Alerting options

One of the major concerns driving the adoption of environment monitoring solutions in I.T. is the desire to be alerted when conditions in the server room become abnormal.

A number of alerting options exist, which you choose will largely depend upon your own particular circumstances.

E-mail

By far the most popular alerting method. Has the great advantage that many people can access their emails away from the office using devices like the Blackberry.

In addition, with Intellipool, you can embed a graph of the offending probe readings with your alert.

SMS

Another popular alerting mechanism is the Short Message Service (SMS) available for most, if not all, mobile phones. Very popular with IT shops who have an “on duty” mobile phone.

The main disadvantage of SMS is the priority networks give to your messages. When the mobile network is busy SMS messages can take a while to get through to the recipient.

One problem with SMS alerting is that the data centre can be hostile to mobile phone GSM signals.

Email to SMS gateways provide a good “zero installation” way to send SMS messages. The only prerequisite being that you must have access to a mail server. Many customers use email to SMS conversion services in situations where installing a dedicated SMS modem is impractical.

With the increased availability of email on mobile phones SMS is less important than it used to be.

If timely and guaranteed delivery of your alerts is a priority then an email integrated mobile phone, like the BlackBerry, may well be worth considering.

Phone based

One way almost guaranteed to get you out of bed at 3am on a Sunday morning is the phone. Phones intrude in a way that texts and emails rarely do.

There are two ways to alarm using the phone. One very easy, the other not so easy.

A little heard of technology rolled out recently by many telcos has been fixed line SMS. One little known fact is that you can use fixed line SMS to receive text messages using your regular phone (in the UK and most of Europe anyway, fixed line SMS hasn’t been implemented in the USA).

If you want to test the service, send a text message using your mobile phone to your home phone number. You will receive a call and hear a computerised voice reading out your text message.

The more difficult option involves installing software like VoiceGuide into your monitoring system.

VoiceGuide is a Windows based software tool for dialling your phone and talking to you. The software can be integrated with any application including Intellipool.

VoiceGuide requires your server to have a modem and access to a telephone line. A modest amount of integration work is required too.

SNMP Trap

All of the featured network enabled environment monitors include the ability to generate SNMP traps when environmental conditions go out of bounds you select.

The management system, when it receives the trap, then performs the steps required to inform you of the problem.

If you do not already have a network management system, I wouldn’t recommend using SNMP traps. Much simpler alerting mechanisms are available.

Buzzer

The Senturion has an on-board buzzer and red light alarm on the front panel. Both can be very useful indications of a problem with your environment when you are in your data centre.

The main problem with physical alarms is that somebody needs to be around to see them. Many data centres are unmanned for much of the time.

Relying upon physical alarms as the sole means of informing you of a problem is not recommended.

Siren & strobe

The siren & strobe sensor provides a visual and/or audible alert, ideal for situations where it is imperative that an alarm is acted upon immediately. Plainly, a siren & strobe is best used in a staffed environment.

Sensor controlled relay

The sensor controlled relay probe allows you to control a single power supply. It is able to switch the power on or off or to cycle the power to a device.

Dry contact

If you have an existing alarm system which takes as input one or more dry contact ports then an environment monitor supporting dry contact alarms would be able to trigger your existing alarm system.

Summary