SOLVED Well I created a new host, service etc, everything was exactly the same as one I was testing that had the broken service. It worked fine. I ended up removing the retention.dat file and restarting, and after everything, just under 2000 services :), ran everything was fine. I plan to look at the old retention.dat file and compare it with was is currently saved for that host. <div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Jan 13, 2009 at 3:11 PM, Matt Nelson <<a href="mailto:matt@frozenatom.com">matt@frozenatom.com</a>> wrote: <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> Hello, We seem to be having an issue with our alert notifications. From what I've determined the command 'notify-by-email' isn't even being called from commands.cfg. I verified this by: 1)replacing the current command with a simple echo "test" > /tmp/test. 2)leaving the mail command in and checking my postfix log - which shows no attempts being made at all. I also don't see anything about sending alerts in my nagios.log/syslog Jan 13 13:13:26 nocnag02 nagios: SERVICE ALERT: mt-ubuntu;SMTP Availability;CRITICAL;HARD;2;Connection refused I have the following configuration for this service: # templates_services.cfg define service{ name critical-service active_checks_enabled 1 passive_checks_enabled 1 parallelize_check 1 obsess_over_service 0 check_freshness 0 notifications_enabled 1 event_handler_enabled 1 flap_detection_enabled 1 failure_prediction_enabled 1 process_perf_data 1 retain_status_information 1 retain_nonstatus_information 1 is_volatile 0 check_period 24x7 max_check_attempts 2 normal_check_interval 2 retry_check_interval 1 notification_options w,u,c,r notification_interval 2 notification_period 24x7 register 0 } # services_social.cfg define service { use critical-service host_name mt-ubuntu service_description SMTP Availability contact_groups individuals_group check_command check_smtp flap_detection_enabled 0 } # t_host.cfg define host { use no_icmp host_name mt-ubuntu alias mt-ubuntu address 10.2.23.23 contact_groups individuals_group } # individual_contacts.cfg define contact{ contact_name mt alias MT service_notification_period 24x7 host_notification_period 24x7 service_notification_options w,u,c host_notification_options d,u,r service_notification_commands notify-by-email host_notification_commands host-notify-by-email email <removed> } define contactgroup{ contactgroup_name individuals_group alias Individuals members mt } # commands.cfg # 'notify-by-email' command definition define command{ command_name notify-by-email command_line /usr/bin/printf "%b" "***** NOCNAG *****\n\nNotification Type: $NOTIFICATIONTYPE$\n\nService: $SERVICEDESC$\nHost: $HOSTALIAS$\nAddress: $HOSTADDRESS$\nState: $SERVICESTATE$\n\nDate/Time: $LONGDATETIME$\n\nAdditional Info:\n\n$SERVICEOUTPUT$" | /usr/bin/mail -s "** $NOTIFICATIONTYPE$ alert - $HOSTALIAS$/$SERVICEDESC$ is $SERVICESTATE$ **" $CONTACTEMAIL$ } Any assistance would be appreciated. Matt </blockquote></div>