Since PaperCut 16.1 introduced a bunch of new API’s, our technical teams have been busy investigating some of the traditional 3rd party monitoring tools available. We kicked the tires and gave a couple a good test drive. Our time spent testing was limited and in a very controlled (stable) environment, so your mileage may vary.

ZABBIX

Zabbix is one of the more mature enterprise-class monitoring solutions and is able to to monitor millions of metrics, oh and it is open source!

From our time with Zabbix we felt it was easy to use and very powerful, we only touched on some of its features. While it seems to be Linux only, they offer pre-made ISO / VM images for easy setup and testing.

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PRTG Network Monitor

PRTG as far as network monitoring software goes, is powerful and easy to use. Setup was very simple, and we found being able to graph the usage of the applications memory a welcome feature. PRTG is Windows only and a great starter option for most users.

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PHP Server Monitor

PHP Server Monitor can be installed on any web server that runs PHP, It was super quick to setup and the UI is easy to use. Unlike the other options it is just designed for Up or Down notifications, there is no middle ground here. On the plus side it can alert you via text message or via Pushover.net.

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Nagios Server Monitoring

Nagios was a tricky beast to setup and all the configuration for the monitoring commands are completed via files held on the server. It is also Linux only and one of the more challenging options we investigated.

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What you go for depends on what you or the client wish to monitor. If they want a red or green light, then choose a product that can monitor HTTP URLs. If they want detailed information, the product would have to be able to read JSON data.

For more information, including help and advice don’t hesitate to get in touch with your Account Manager or give us a call at 01256 246970