Overview of Event Notification

A PacketWise event is a network situation that can trigger an alert message sent via an email, SNMP trap, Syslog server, or a combination of any of these methods. The event is based on a particular measurement variable, associated with a specific class, partition, or link, and has a defined threshold. When the threshold value is exceeded, PacketWise will automatically send notification of the event and record the event in a log. For example, you might have an event defined to notify you when the percentage of TCP connection aborts (the tcp-conn-aborts% variable) exceeds 70% (the threshold value). In this example, the event can notify you of conditions that could lead to poor customer service.

Network and system administrators rely on event notification to proactively manage network resources. PacketWise's event notification feature takes advantage of the network metrics already collected by the unit. For example, you can use event notification to automatically report to you when there are unacceptable network delays or when there isn't enough bandwidth to satisfy guaranteed rate demand. By having PacketWise send you notifications automatically, you have the opportunity to be aware of situations before they trigger user complaints.

Using PacketWise's event notification feature, you can:

• Define your own events or use one of the predefined events.
• Configure thresholds for key performance variables, which are sampled at regular intervals.
• Receive notification — emails, SNMP traps, and/or Syslog messages — when threshold crossings occur.
• Access event log files stored on the unit's hard drive.

Configuring the Event Feature

Before creating events, you need to decide how you want to be notified when events occur. To be notified via email, you must identify the email server and email recipients. If you want PacketWise to send an SNMP trap, you must define the SNMP trap destination. See Set Up Event Notification.

Setting Up and Managing Events

Once you have finished setting up event notification, you can start configuring events. Event notification is configured via the command-line interface (CLI); after events are configured, event status and statistics can be monitored through the browser user interface. See Define an Event, Use Predefined Events, and Register an Event.

Note: The User Event facility may not be accessible for a few minutes after a measurement engine reset.

See also:

Notify Someone of Situations of Interest