://mySCCMMP/sms_mp/.sms_aut?mplist”.

That is it for the class and discovery, just 4 steps (class, relationship, data source, and discovery). To test this out add the following registry key and value to one of your OpsMgr agents and import the MP. Note, you can add more registry values under this key if you want that agent to watch more than one URL in this particular class (so more than one SCCM MP).

After importing the MP you just created you should see new discovered, but not monitored, inventory of type “SCCM MP Class”. Notice that the “Path” is actually the Watcher Node while the Display Name is the URL.

Custom URL Monitoring Part I – The Design

2009-07-08T00:11:00Z

The out of the box Web Application template that exists in OpsMgr 2007 SP1 and R2 is useful but there are situations where it just doesn’t fit.

Consider the following scenario: The Contoso Corporation’s global IT headquarters is located in Richardson, TX. They have over 2,000 retail stores spread out across the world and over slow connections. Each of these retail stores have two local servers. One of these servers is a web server that hosts 3 web applications which are used for internal tools critical to the operation of the retail store. The CIO wants the main page of SCCM Management Point site to be checked every 15 seconds to ensure the site is up. She wants the POS Web Application site to be checked every 15 seconds to ensure it is responding within 500ms. Finally, she also wants Store Inventory site to be checked for the text “store inventory web application” every 15 seconds to make sure the site is displaying the appropriate information. Because of the remote nature of these retail stores the CIO wants the check to be done from the non-web server at each retail store where the websites are going to be viewed.

The out-of-the-box Web Application template in OpsMgr doesn’t fit well in this scenario because we need to monitor 6,000 websites every 15 seconds from 2,000 different watcher nodes. One of my customers has a very similar scenario in their environment and asked for a custom solution that uses OpsMgr. I created a solution that does these checks every 15 seconds from the local watcher node at each retail store. The cool part about this solution is we only use 3 monitors to watch all 6,000 web sites, it is dynamic so once the solution is in place there is very little additional administrative overhead, and it scales incredibly well.

Because of the complexity of this management pack I decided to split this topic up into multiple blog entries. The primary purpose of this series is to offer an alternative to the Web Application template in OpsMgr and the secondary purpose is to show how I developed this solution. The series is broken up into the following posts:

Custom URL Monitoring Part I – The Design
Custom URL Monitoring Part II – The Classes and Discoveries
Custom URL Monitoring Part III – The Monitors

My design is generic and was designed for OpsMgr 2007 SP1 although it should also work in R2. It consists of 3 discoveries, 3 classes, 3 monitors, 3 monitor types, and 4 data sources. I attached the entire solution to this blog entry.

Here is a diagram of the design of this MP:

To test this MP in the lab do the following:

1. Create a test website with the text “store inventory web application” on the main page
2. On several OpsMgr agents (which would act as watcher nodes) create the following registry entries:
    - HKLM\Software\URLWatcher\SCCMMP (Key)
      - HKLM\Software\URLWatcher\SCCMMP\SCCMMP:http://<yourwebsite> (String Value)
    - HKLM\Software\URLWatcher\POS (Key)
      - HKLM\Software\URLWatcher\POS\POS:http://<yourwebsite> (String Value)
    - HKLM\Software\URLWatcher\StoreInv (Key)
      - HKLM\Software\URLWatcher\StoreInv\StoreInv:http://<yourwebsite> (String Value)
3. Import the MP and wait 5 minutes
4. Under Monitoring\Discovered Inventory look at the 3 classes in the Website Watcher Library MP
5. Change the text and bring the website up/down to view the results

Monitoring the Monitoring solution

2009-02-26T02:14:00Z

What if OpsMgr is in a state where it is running but not working properly? Maybe your RMS is gray or the notification and alerting systems are down. How do you detect this condition so someone can take action to resolve it? Monitoring the console all day isn't very efficient. This is where monitoring the monitoring solution is required.

Below is just one approach to detecting these types of failure conditions. First, we generate an alert on an interval which triggers a notification. The alert auto-resolves and the notification triggers a vbscript that updates a log file on a share. An OpsMgr agent (watcher node) is used to read the log file on the share periodically. If the log file is out of date then the agent triggers an external process which notifies the appropriate administrators that OpsMgr is down. Here is a diagram of this design:

The way the agent notifies an administrator is configurable on the rule that runs the script on the agent. The script writes an event 9898 to the agent's Operations Manager event log. This event can be picked up by any other method that can be used to notify the appropriate administrator of a problem. Also, there is an optional parameter of a process that the script can run. This process could me something like sendmail, net send, createticket, etc... which would be used to notify the appropriate administrator of a problem. This is a good design for determining the health of a management group because it uses the alerting and notification systems and if both of these are working then chances are you're going to be alerted of any issues that occur.

I have created an example MP using this design and provided the steps below to use such an MP.

Step 1 - Create a share that the RMS and agent watcher can write to

Step 2 - Copy the RMSMonitor.vbs script to this share

Step 3 - If an alerting or notification program is to be used then copy this program to the share as well

Step 4 - Configure Command Notification passing the management group name as a parameter to the VBScript. The MG name is used so if you have multiple management groups you can use the same share

Step 5 - Import the MP (it contains one group, one monitor, and one rule with an override)

Step 6 - Add an agent (which will be the watcher node) to the RMSHealthAgent group

Step 7 - Ensure the "Alert Generator" monitor is working by checking for the <mgmtgroupname>RMSMonitor.log. It should contain a new line every 10 minutes.

Step 8 - Configure the "LogWatcher" Rule. Create an override for this rule so that it is enabled for the RMSHealthAgent group. Modify the script so that the proper parameters are passed (the share path, the mgmt group name-optional, and the application you would like to call to alert you - optional).

Step 9 - Confirm it is working properly. If the appropriate RMSMonitor.log is updated within 30 minutes this rule will simply clear the log to keep the size small. If it hasn't then it will update the log saying there is a problem, log an event 9898, and call the alerter program if one was configured. Make sure that the log is either empty or contains fewer than 3 or 4 lines. If it contains more then this rule isn't working properly.

Much of this example would probably need to be customized based on your environment. Things such as how often the alert is generated, how often the watcher node checks the log, how you get notified, changes in the script, etc...

What do you do here?

2009-02-25T05:17:07Z

Here at Microsoft I have had the opportunity to work in different roles on several teams all of which contained very smart people. I have to say though, I am currently working with some of the most talented engineers of my career. I work with a team of rock stars and we are part of a larger, very talented, organization called Premier Field Engineering.

My OpsMgr focused peers are DSE's (Dedicated Support Engineers). This means that we work with a single customer, or a very small group of customers, and are their primary resource for everything OpsMgr. We work with our customers on projects, provide training, and also provide solutions to problems that may arise.

My current OpsMgr DSE teammates are Steve Rachui, Kevin Holman, Jonathan Almquist, and Jimmy Harper. If you are reading my blog then chances are you've also read their blogs and know about the quality of work that these guys do.

If you would like to learn more about DSE check out the data sheet available on the Microsoft Services site or send me an e-mail.

Using a property bag to populate an alert description part II

2009-02-25T04:06:00Z

Over a year ago I blogged about the proper syntax required to populate an alert description with data returned from a property bag. The syntax in the blog is correct but the idea of doing this confused some. I will describe below how to accomplish this with a rule using the following scenario.

Lets say you have an application that creates an event (we'll use event 9999 as an example) when it has a certain problem. You want to get alerted when this event occurs, but you want to do some additional diagnostics before the alert is generated and populate the alert description with information collected from the diagnostics. I have put a diagram of this scenario below:

I have listed each step that I used to create this management pack below.

Step 1 - Create and name a new management pack in the Authoring Console

Step 2 - Create a new composite data source

Step 3 - Add the Microsoft.Windows.EventProvider member module to the data source

Step 4 - Configure the member module to look for an event id from the application event log where the id = a parameter that is passed in.

Step 5 - Add the Microsoft.Windows.ScriptPropertyBagProbe member module to the data source

Step 6 - Configure the member module to accept parameters for the script name, arguments, and script body. In my example I hard code the script timeout to 30 seconds but you can also make this configurable via a parameter.

Step 7 - Set the order of the member modules so the EventProvider runs first, the ScriptProvider runs second, and the Module Output is last.

Step 8 - Add all of the parameters that need to be passed into this data source. Your data source is now complete.

Step 9 - Create a new custom rule in the Authoring Console. I am targeting my rule to Microsoft.Windows.Computer for example purposes.

Step 10 - On the Modules tab, add our custom data source and then click "Edit" to configure the parameters we want to pass to this data source. My ScriptBody parameter contains a very simple VBScript that returns a string that I want to have appear in the alert description ("This is the information that I collected for my alert"). In the real world this string would obviously be additional useful information that was gathered by the vbscript. I use notepad as my XML editor so this is what my configuration looks like.

Step 11 - After the data source is configured go back to the Modules tab and add a new action of type System.Health.GenerateAlert. Once added click "Edit" and then "Configure" to pull up the Alerting User Interface. Now fill in the appropriate fields for the alert. Notice that the Alert description xpath is looking for the value in the property bag which is populated in the vbscript which we configured in the last step. After this step your rule should be created.

Step 12 - Import the MP and create an event of 9999 in the application event log on an agent

Step 13 - View the alert generated to ensure it contains the string from the VBScript

I hope this example helps explain how information from a property bag can appear in an alert description and might also be a good introduction to the authoring console for some. I have attached the MP that was created by these steps for your reference.