SMTP Monitor belongs to more advanced IPHost Monitors. SMTP, an application layer protocol, is since early 1980s de facto standard protocol for email transmission across IP networks. The protocol has several extensions, created to add functionality and enhance security. SMTP Monitor allows to test both basic and extended functionality, including general connectivity and network latency.
Although SMTP can be tested manually (by using telnet or openssl client feature and by piping commands), to test such features as authentication and correct mail delivery is a cumbersome work. The lack of monitoring, or simplified monitoring (checking the mere fact of connectivity) can result in not being notified promptlyon whatever problems can happen to the mail server. Since mail service is one of crucial services for most Internet-related business, it is important to monitor it in full. IPHost Network Monitor offers a simple solution to perform these tasks on multiple servers.
IPHost SMTP Monitor can be created in a few minites. It takes several parameters; you start creating it by specifying server name and port (depending on server configuration, several ports can be available,such as 25, 465, 587 and others).
You can test authentication by SMTP Monitor by specifying proper user name and password acceptable by the mail server. Note: it is not recommended to use a user name used by a human owner of email address; a technical account created solely for monitoring purposes is recommended.
It is also possible to test SMTP by sending messages. There are ‘To’, ‘From’, ‘Subject’ and ‘Content’ fields for that purpose. Note: make sure that whatever anti-SPAM or related filters do not treat the repeated monitoring messages as possible junk mail. White list the sender and/or IP address of the server where IPHost Network Monitor is running; provide sensible text in both subject and body of the test message and do not send it too often (sending a test message every minute isn’t a good idea, so change the polling time respectively if using ‘Test message’ feature.
Finally, you can specify what security connection type to use: TLS if available, TLS, SSL or no security at all. The last should be used with great precaution. The last of parameters are common for all the monitor types. Specify polling interval, alerting type (if the default one isn’t suitable), availability and performance parameters to your taste.
Common usage of SMTP Monitor is to make sure that all mail transferring facilities are working as expected, that message is delivered properly and within reasonable time. A word of note: if you are testing your mail service responsible for communicating with the outer world, make sure the alert type selected doesn’t rely on this facility’s being available (otherwise you risk not being informed of problems). Typical approach is creating an Alert sending email via another mail server. Another typical use case is checking whether the authentication passes (if it doesn’t, another facility may malfunction — this SMTP Monitor may indicate related problems). System administrators are most probable users of this monitor type.
SMTP monitoring, as part of more general mail services monitoring may be used in conjunction with POP3 and IMAP monitors, as well as with monitors designed to watch authentication and general connectivity. Note that if test messages are used, the absence of such message should be treated as an alert as well.
Description of other features:
| Monitoring Features | Here you can find the list of monitor types supported in IPHost Network Monitor and brief description of their parameters. |
| Network Discovery | Helps you to create a basis of your monitoring configuration and automates the task of detection network hosts and network services. |
| Alerting Features | Here you can find the list of alert types (ways of reaction to the problems happened during monitoring) available in IPHost Network Monitor, and their brief description. |
| Reporting Features | Here you can find the list of report types available in IPHost Network Monitor with brief descriptions. |
| IPHost Network Monitor interfaces and structure |
Here you can find an overview of IPHost Network Monitor components, Windows and web interfaces. |
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