Overview

InterMapper can send many different kinds of notifications to alert the network manager of problems in the network. An entire map can be configured to use a default notifier (or set of notifiers), and then individual devices can have customized notifiers.

What is a Notifier?

Think of a notifier as a little "robot" that watches the state of one or more devices, and performs a specified action when the device changes to a certain state. The action is called a notification.

You can attach notifiers to a device, and then specify which states (down, up, warning, alarm, critical) should trigger the notifier. When a device changes to that state, the notifier triggers, and InterMapper sends the notification.

For example, you can create a notifier that sends an e-mail message. You then attach that notifier to a device. You might also specify that it should be triggered when the device goes down or comes back up. When the device goes into either of those states, the e-mail would be sent.

Notifier Types

There are several types of notifiers; each uses a different method to send a notification:

What You Can Do With Notifiers

Parts of a Notifier

  Notifier Name This is a human-readable description of the notifier. It's useful to include the type and recipient in the name, e.g., "Network Techs via email" or "Syslog to Main Logger"
  Notifier Type There are many notifier types - e-mail, sounds, traps, etc. - as listed above. Each notifier you create will cause some kind of notification or alert, depending on its parameters.
  Notifier Parameters The parameters of a notifier indicate the recipient or the action to be performed. Parameters can specify an e-mail address, a sound file to play, the address of a syslog or trap server, a pager account, or a script or program to run. Each notifier type determines its parameters.
  Notifier Schedule Each notifier has a schedule associated with it. The schedule specifies the days of the week, and the hours of each day during which a notifier should send notifications. If the event happens outside the schedule, no notification will be sent.

About the Notifier List

The Notifier list is a library of notifiers that you can attach to different devices on your map. It is available from the Server Settings window. You create, configure, edit, remove, and disable notifiers from the Notifier list. Once you have created and configured the notifiers you want to use, you can attach them to devices.

Occasionally, you may be about to attach a Notifier, and discover that you need to create a new one before you can attach it. You can quickly open the Notifier list from the Notifiers window, and create a new notifier.

How Notifications Get Sent

When an event occurs, for example, when a device changes to a new state (Up to Down, Warning to Alarm, Alarm to OK) InterMapper triggers the attached notifiers that apply to that new state. The notifier then sends a notification, as defined in its parameters, to the specified target users as defined by the notifier schedule.