text pagers / 2-way responses too

[Subhendu Ghosh]

Cool :)

Q.- if the network is down - how do you get the DTD since there seems to 
be a external http reference rather than a local definition.

Isn't that when the pages go out :)

-sg

On Thu, 14 Nov 2002, Brandon Knitter wrote:

> I know that sometimes email is your only option, but...
> 
> Email is by far the absolute WORST way to get your monitoring alerts.  Even 
> when your network and internet connectivity is up.  The smtp protocol in 
> general states that there is no guaranteed delivery time (there are typically 
> warning responses at 24 hours, and complete failure at 72 hours), as well many 
> email gateways (your paging provider's) will queue up messages based upon load 
> and other rules.  There is no guarantee that you will get your message today 
> even!  I frequently used to get a "GOOD" page before a "BAD" one when using 
> email, and sometimes only a "GOOD" one since the "BAD" email got lost somewhere.
> 
> With that said, TAP is a great way to send things (qpage, sendpage, etc.).  But 
> you do lose some features, although it's a great backup.  If you can cascade 
> things, start by sending a page to your provider's delivery gateway.  Many 
> paging companies provide an SNPP or WCTP gateway which allows you to "drop off" 
> a message on their server directly, and you will get the page sooner than 
> email...that's just about what their email gateways do...when the email gateway 
> actually gets the message.
> 
> In the case of 2 way pagers, I have written scripts that will drop off a 
> message on a WCTP gateway and save off the message identifier.  Then, every 5 
> minutes I check and see if any of those messages have had a response from the 
> pager (that expires after 60 minutes).  When my pager gets the message 
> (typically within 15-20 seconds of Nagios sending the alert) I have a list of 
> canned response options I add to the message (ack, dis 30, dis nagios, etc.).  
> I choose my response, then when the response is picked up by my server it does 
> the appropriate action on Nagios.  Very handy when you can't get to a terminal 
> and are at the colo and want to quiet an alarm.
> 
> If you want to try out the scripts, check out the project I started at SF: 
> 
>     http://sourceforge.net/projects/wctpxml-perl
> 
> For now just grab it from CVS (tests project) I'll make a distro and write up a 
> quickie README file for how it works, and an INSTALL for how to make it work! :)
> 
> I'd be curious if that script is helpful for anyone.  I mean come on, let's use 
> the second direction in our two-way pagers! :)
> 
> 

-- 




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