Re: {bb} Clearing an alert or datestamp check

[Richard Warkentin <warkentin@bellsouth.net>]

At 02:44 PM 7/28/2005, you wrote:
> Hello!
>
> BB is a truely wonderful tool.  I have a question please.  We have red 
> status on some columns that stay red for as long as 45 days and sometimes 
> longer.  We would like to have a button on the detail/status page that 
> would let us reset the alert to green or some status that is at least 
> acknowledged so that our alert screen can be manually 'cleaned up' in this 
> way.  If there is another method we would be open to that as well.
> <<snipped>>


You didn't provide much in the way of detail so I'll assume your display 
server is Unix/Linix and you are using the BTF version (better than free) 
rather than the PE.

AFAIK, there is no way to "reset" an alert.  Just as well because  you have 
tests that are frequently failing.  BB is a simple state monitor and it 
only reports the last status it has received.  Take a look in your 
$BBVAR/logs directory and you'll probably see status reports that are very 
recent.  In fact, once the display server has a report for a Server X Test 
combination, it must receive another report or it will "time out" (default 
value for this timeout is 30 Minutes) and you'll start receiving the 
dreaded "Purple" alert.  Check it out.  for some server that you're getting 
an  unwanted Red status, go to that client and stop the client.  the test 
result should turn to purple in 35-40 minutes.  restart it and the test 
will (probably) gored again.

So, investigate why you get the error and see if you can fix it.  True, 
sometimes it is more work than you can afford to invest.,

If you still have reds that get in the way of the big picture, you can 
build another view.  I call mine "Critical".  Only put servers on this page 
that are "critical" and only place tests on it that are worth your keeping 
on top of.

Additional views are created in the bb-hosts file on the display 
server.   Take a look at the upper left hand corner of every BB 
screen.  There are some interesting button's there but the single most 
important is the "I".  these takes you to the help screens.  This is from 
memory since I'm not logged onto the company network.  The help is quite 
extensive but without giving away the entire plot, I'll give a nudge in the 
right direction.There is a configuration help page.  Investigate the the 
"page" & "subpage" directives these allow you to create new views with only 
certain servers in them.  that takes care of the "critical" server part of 
the problem.  To restrict the tests displayed on this view, investigate 
"group only".

Notification is the other part of the equation and you can do the same type 
thing as "group only".  just list the tests you care about.  again, the 
help page are a life saver.

Now something that isn't in the help.
You don't want a test to be reported from more than one page causes many 
obscure problems.  mostly this happens on the "network" tests (e.g. tests 
actually initiated by the BB server rather than a client).  the rule is 
don't specify a test (e.g. smtp, http etc) for a host more than once.  The 
complication is that BB defaults to doing the "ping" (conn column) every 
time the network tester finds a host in the bb-hosts file.  be sure to 
specify the "noconn" test on all but the first occurance of the test.  This 
is an example bb-host file but I don't remember the syntax of all the 
directives  (not necessary, that is what the help is for)

But my bb-host looks something like this.

ip1 host1       # smtp http://ip1
ip2 host2       #
ip3 host3       #

page critical    # some more stuff
group only  conn http disk
ip1  host1      # noconn
ip3  host3      # noconn

The "critical" view will, once you ferret out the correct syntax, look 
pretty much like you'd expect.

hth. 

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