IPHost Network Monitor provides user with two interfaces:

A monitoring client (Windows UI) lets you view and change the monitoring system configuration and to view most of reports, graphs, and logs.

A Web interface (Web UI) enables you to view the current state of monitored resources or reports and graphs showing monitoring results for any period of time from any web-enabled device (i.e. with web-browser).

Windows Interface

The Windows interface of IPHost Network Monitor (also called a client GUI) provides a way for the user to start, stop and configure network monitoring, obtain and analyze the results of monitoring and state change notifications.

GUI overview

The IPHost client GUI displays all monitoring configuration controls, monitoring results and logs on one screen. This design is intended to save your time. Typically when you change the settings you expect to see the effect of your change in monitoring results, and when you see a problem in monitoring results you may want to adjust the monitoring settings or actions.

The GUI uses a flexible visualization approach: it offers a number of dockable windows that you can arrange as you wish; it also has a standard Windows menu, toolbar and status bar.

There is an 'Internet pager-like' layout where only the Tree View pane is visible and you open the Reports window when you see some bad state change.

Windows GUI includes four panes:

• Tree View,
• Property Editor,
• Report View,
• Log View.

Client GUI creates icon in the system tray; even when you close the GUI main window, the icon remains present and you can double click it to reopen the client GUI. When a monitoring service is running, the icon displays the worst state of monitors in your system; when the monitoring service is stopped, the icon is grayed. By placing the mouse pointer over the tray icon you can get a state summary tooltip for your system.

When the client GUI runs in the system tray, important system events such as monitoring service start and stop are signaled with tray balloons. If you set up a Pop-up window action for some monitors, it also shows a balloon in the tray.

Tree View

The Tree View pane provides different views of monitored objects and allows taking a quick glance at the system status. It contains a toolbox with five trees: By Host, By Monitor Type, By Current State, Discovery and Favorites. Each node of a tree carries an icon corresponding to the worst child monitor state within it. Changing the focus in Tree View reloads the contents of all the other dockable client windows on the screen. The most demanded actions are available from the context menu of the Tree View pane that appears when you right-click a selected monitor or group.

Property Editor

Property Editor is used to configure monitoring. It displays all properties of a currently selected object. For monitors the editor displays and allows changing the name, comment, polling frequency and monitor-specific parameters, availability settings such as timeout, performance level settings, and actions to be performed on state changes. For monitor groups, the editor also displays a monitors state summary across the group. Some of the settings in Property Editor have specialized child editors (dialog windows) associated with them. You can start, stop, and poll monitors from the toolbar in Property Editor.

Report View

Report View displays an HTML report for a currently selected monitor or group. When a monitor is selected, a detailed report including a performance graph and all state changes of this monitor is displayed. The default report period is the last 24 hours and may be changed in the Global Settings dialog (Tools menu). When a monitor group is selected, a summary report for it is shown. You can navigate the reports you have loaded using the Back and Forward buttons on the toolbar in Report View, Refresh a report, and open the IPHost Web interface with this report loaded using the Web UI button. When you navigate the HTML links in a report or use the Back / Forward buttons, not only the Report View content is changed to display data for the new monitor or group but all the other dockable windows are updated too.

Log View

Log View provides access to log messages stored in the database. You can enable the displaying of either system messages or monitor state change messages or messages of both types in the Log View using its toolbar; it is also possible to adjust a log period (the default period is 24 hours) and to change log record order. The records of state changes and events are filtered in accordance with a currently selected monitor or group; only the messages related to the current selection are shown. Log records for hosts and monitors contain hyperlinks; by clicking on them you select a corresponding object in the Tree View pane and all the other dockable windows.

Web Interface Overview

IPHost Network Monitor comes with a Web interface that provides you with access to monitoring reports. The interface is provided by Apache web server, version 1.3.37; its configuration file httpd.conf may be found in the conf subdirectory of your installation directory and you can change it to suit your needs (for instance, you can get Apache to perform client authentication).

The Web interface provides several views of statistical data and allows you to:

• quickly review the current and all previous states of your network resources
• get a list of problems that have been occured over a period of time
• study trends and detect performance degradation early when it appears
• obtain detailed reports that include a useful performance graph and detailed log of resource state changes

You can choose different groups of monitors for building a report; you can also choose any desired timeframe as well as one of the several predefined time intervals such as Today or Last week.

The general layout of the Web interface main window is shown below.

On the left side of the window there is a Tree View panel. It is separated from the Parameters panel and Report panel by a vertical splitter which you can drag to resize the panels. The Parameters panel is at the top of the window and is separated from the Report panel by a grey non-movable horizontal line.

The Tree View contents match the contents of Tree View in the client application (Windows UI). There is a combo box to select a view (you can select the Hosts, Monitor types, States, Discovery or Favorites tree). Once the selected tree is loaded, you can navigate through it and highlight the necessary monitor or group of resources; your selection becomes prominent in bold type. The report gets generated when you select a tree node and when you press the Generate button on the Parameters panel.

The Parameters panel allows you to select:

1. the type of report (from the combo box).
   
   There are three report types: Summary, Problems, and Trends. A summary report for a monitor contains a performance graph and state change log; all other reports include "pseudo graphs" (color-coded state change records) and a statistical summary. Please refer to Report Types and Generation for more information on report types.
2. the report period. There are several predefined periods that you can select from the combo box; once you do so, the system will set the report start and end dates automatically.
   
   You can also define the start and end dates of a report manually; the report period will be reset to Custom. Dates are selected using a calendar, and times are chosen from the combo box with a 30-minute accuracy.
   
   

When you are done with selecting the report, you can either (the report will appear in the Report panel) or it (the report will appear in a new browser window or tab without the Tree View and Parameters panel, and the standard Printer selection dialog will be shown to allow printing). You can also the report over E-mail (a form will appear where the destination address and the message subject may be changed; by default, the report is sent to the administrator e-mail address).

You can hide most of the Parameters panel by clicking the button. This proves useful when you generate several reports of the same type for different monitors or resource groups and don't want the report parameters to occupy space on your screen. Once you hide the parameters, the button changes to Show Parameters button.

Following the hyperlinks in reports shown in the Web interface reloads the whole interface with a corresponding monitoring object, type of report, and report period already selected. You can share these links with your colleagues who should look at the report in question. You can also open such a link in a new browser window or tab to create a copy of the Web interface that already displays the necessary report. In contrast, navigating Tree View and changing the report parameters does not reload the Web interface; only the Report panel of it gets updated when you press the button.

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.
Actions Features	Here you can find the list of action 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.