Building Custom Probes

Would you like to have probes for equipment not listed here? It's pretty straightforward to make your own.

Probes can be created and edited with any text editor. The Writing Custom SNMP Probes tech note describes what's involved and gives example files.

Contributed Custom Probes

Many of our customers have designed Custom SNMP Probes. They've contributed them for you to download and use with your own copy of InterMapper.

To use these probes, download them and uncompress them. Then import them into InterMapper with File -> Import -> Probe...

Jeremy Eder from Invision/mindSHIFT sends probes for monitoring IBM hardware (xSeries and Bladecenter), similar to Joe Vogt's Dell PowerEdge server probe, and a probe that monitors the Red Hat Cluster Suite.

  • IBM xSeries [.zip]
    This probe monitors IBM hardware by querying the Remote Supervisor Adapter (RSA-II) card installed in the server. You must configure SNMP and network settings on the RSA for your environment, and import the included rtrsaag.mib file into InterMapper in order to use this probe.

  • IBM Bladecenter [.zip]
    This probe monitors IBM hardware by querying the Bladecenter Management Module installed in Bladecenter. You must configure SNMP and network settings on the Bladecenter MM for your environment, and import the included mmblade.mib into InterMapper in order to use this probe.

  • Red Hat Cluster Suite [.zip]
    This probe monitors the Red Hat Cluster Suite node/service/quorum status. You must follow the setup instructions in /usr/share/doc/cluster-snmp-/README.snmpd and import the included redhat-cluster-mib into InterMapper in order to use this probe.

Adam Osterlund from Wi-Fi Guys sends probes for Astrocom and 3Com 5500 devices. Each probe polls the bytes per second from each interface on the device, converts it to kilobytes per second, and displays this information for each port at the bottom of the status window. Both probes will generate an alert if traffic on the monitored interface exceeds thresholds defined in the probe. These probes can be used as templates for creating additional SNMP probes to monitor different devices. Since some devices have a different interface index number for ports then others, to use these probes on other devices, you will need to know the interface index numbers that you want to poll and modify the probes accordingly.

  • 3Com 5500 switch [.zip]
    This probe polls each interface of a 3Com 5500 switch, displays the current traffic in and out of each interface in kilobytes/second, and generates an alert if traffic on the monitored interface exceeds thresholds defined in the probe. This probe currently can only monitor one interface at a time.

  • Astrocom [.zip]
    This probe polls each interface of an Astrocom device, displays the current traffic in and out of that interface in kilobytes/second, and generates an alert if traffic on the monitored interface exceeds thresholds defined in the probe. This probe currently can monitor up to three interfaces at a time.

Gregory Lorence from 29West sends probes for all three base 29West transports: reliable multicast (LBT-RM), reliable unicast (LBT- RU) and TCP. When used in conjunction with the 29West SNMP Agent, these probes will allow you to see comprehensive statistics for the behavior of every application on your network running 29West Messaging.

  • 29West TCP Source Probe [.zip]
    This probe facilitates the monitoring of TCP sources. A table of all TCP sources can be viewed, as well as aggregate statistics for all TCP sources on the monitored node.

  • 29West TCP Receiver Probe [.zip]
    This probe facilitates the monitoring of TCP receivers. A table of all TCP receivers can be viewed, as well as aggregate statistics for all TCP receivers on the monitored node.

  • 29West LBT-RU Source Probe [.zip]
    This probe facilitates the monitoring of LBT-RU sources. A table of all LBT-RU sources can be viewed, as well as aggregate statistics for all LBT-RU sources on the monitored node.

  • 29West LBT-RU Receiver Probe [.zip]
    This probe facilitates the monitoring of LBT-RU receivers. A table of all LBT-RU receivers can be viewed, as well as aggregate statistics for all LBT-RU receivers on the monitored node.

  • 29West LBT-RM Source Probe [.zip]
    This probe facilitates the monitoring of LBT-RM sources. A table of all LBT-RM sources can be viewed, as well as aggregate statistics for all LBT-RM sources on the monitored node.

  • 29West LBT-RM Receiver Probe [.zip]
    This probe facilitates the monitoring of LBT-RM receivers. A table of all LBT-RM receivers can be viewed, as well as aggregate statistics for all LBT-RM receivers on the monitored node.

Netbotz 320 Probe [.zip]
Mark Turczan from New York Presbyterian Hospital sends a probe that monitors the temperature, humidity, and airflow of a Netbotz 320 device. It will also alert when the camera motion sensor goes off.

Check SNMPTT Probe [.zip]
Anthony Rodgers from the District of North Vancouver sends a command-line probe that uses SNMPTT (SNMP Trap Translator) to translate SNMP traps into human-readable messages. It requires a shell script on the host that tails snmptt.log and extracts the error level and message, delimited by a pipe. This probe then remotely executes that shell script via a local shell script.

This shell script requires plink from the PuTTY suite (http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html) and awk from the GNUWin32 suite (http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/gawk.htm). If InterMapper is on a Unix/Linux/Mac box, then there's no need for those packages - native SSH and awk can be used instead, but the shell script will need to be modified accordingly.

SNMPTT (http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=51473) is an SNMP trap handler written in Perl used to 'translate' traps received from the NET-SNMP / UCD-SNMP snmptrapd trap daemon into easy to understand messages.

The zip file contains the probe, the shell script that resides on the SNMPTT host, and the local shell script that should be saved to the InterMapper Settings > Tools directory.

Enhanced Table Viewer Probe [.zip]
This enhanced SNMP/Table Viewer probe displays a number of tables for an SNMP router or switch, including the ifTable, ifXTable, tcpConnTable, udpTable, ipAddrTable, ipRouteTable, ipForwardTable, ipCidrRouteTable, ipNetToMediaTable ("ARP table"), and a switch's forwarding table from the Bridge-MIB. The zip archive contains the probe file as well as five MIBs (RFC-1213, IP-MIB, IF-MIB, IP-FORWARD-MIB, and Bridge-MIB) that must be imported.

Dell PowerEdge Server Probe [.zip]
Joe Vogt of Electronic Arts sends a probe for Dell PowerEdge servers that works with any Dell server with OpenManage 4.0 and above installed. This is a comprehensive system state monitor probe that polls the overall System Status values for the Global System, Chassis, Power, Cooling, Voltage, Temperature and Storage subsystems.

Andrey Gordon sends probes for the Riverbed Steelhead appliance, Cisco 4400 Wireless LAN Controller, the MGE EPC 6000 Series UPS, the Cisco Firewall Services Module, and the Cisco ASA 5500 Adaptive Security Appliance. Andrey has also sent two command-line probes that will probe Windows services from a Debian Linux machine utilizing the wmi-client package on Debian.

  • IIS SMTP Queue Probe [.zip]
    This probe will poll a Windows machine running SMTPSVC for the total queue size, utilizing the wmi-client package on Debian Linux. The probe requires that you install the wmi-client package and place the included wmi-queue.sh script in the InterMapper Settings/Tools directory on the Debian machine running InterMapper. Additional information on utilizing the wmi-client package on Debian can be found in this Knowledge Base entry.

  • WMI Service Probe [.zip]
    This probe will detect the state of a specified service on a Windows machine from a Debian Linux machine utilizing the wmi-client package. The probe requires that you install the wmi-client package and place the included wmi-service.sh script in the InterMapper Settings/Tools directory on the Debian machine running InterMapper. Additional information on utilizing the wmi-client package on Debian can be found in this Knowledge Base entry.

  • Riverbed Steelhead Probe [.zip]
    This probe monitors the CPU, temperature, optimization service status, and connection counts for Riverbed Steelhead appliances

  • Cisco 4400 LWAPP Controller Probe [.zip]
    This probe displays CPU utilization, total RAM, free RAM, the first three WLANs, and tables for Connected APs and Rougue APs.

  • MGE EPC 6000 Series UPS Probe [.zip]
    This probe is a modification of Bill McHargue's MGE EXL5 UPS probe. It provides basic monitoring of an MGE EPC 6000 UPS with a UM-Link Ethernet interface, including phases B and C.

  • Cisco FWSM Probe [.zip]
    This probe is a modification of Matthew Willis' Cisco PIX firewall probe. It monitors CPU and memory utilization, the number of connections, and performs interface polling.

  • Cisco ASA 5500 Probe [.zip]
    This probe monitors the CPU and Memory utilization and number of total, IPSec and IKE connections of a Cisco ASA 5500 Adaptive Security Appliance.

DragonWave AirPair Probe [.zip]
Tim Huffman from Business Only Broadband sends a probe for DragonWave AirPair radios. This probe monitors Serial Number, AP Type, Modem Sync LED, Rx Cable Loss, Tx Cable Loss, RSL, and BER. Tim also provides the MIB for the radio along with the probe.

HP DesignJet Probe [.zip]
Don Levinson from Anchorage Water & Wastewater Utility sends a probe for HP DesignJet plotters. This probe monitors ink levels, media status, and some printer status on HP Designjet 1000, 2000, and 3000 series plotters using the SNMP to PML translator on the printer.

APC Environmental Monitoring System Probe [.zip]
Don Levinson from Anchorage Water & Wastewater Utility sends a probe for the APC AP9230 Environmental Monitoring System. This probe monitors temperature and humidity and alarms when thresholds are exceeded.

Satellite/Video Receivers
Richard Roberts from Globecast sends custom probes for the Motorola DSR 4520 video receiver and the Scientific Atlanta D9850 satellite program receiver.

  • Motorola DSR 4520 Probe [.zip]
    This probe monitors signal status, LED status, and device alarm state. The probe will alarm on device alarm state, triggered alarms and alarm bypass mode.

  • Scientific Atlanta D9850 Probe [.zip]
    This probe queries for current program number, safe signal state, bit error ratio, signal to noise ratio, signal level, AFC level, and video bitrate. The device will alarm on safe signal state, safe signal ratio and safe signal level.

APC PDU Probe [.zip]
Bryn Hughes of SITA sends a probe for monitoring APC PDU devices. This probe works with 3-phase APC rack-mount PDUs. The probe checks all three phases for load plus current for each of the individual phases. Warning, alarm and critical thresholds can be set for current.

Adtran DSLAM Probe [.zip]
Brian Megel of BGAM Services sends a probe for monitoring Adtran 1248 DSLAM devices. This probe will scan the Adtran 1248 DSLAM and check to see if any of the sub-tended clients in the stack are communicating or not.

Pedro Quezada from Viacom sends custom probes for the Cisco Content Switch Module (CSM) and the Cisco Application Control Engine (ACE) load balancers.

  • Cisco Content Switch Module [.zip]
    This probe monitors the connection parameters of a Cisco CSM.

  • Cisco Application Control Engine [.zip]
    This probe will monitor the CPU, memory and global connection parameters of a Cisco ACE module.

High Traffic - PPS Probe [.zip]
Jon Mansey of TigrisNet has modified Fabiola Bejarano's High Traffic probe to monitor traffic in packets per second, instead of bytes per second. This probe will provide a notification when traffic on a certain port/interface exceeds thresholds and give alarms when that interface goes down.

Michael Graziano from Invision sends custom probes for Liebert AirCon, APC Silcon UPS, Liebert 600 UPS, and Sentry 3 CDU devices.

  • Liebert AirCon [.zip]
    This probe polls an AirCon for its alarm settings and current readings, and allows user-specified pre-alarm (warning) and critical values.

  • APC Silcon UPS Probe [.zip]
    Michael writes: "The APC probe is for the actual UPS module, and interprets/reports most of the important status conditions as spec'd by our datacenter manager. It's geared for a three-module N+1 setup on 208v power, and warns about load when you are in danger of going out of redundancy (as opposed to reaching the one-module tolerances), but the thresholds are fully adjustable."

  • Liebert 600 UPS Probe [.zip]
    Michael writes: "The Liebert probe is just for the SCC and static switch - so far we haven't been able to worm out details on the modules from our friendly Emerson Power dealers (there's a MIB for the modules, but there's voodoo involved in getting to it). It's utility is limited since it can't tell you about module load or battery status, but it will warn you when you're on bypass (or if you can't go to bypass for various reasons.."

  • Sentry 3 CDU Probe [.zip]
    Michael writes: "The Sentry 3 "SMART CDU" Probe is the most experimental of the three - we haven't worked out what any of the thresholds should be yet (they're set to "I don't want to see any alarms" values or reasonable approximations right now), but the status windows provide some useful information. This probe is based on two infeeds, each with two branches (AA, AB, BA, BB) and does give false alarms for CDUs with one infeed(AA, AB) since it can't communicate with the B tower."

Promise VTRAK Disk Array Probe [.zip]
Bryn Hughes writes: "I put together a probe for a Promise VTRAK m500p Disk Array - this is an external storage box with its own RAID processor and up to 15 drives. The probe monitors both power supplies, all 6 fans, all 6 temp probes and a few other statistics including failed/offline arrays and physical disks. It will likely work for most of the Promise disk array line although the number of sensors/fans may have to be changed."

Sample Custom SNMP Probes Example and Prototype:
We've split our sample custom SNMP probes into an Example Probe that has a lot of tutorial text, and a Prototoype Probe that's pared down, and can serve as a template for creating your own custom SNMP probes.

Tipping Point Intrusion Detection System (IPS) [.zip]
Pedro Quezada from Viacom sends along a probe he created for monitoring CPU, memory, critical log messages, and the number of passed/blocked packets for a TippingPoint IPS.

WeatherGoose Environmental Probe [.zip]
Mel Beckman sends along a probe for the very clever Weather Goose environmental monitoring device. The WxGoos-1 has built-in sensors for temperature, humidity, airflow, sound, light, and three I/O terminals and has a web, SNMP, XML, PDA, and WAP interfaces. This probe is for the WxGoos-1 internal sensors only. This probe graphs all the sensors and has low- and high-alarm and warning for temp. The WeatherGoose is made by I.T. Watchdogs, Inc., and a test unit is available at http://www.weathergoose.com/

UPS Probe Bundle [.zip]
Dartware has produced a set of probes to monitor the important stats of Uninterruptible Power Supplies from APC, BestPower, Exide, Liebert, Tripp Lite, Victron and UPS's that support RFC1628.

BestPower Uninterruptible Power Supply [.zip]
Robert Hingst from the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District in Fairbanks, Alaska helped us develop a custom probe for a BestPower Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS).

EDS Environmental Monitor [.zip]
Environmental Data Systems submitted an InterMapper probe for their HA7Net temperature sensor. It can monitor a few or a hundred temperature sensors: see the HA7Net page for more details.

Ravica BitSight [.zip]
The Ravica BitSight is an environmental monitor that allows you to monitor temperature, humidity, air flow and contact closures. Get more information at the BitSight site

Windows Fileshare Probe [.zip]
Jim Hurst from UIUC sent in a command-line probe that uses a Visual Basic script to test a Windows Fileshare. In addition, it provides a nice example of calling a Visual Basic script from a command line probe.

Cisco Service Assurance Agent (SAA) Probe [.zip]
Dennis O'Reilly sends this probe that monitors latency, jitter, or packet loss measured by a Cisco router with SAA installed, and produces alarms and warnings when they exceed user-specified thresholds.

Matthew Willis from eCornell sends custom probes for Cisco PIX, VPN3000, APC EMC, and Foundry Switches.

  • Cisco PIX Firewall [.zip]
    Monitors the CPU and Memory utilization and number of connections of a Cisco PIX Firewall.

  • Cisco VPN 3000 Concentrator [.zip]
    Monitors the average CPU utilization and number of active sessions on Cisco VPN 3000 series concentrators.

  • APC Environmental Monitor [.zip]
    Monitors the temperature and relative humidity of an APC Environmental Monitor. This probe can monitor the values of up to two APC probes.

  • Foundry CPU Utilization [.zip]
    Monitors the CPU utilization of Foundry hardware.

Oracle TNSPing Probe [.zip]
Sven Hoffer of System & Project GmbH sends this command-line probe that monitors an Oracle database. It uses the TNSPing utility that is part of the Oracle distribution to query an Oracle instance for the availability of a particular database. It also offers a good example of how to create a Command-line probe.

SNMP-Alert Temperature Probe [.zip]
Frank Knapp sends this probe that monitors the temperature measured by the SNMP-Alert SL81 sensor units, sold by AlarmsPro Inc.. These boxes also have RS-232 ports, switch closure inputs, analog inputs and relay outputs, all of which can be read by SNMP. The unit displays analog sensors in a 'real world' format converting to gallons, dBm etc. for display and graphing in InterMapper.

Doug Weathers sends custom probes for various kinds of devices

  • Compaq Host/RFC 1514 [.zip]
    Monitors CPU Load for two CPUs, as well as Disk utilization, Allocation Failures and Memory Errors.

  • Novell GroupWise Message Transfer Agent [.zip]
    Monitors rates of routed and undeliverable messages (in messages per minute) on a Novell GroupWise server.

  • Novell GroupWise Post Office Agent [.zip]
    Monitors number of users connected, as well as messages and timeouts per minute, and client requests per second.

  • Novell Netware Volume [.zip]
    Monitors free space on a specified Netware volume.

  • Printer MIB [.zip]
    Monitors the state of the input and output trays, toner/ink levels, and any alerts generated by the printer.

  • Nortel Ping Proxy [.zip]
    Tells a Nortel device to ping the specified address, and returns whether the ping succeeded.

  • IBM AIX High Availability Cluster Resource Group [.zip]
    Monitors the resource group for the number of resources and nodes.

  • IBM AIX HACMP Cluster State [.zip]
    Displays Cluster name, state, substate, number of nodes, and status of an IBM High Availability Cluster.

  • IBM AIX HACMP Resources [.zip]
    Displays the resource name and type of an IBM AIX HACMP high-availability cluster.

Cisco CPU/Memory/Temperature [.zip]
This enhancement to InterMapper's built-in SNMP-Cisco probe monitors the router's temperature, and allows you to set the device into alarm if the temperature exceeds your settings.

BGP Peering Session [.zip]
Dennis O'Reilly sends this probe that monitors the status of a particular BGP peering session on a Juniper or Cisco router, and generates alarms when the BGP session goes down. To monitor multiple BGP peering sessions create multiple copies of these probes.

Cisco CSU [.zip]
Fred Engelmann of Rainmaker Network Services submitted a probe that displays Errored Seconds, Severely Errored Seconds and Unavailable Seconds from the Transmission MIB of a Cisco CSU. It shows stats for both the current 15 minute interval and the last 24 hours on the first T1 CSU. Alarm thresholds can be set for current interval Errored Seconds and Severely Errored Seconds.

Ascend CSU [.zip]
Fred Engelmann also sent a similar probe for showing errors on an Ascend CSU.

Adtran CSU [.zip]
Fred Engelmann also sent a probe for monitoring an Adtran CSU.

MeetingMaker 7.1 [.zip]
Dan Stanish of UMich sends along this probe that tests a MeetingMaker server. It connects to the server and receives the list of calendars that are open. If the desired calendar isn't available, the device is marked as down.

Tut Systems XL-4000 Campus Modem [.zip]
Jesse Anderson from Ecotarium submitted a probe that monitors the status of a Tut Systems campus modem.

Epson 900N Printer [.zip]
Jesse Anderson also sent a probe that monitors the ink levels in an Epson 900N printer. May work for other network-attached inkjets with two cartridges.

SNAPServer - Single Disk [.zip]
Jesse Anderson also sends along a probe that monitors the disk space (and overall server health) of a single disk (eg. 1000 series) Quantum SNAP Server.

SNAPServer - Mirrored Disk [.zip]
Lastly, Jesse Anderson sent a probe that monitors the disk space (and overall server health) of a dual disk (eg. 2000 series) Quantum SNAP Server configured to run as a single mirrored volume.

Device Watcher from GeBE info page Oliver Breidenbach has written a custom probe that displays the free disk space on a remote MacOS X computer. It queries a perl script (included) running on the remote computer to get the information.

Breezecom Wireless Devices [.zip]
Eric Albert submitted this custom probe for the Breezecom line of equipment from Alvarion.

Nortel Passport and Accelar Switches [.zip]
Dennis O'Reilly writes: "This probe monitors the CPU, Switch Fabric, and Buffer utilization of a Passport 8600 router."

Communigate PRO [.zip]
Jakob Peterhänsel writes: "I'm happy to announce my first custom probe. This probe looks at a CommuniGate Pro server, and displays the SMTP details." CommuniGate Pro is a high-performance e-mail server from Stalker Software.

Basic Monitoring for MGE Pulsar EXL5 UPS [.zip]
Bill McHargue writes: Custom probe for basic monitoring of an MGE "Pulsar EXL5" UPS with a UM-Link Ethernet interface via SNMP. The probe can be used as a starting point for the design of similar probes for other models from MGE, but this implementation assumes a single phase/single receptacle unit (i.e. it only looks at the first entry in tables that index on phases or receptacles) and has only been tested on an EXL5 UPS.

Environmental Monitoring Probe for MGE UM-Sensor [.zip]
Bill McHargue also sent in this probe: Custom probe for basic monitoring of an MGE "UM-Sensor" environmental sensor with a UM-Link Ethernet interface via SNMP. The probe can be used as a starting point for the design of similar probes, but this implementation assumes a single UM-Sensor (up to 4 could be daisy-chained) on the assigned comm port of the UM-Link interface (i.e. it only looks at the first entry in table that indexes sensor units).

Environmental Monitoring Probe [.zip]
Mike Richardson sends in this probe to monitor the conditions (temperature and relative humidity) from an APC environmental monitoring card.

High Traffic Probe [.zip]
Fabiola Bejarano suggested this probe that will give a notification when traffic on a certain port/interface exceeds thresholds. Revised to give alarms if that interface goes down.

SNMP-Link Temperature Probe [.zip]
This probe monitors the temperature measured by the SNMP-Link SL60 & SL61 sensor units, manufactured by Omnitronix of Seattle, WA. These boxes also have RS-232 ports, switch closure inputs and relay outputs, all of which can be read by SNMP.