Sitemonitor
An application we recently released Sitemonitor (SM) - is a website monitoring program designed for website developers and hosting companies and basically anyone who has a website and needs to make sure its running and accessible to web users.
Sitemonitor checks website status and records browser load times (cached and uncached) at a user specified time period. Sitemonitor generates graphical reports for your site using a control site as a benchmark.
Sitemonitor can be deployed on multiple machines in different countries around the world to give you a reliable snap shot of site accessibility. Sitemonitor will attempt to geographically locate its current 'run' location in order to stamp each site report and graph.
Sitemonitor is affordable to everyone from a single site owner/developer to multi-site deployments. If you wish to buy multiple copies please contact us to discuss our special rates.
a) Sitemonitor main program
Sitemonitor monitors website 'UP' status using both ping (ICMP) and TCP/IP (echo) port methods and or http browser load at a user specified time period. It supports pop up, voice and email notification.
If a server does not respond to ping using ICMP or TCP/IP port methods then it is almost certainly down. Couple this to HTML content load testing and Sitemonitor becomes a very useful and reliable tool for monitoring any internet based server whether it be a web, mail, ftp, proxy or audio/video server.
Sitemonitor measures the cached or uncached load times of web pages and can be used to do comparative page tests for an entire site. Load speeds are useful for optimizing each section of a site.
Up to 10 websites or pages are polled sequentially at a specified time. Sites tested using browser load are loaded into a mini browser window.
Only once the entire target page is loaded is the page accepted as active. This is a far more accurate and useful measurement of a website's status than simply using ping. A server might be up but not serving page components correctly or at all.
Ping, cached or uncached load times are recorded for each test site and graphically presented for use in client reports etc.
As mentioned site status can be flagged using either a pop up alert window or voice on the machine running the application. Voice alerts make use of TTS (text to speech) - Windows built in speech API (SAPI). You will obviously need a sound card and speaker for voice notification to work. Sitemonitor will 'talk to you' and let you know if there is a problem with the internet connection or if a site is unreachable - Sitemonitor is like having a very efficient personal assistant that allows you to stay one step ahead of your clients.
Sitemonitor can also be set to run in silent mode with simple pop up notification if preferred. Remote notification is via email, where as mentioned the log file is sent to a specified address at a scheduled time interval.
If your internet connection goes down Sitemonitor will alert the system operator using either a pop up mini window and siren or use it's voice notification to alert the system operator. You can also adjust Sitemonitor's voice prompts for each condition. This can be fun not to mention useful. Personalize each voice response e.g. 'I'm sorry Dave the internet connection seems to be down".
Sites or pages that are down or unreachable are logged and can be automatically emailed to a specified address at a regular time interval. This allows Sitemonitor to run in unattended mode and send alerts to a website manager if he is in the same building or anywhere in the world.
b) Sitemonitor Browser
This application as mentioned is system tray based. It monitors up to 12 sites or pages simultaneously using http only. Sites that are 'Down' or do not load correctly are flagged in red. This application gives the user a quick graphical 'snap shot' of all monitored sites or pages. This application can only be run in conjunction with the Sitemonitor main program.
System Requirements
Sitemonitor is designed to work with Windows 7, Vista and Windows XP. It has not been tested on earlier versions of Windows, it may however run correctly on the Windows 98 platform.
* Windows 7 / Vista SP1+ (recommended) or XP SP2+
* 1024x768 minimum screen resolution
* Sound Card - for audio alerts
* Windows Vista (strongly recommended) or Windows XP
Internet connection : A permanent reliable internet connection such as ADSL is required. It is preferable although not essential that a fixed IP is used. To get the best results your internet connection should be not less than 512kbs. Ideally we recommend a 4Mbs (or higher) internet connection.
Internet Explorer 4 or higher : Internet Explorer must be installed on the machine where Sitemonitor is installed. It is strongly recommended that the latest version of Internet Explorer is installed along with all the latest updates and extensions such as Flash, Java etc. to ensure that sites load correctly as they would in the real world. Your IE installation should obviously be stable, up to date and running correctly before installing Sitemonitor.
Bandwidth issues : Other applications may affect Sitemonitor's ability to connect to the internet and function correctly such as timed or scheduled events i.e. anti virus scans, email, anti virus updates and any other application that uses the internet.
Since Sitemonitor polls websites and servers at a specified time interval it would be ideal if no other internet applications that use significant bandwidth are running on the Sitemonitor machine at the time of site testing since these additional bandwidth loads will adversely influence Sitemonitor test results. Firewalls should not affect Sitemonitor's ability to ping or load sites.
In order to report accurately on the status or load time of a site or page, content is loaded either from the server or compared to the local cache depending on user specification. It is recommended that a maximum of up to 36 tests are run each day (every 40 minutes) for monitoring purposes. Ping tests use 3 packet average. Packet size is very small so bandwidth usage is minimal.
Screen saver and Power settings : Adjust your machine's screen saver and power management system so that the machine stays awake during the full test period. Sleep mode should be switched off if running in unattended mode over long periods of time.
Sitemonitor Tools
Geolocation
Geographically locate a server (IP), calculate IP numbers and lookup IP addresses. In some cases you may not know where or who the hosting company is for a website or webpage. In addition knowing the geographic location of the hosting server is important when comparing site response times.
Geolocation servers normally require the target sites IP4 address. They then convert the IP address into an IP number using the formula :
(Block1*16777216) + (Block2*65536) + (Block3*256) + (Block4) = IP Number
IP number's are then compared against a master IP number database which will return (if found) the Country, Country Code, City, Lat, Long, and sometimes additional information. These databases have varying levels of accuracy.
Public geolocation servers such as http://hostip.info are getting more accurate by the day - however commercial geo-databases are generally more accurate or comprehensive. No database will ever be 100% accurate due to the transfer and management of IP blocks. The whole system is in need of change. You can add your own geolocation servers to the sample list in the Sitemonitor program folder. Note the sites listed are for demonstration purposes only and are copyrighted to their respective owners.
Hackerwatch
Hackerwatch allows you to enter a specific site that you would like to monitor for changes. This tool stores a copy of the known 'good' page code and compares it on each subsequent test to the incoming code. If a change is detected then an email alert will be sent to the specified recipient.
Alternatively if the page code changes dynamically, a specific line of text that does not change can be specified - the program will then only check for the existence of this string rather than monitor the entire page for changes.
"We have developed quite a few websites. Some of them we have continued to maintain over the past months and years. When taking care of other people's websites it is often necessary to inform them when something goes down. Or perhaps (and maybe more accurately), quickly see when something goes wrong and then fix it before anyone notices. Enter SiteMonitor. This is a great product that was developed for just this purpose. I find it quite useful to monitor website response times too, which can often give you a few insights into how others are enjoying (or not enjoying) the web viewing experience." - Andrew Solomon MD Androidfarm
Changes for version 1.04
- modified speech routine
- fixed local Geolocation lookup not refreshing in some instances
- fixed Geolocation IP number calculation not updating in some instances
- adjusted TTL on connection test and ip look up
- fixed occasional error message with TTS sub system
Changes for version 1.03
- modified registration and activation system
- changed smtp server setup for sending mail notifications
- changed registration email system and name display
- fixed error in url save procedure
- changed log file notification variables
- changed smtp detection method
- geolocation at startup improved
- browser message size increased
- stop navigation from sm test screen when test running
- move log window position
- adjust font size of status
- fix email options on hackerwatch
- adjust bg colour of browser window on sm test
- adjust default vars on graphs on first draw
- change bg colour of url entry in sm browser
- change font size of hms in SM browser
- fixed default help in SM Browser
- fixed SMB url issue if SMB url didnt exist