PA Server Monitor Change History

Updates in 2008

3.5.1.32	* Added $Group$ to expansion variables * Added action to put servers/monitors into maintenance and pull out of maintenance * Added Summary Disk Space report that shows one line per data set * Added Group-based All Computers report * Group status reports update correctly when servers and groups are dragged around * Added support for multiple server maintenance periods * Added Manufacturer and Model to the Server Status report * Added Bulk Config Rename Monitors operation * Added Monitor Summary Status report type * Bulk Config failed some operations if it ran into non-Latin characters * Corrected spelling error of 'occurred' * Fixed installer so ServerScript can always register * Fixed the Disk Space Summary report's sorting * Temperature monitor guesses units better when they aren't specified * Fix for Visual Status Map report which occasionally stopped updating * Added Citrix monitor login and connection-specific timeouts * Minor speed improvement when communicating with MS SQL Server * Viewing a server status report automatically finds and selects the server in the navigation tree * HTTP error log fix * HTTP requests to the local machine will ignore proxies by default * Less memory pressure when running large SQL statements (for reports, etc) * More obvious when a maintenance period is not set * Setting up escalation periods is more straight forward * Log File monitor won't complain that there are no files just because they're all too old
3.5.0.143	* Monitoring service can optionally check for updates every 30 days from the service and notify via email message * Fixed an issue in the Discovery process * Added Run Now (for all monitors on a computer) under the Operations menu of a computer node * Application works better with .NET 1.1 (as well as .NET 2.0 currently) * Server status reports update much more quickly, especially in large installations * Fixed rare case where CPU usage would go very high, usually involving network errors
3.5.0.124	* Fix to Uptime reports where data rollup other than Raw used with MS SQL Server backend reported 'No Data' * File & Directory monitor performance improvement * Times in MS SQL tables will be UTC instead of local time from this point forward * Reports with period summarization will take local timezone into account * Server maintenance start times honored more accurately * Execute Script action added back in * Start Application action can use replacement variables * PAChartGen forcibly shutdown after 120 seconds * Group and server status reports created in separate threads * High CPU usage diagnostics added - fix for rare 99% CPU usage
3.5.0.115	* Microsoft SQL Server supported as a backend database * Citrix XenApp client probe monitor * Server and server room environment monitor * Running process monitor * Bulk Configuration for making configuration changes to many servers or monitors at once * More attractive reports, and new report types * Less CPU used, less memory used, can monitor more servers/devices
3.4.10.35	* Authentication fix for machines in non-connected (ie from a Workgroup) or non-trusted domains * Improved support for UTF-8 report emails * HTTP requests will optionally follow redirects based on a registry setting * Activity view only shows a single instance of "Monitor Busy" * Fix very rare crash in the Event Log monitor UI with some video cards

Updates in 2007

3.4.10.14	* Message Box action now works on Vista, and in Terminal Services windows as well * Not prompting for proxy auth credentials until after an HTTP 407 is received * localhost used for Run Now command rather than computer name * Write to Log File action has configurable max size * Log File monitor updates its progress in View System Activity * Log File monitor interactive test will offer to stop after 30 seconds * Log File monitor can skip older files * Log File monitor has better code-page guessing and user-specified settings * Log File monitor uses server credentials to access remote files * Message Box action uses configurable message text * SNMP Monitor works when other services are listening for traps * Performance monitor configuration uses login credentials to access counters on remote machines * Easy Configuration works better with optional usernames and passwords * SNMP monitor works with other SNMP listeners on same machine
3.4.10.4	* Minor resource leak in the Console has been fixed * Report templates can be customized * Emailed status reports with embedded report graphs show correct graphs * Servers entering and leaving Maintenance mode have been assigned a specific system security alert category * Additional date cut-off precision when returning data for single day charts * Simplified Ping monitor GUI, including using ms instead of fractional seconds * Increased SQLite page size for better I/O efficiency * Deleting orphaned SQLite master journal files * Performance monitor thresholds times can be set in seconds * Impersonating before hitting web pages (for Windows-authentication based web sites) * WinHTTP client auto-detects more proxy information from IE settings and handles proxy authentication * Log File monitor now easily handles thousands of log files * Email throughput optimization * File & Directory monitor fix to store file dates in UTC to handle next year's day light savings time :( * Ability to remove HREFs in emailed HTML status reports
3.4.9.15	* Importing configuration for a server whose name contains the name of the source server works better [Thanks Dennis P] * Changes to Performance Monitor to handle international number formats [Dennis again!] * Web Page monitor interprets embedded charset directives to read web pages in all languages * Changes to reduce remote logins on Windows machines * File/Directory Size Monitor's 'percent size change' calculation fixed * Fix: Disk Space monitor shows free bytes in $CurrentValue(1)$ when doing percentage comparison * Phone Dialer (DTMF/SMS) action will force $Details$ to be a single line of text * Emailing reports works with UTF-8 report files * WMI polling no longer causes the floppy disk to seek
3.4.9.2	* Web Page monitor correctly handles URLs with = character and ignoring multiple failures * Added additional logging for report generation * Change to try and make WMI let go of our DLL on shutdown * Fixed a repaint problem in read-only text boxes * UTF-8 used for HTML reports to better support customers of non-Latin based languages (particularly Asia languages) * Fix to Event Log monitor that wasn't recording what it had seen in custom event logs
3.4.8.17	* Fix in the periodic daily scheduler for monitors with a fixed start time and a small period * Added logging for hosted .NET CLR startup * Alternate technique for finding drives in WMI * Phone Dialer (DTMF/SMS) action will appropriately serialize multiple calls to the phone/modem * Server maintenance scheduled now copied when importing from a configuration file * Added support for the MachineIP script and message variable * Changed the way .CSV files are attached to mailed reports
3.4.7.6	* Added SMTPS (SSL-encrypted SMTP) support * Optimized status report creation * Added additional diagnostics for File & Directory monitor * Added the File Age monitor * Alternate File & Directory monitor exclusion algorithm * Added escalation capabilities to the File Age monitor * Fixed custom event log source filtering * Event Log monitor will fire on 'None' Event Types if all event types are being alerted on * Updated to SQLite 3.4.1 * Improved database layer efficiency * Ability to delete multiple reporting data sets at once * Additional Performance monitor retries added to failure scenario handling * Greatly reduced flicker while scrolling and resizing
3.4.4.4	* Application correctly matches subdomains (ie mail.yahoo.com and yahoo.com) * Using better HTTP client library * Ignored directories in File & Directory monitor can be scrolled, cut, copied and pasted * More aggressively throttling CPU usage to the target value * Web monitor's CACHEBUSTER values ignored when recording report data (so dataset names are stable) * TimeInErrorStr and SecondsInError variables added to notification script * Added repeating event escalation support * Fixed error in scheduled reports UI where no report type is chosen when OK is pressed * Fixed an error in recording and reporting on Event Log entries * Added additional SMTP logging * Backup From address added to the Email action * Added Phone Dialer support sending control characters (useful for sending SMS messages via an attached phone) * Added Phone Dialer support for variables (for sending SMS messages via an attached cell phone) * Added the scheduling and delivery of computer and summary status reports * Fixed end-user email alerts for the Directory Quota and User Quota monitors * Added Server Temperature reports
3.4.1.25	* Additional error checking and logging added to Performance Monitor * Log files handle branding * Split database tables in the EventLog monitor for better performance * File & Directory Monitor can be throttled via registry setting * File & Directory Monitor now uses an edit box to add ignored files * Added additional controls to monitor and improve internal efficiency * Diagnostics added for graphical report creation * Fixed a path length overrun in File & Directory Monitor * Creating graphical reports is slighly faster and uses less memory * Quieted some less important internal warnings * Fixed logging of error code for failed SNMP queries * Ensuring the monitor's last run time is accurately saved * Added additional startup logging * Uninstaller behaves better * SNMP monitor handles multiple simultaneous requests better * Optimized the scheduler thread * Activity tracker has been highly optimized * Better throughput for a busy File & Directory monitoring system * File & Directory monitor will complain if a monitored directory can not be accessed * Updated trial licenses to 25 servers * Security message about app starting to match message for app stopping * File & Directory monitor can accept individual file specifications * Monitor result status in log file output changed to be more user friendly * Ability to disable CPU throttling * Guarantee no hanging linefeeds in outgoing SMTP messages * Scheduler fix that sometimes prevents auto-maintenance from starting
3.4.0.39	* SNMP monitor * Automated server maintenance scheduling * Phone Dialer action for sending DTMF/CallerID alerts over the phone system via a regular modem * Dial-Up Connection action for connecting to the Internet so notifications can be sent * Fixed a bug in the Log File monitor which couldn't display gigantic test results in the UI * Much more flexible scheduling for monitors, maintenance and scheduled reports * Fixed Ping monitor which could get stuck if actions were to be fired immediately * Fixed Log File monitor to better handle Unicode log files * Mailing of HTML reports is now supported * Upgraded to SQLite 3.3.13 * Additional logging and error reporting in Performance monitor * Improved server credential handling and related user hints * MessageBox actions correctly truncate messages too long for the screen * The system will allow you to add duplicate computers if you really want to * Update to handle Lite->Pro or Pro->Custom upgrades when existing service is running * Option to have status reports almost instantly up-to-date (see Settings -> Status Report Settings) * Hardened internal HTTP report server * Ability to set action names for E-mail, Pager and SMS actions
3.3.2.10	* Fix for the Ping monitor where it can get stuck if a ping response is not received
3.3.2.9	* Fixed a sporadic problem in the Console when showing existing reports
3.3.2.8	* Servers can have a human-friendly alias (most helpful when the server was originally specified by IP address) * New Uptime report * Service monitor supports the Uptime report * Web monitor supports the Uptime report * TCP Port monitor supports Uptime report * Ping monitor supports Uptime report * Mail Server monitor supports Uptime report * Ability to delete most datasets from the create report views * Logging SMTP activity for troubleshooting purposes * Fixed the scheduled report dialog that was always selecting the first data set * Able to get status reports (via WMI) from additional machines * Fixed a crash in report auto-print if running as Local Service

Updates in 2006

3.3.1.5	* Event Log reports * Changed the threshold for the free memory status light, and it can be disabled completely * Fix for groups within group support * Change to attempt monitoring for NT 4.x machines * Allow manually removing of groups
3.3.0.4	* New branding graphics to match new website * MessageBox action constrained so it doesn't go off screen * Fix for a problem when valid licenses are not recognized
3.2.24.7	* Action/notification event escalation is now supported on most monitors (where it makes sense) * File & Directory Change monitor now records findings to a database and supports reports * Scheduled reports moved to a more prominent position. They also now have their own schedules * Most reports now allow selection of date ranges rather than the number of monitor checks * Larger graphs shown on some displays * Many minor user interface improvements * Performance Monitor now handles selecting "All" instances of a counter * Fixed an issue with the Ping monitor where ping requests could get behind * Cleaned up event log entries that get created by this application * Fixes to the User Quota monitor database interaction * Performance monitor will ignore the first few invalid data errors (returns 0) as a work around for an apparent Win2003 error * Removed WMI free disk space red light in server status report * Increased default max threads to 80 * More efficient database cleanup
3.2.22.19	* Can now connect to domains that are untrusted, or remote computers without having synchronized local accounts * Fixed configuration of Start/Stop/Restart Service action so it can be edited from All Actions panel * Upgraded to SQLite 3.3.7 * Various minor user interface tweaks to make it easier to use for first-time users * Additional debug logs for tracking down a customer reporting issue
3.2.22.11	* Reporting option to show sizes in bytes, K, MB, GB in reports with the units shown on the y-axis * Ability to do multiple delete on ignored files in File & Directory Change monitor * Made the End Training button in the File & Directory Change monitor visible again :( * Log file truncation now keeps some of the previous log instead of completely truncating it * Added logging for reports when a parameter is missing * Fixed an issue in the File & Directory size monitor that kept it from alerting on growing files * Cleaned up exception reporting message * Fixed HTTP server where requests (specifically report generation requests) could get truncated * File/Directory Size monitor now also reports the previous size of files/directories in the alerts * Additional application helps
3.2.21.6	* Free edition shows correct icons when adding new monitor * PerfMon will no longer record error values to the database * Performance monitor schedule adjusted as needed to account for counter duration checks * Web page monitor working correctly with https (SSL) URLs again * Importing configuration from file no longer causes two servers to appear in the user interface * Added "Used Disk Space" report to Disk Space monitor * Server Temperature Monitor added (using SpeedFan - http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php) * Fixed an issue with re-publishing reports via an alternate web server * Security alerts if monitoring could be interrupted * Pending email and MsgBox notifications quickly sent if shutting down (to support security alerting) * Removed requirement to give a name to each monitor before saving * Debug logs can be enabled without restarting the service
3.2.20.9	* Group within group support added to the Console for arbitrary server/device grouping * Fixed error where computers could be added with no name * Run ad hoc reports off the monitor node in the navigation tree * Fixed timezone issue for outgoing email messages * Not sending credentials to WMI if probing local computer * Fixed a rare crash that might occur in the Console while reports are generating
3.2.19	* First status report for a newly added computer shows up quicker * Fixes for Web Page Monitor error when server is auto-added * Reboot action changed so a server can be specified, and sets the reason to "planned shutdown" * UI wrinkles smoothed out * Decreased instances of log file contention * Necessary account rights assigned more precisely * .NET 2.0 support added to the existing .NET 1.1 support
3.2.15	* Added new Log File Monitor * Added new TCP Connection Monitor * Reduced CPU utilization generating reports * Don't try to get service list from remote computer if it can't be contacted * A fix for looping error notifications when multiple notification types are mis-configured * Fixed import of reports from config file * Removes references to bad scheduled reports that don't exist * Fixed a .NET error when things get behind * Changed our User-Agent string to be browser compatible
3.2.9	Ability to disable WMI checks, and account privileges are updated automatically to ease remote administration
3.2.7	Made activity log files more easy to import into other apps
3.2.6	Major update! * Less CPU usage creating reports * Added groups to server list * All servers and server group summary reports * Further database access optimization * Upgraded to SQLite 3.3.5 * Added server notes * Many minor UI tweaks and bug fixes
3.1.26	Event log monitor can now filter on more than one event ID
3.1.25	Fixed a memory leak that happens when charts are created :(
3.1.24	Changed the default monitoring time to a more reasonable value. Fixed an issue with slow reports because of a missing database index. Better event log entry information
3.1.22	A number of customer requests: making it easier to publish reports, .NET 1.1 or 2.0 support, server maintenance mode.
3.1.21	Many small usability tweaks. Accessing WMI using explicitly declared username. Better performance (less CPU usage) and slightly smaller memory footprint. Configuration of system broadcasts. Upgraded to SQLite 3.3.4
3.1.15	Final fix for the .NET 1.1 issue. No known problems of any sort. Slightly improved performance.
3.1.13	.NET 1.1 has mixed-mode deadlock/loader lock issue which affects some installations of PA Server Monitor. We now detect it, and have done some work around work. More will likely follow. Also added better information to failed reports. It's been a hard week.
3.1.12	Fixed a rare false positive in the Ping monitor. Also removed a couple of internal notifications that customers are finding irritating. Initializing the .NET subsystem in a better fashion and checking for the .NET Framework 1.1 SP1. Fixed a small issue with password validation.
3.1.8	Major update to version 3 of our monitoring framework!

Updates in 2005

2.2.15	When given a choice about which event log description to use, always choosing the longest one, and also ensuring Server Monitor-generated events are never alerted on
2.2.13	Fixed a single-line text message that is wrongly appended to some Event Log alerts, and also fixed an issue with excluding some events from monitoring
2.2.9.1	Added internal timeout to the web monitor. Work around for an undocumented limitation to the Windows Reboot API
2.2.8.1	Re-enabled bulk install support in Setup and enhanced internal ping monitor robustness, added WatchDog registry setting and web monitor now shows error status if any pages are in error
2.2.6.1	Automatically grants necessary rights for the product directory and registry key to the user running the Server Monitor service (if not running as Local System)
2.2.4.4	Server Monitor 2.2 released!
2.1.1.13	Customer reported today and we confirmed today an issue in the Ping Monitor. The fix is very safe so we wanted to get it out ASAP.
2.1.0.12	Fixed an issue that kept the Disk Space Monitor and Directory Quota Monitor from loading on Windows 2000--Thank you Ulf!
2.1.0.11	Although no customers have experienced any problems, continued development unearthed a slight chance for a bug, and we couldn't sleep until we fixed it (bogus monitors could show up in the list)
2.1.0.10	ServerMonitor 2.1 released!
2.1.0.7	Beta of ServerMonitor 2.1 released

Updates in 2004

2.0.0.12	Beta of Server Monitor 2.0 released!
1.0.0.6	First Beta release