Article: Server Supervisor Review

Server Supervisor is an advanced network monitoring tool that can constantly watch different types of web-servers and network resources. It periodically checks if monitored servers or network resources are online and providing required services. If a monitored object unexpectedly goes offline or drops some of its important services, Server Supervisor can instantly warn the administrator by email, IM, or SMS. Besides, it will supply a significant amount of information to help the administrator find sources of the problem and prevent it from happening in the future.

Server Supervisor is designed for Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista. It installs itself as a Windows service and is accessed through a nice flash-based web-interface (using browser). This allows controlling the program from any computer in your network, provided that you remember your login and password.

Server Supervisor supports more than 20 pre-defined monitor types, with the capability to accept custom ones. The monitor types include: Ping, Connect, DNS, HTTP, HTTP Content, HTTP Transaction, IIS Status, Apache Status, Process execution, MySQL, MSSQL, Oracle, FTP, SMTP, POP3, IMAP, CPU usage, Free memory, Page file, Free disk space, Network usage, File system. Several monitors can be assigned to a single resource to check different properties of its services.

One of the valuable features of Server Supervisor is the ability to perform actions on errors. It can be set up to send email messages, IM, or SMS, if a problem is detected. Such messages will include actual data, so that the administrator can learn immediately what's happening and what action is required. However, Server Supervisor can also start an appropriate application to resolve the problem, or start/stop another monitor. This is useful for situations that can be resolved automatically, without bothering the administrator.

The adjustable system of warnings helps detect and fix problems at early stages, proactively. Thus, you don't really need to wait until your server fails and then spend hours to bring it back to life, especially if offline times cost too much.

Server Supervisor constantly collects statistics about monitored resources and uses its database to store the data. The statistics can be then reported to specified users. The program supports 3 types of users: administrators, viewers and recipients. Administrators have full access to all features, viewers can log in just to view information, recipients cannot log in at all, they simply receive collected information (for example, by email).

In short, Server Supervisor has all necessary tools for monitoring servers and informing about possible or actual problems.