<%NUMBERING1%>.<%NUMBERING2%>.<%NUMBERING3%> PRTG Manual: Account Settings—Notifications

Notification Name

Enter a meaningful name for the notification, for example, SMS to service team or similar.

Tags

Enter one or more tags. Confirm each tag with space, comma, or enter key. You can use tags to group sensors and use tag-filtered views later on. Tags are not case sensitive. Tags are automatically inherited.

Status

Select the status of the notification. Choose between:

• Started: This notification is active. PRTG executes this notification when it is triggered.
• Paused: Pause this notification. If a notification is paused, PRTG does not execute this notification when it is triggered.

Schedule

Define when this notification is active. Select None to set it to be always active, or choose a schedule from the list. Usually schedules define when this notification is active. Schedules defined as period list set this notification to inactive at the corresponding time spans. The available options depend on your setup. To add or change existing schedules, please see Account Settings—Schedules.

Postpone

Define if PRTG should send you notifications that are triggered during Paused status later on when the notification function is in Started status again.

• No: Discard all notifications that are triggered while the notification is paused.
• Yes: Collect all notifications that are triggered while the notification is paused. Send out all these notifications once the Paused status ends.

Method

Define if and how PRTG summarizes notifications if several notification triggers are received in a certain time span. Choose between:

• Always notify ASAP: Always send out one notification for each received notification trigger as soon as possible.
• Send first DOWN message ASAP, summarize others: When receiving several Down triggers, send the first notification immediately, but summarize other notifications into one message.
• Send first DOWN and UP message ASAP, summarize others: When receiving several Down or Up triggers, send each first notification immediately, but summarize other notifications into one message.
• Send all DOWN messages ASAP, summarize others: When receiving several Down triggers, send out one notification for each trigger received, but summarize notifications for all other triggers into one message.
• Send all DOWN and UP messages ASAP, summarize others: When receiving several Down or Up triggers, send out one notification for each trigger received, but summarize notifications for all other triggers into one message.
• Always summarize notifications: When receiving several notification triggers, summarize all notifications into one message, regardless of the kind of trigger received.
   

Note: Regardless of the option you choose here, PRTG executes notifications of the types Execute HTTP Action and Execute Program always ASAP. They can never be summarized.

Note: The maximum length of entries in summarized email notifications is 1,000 characters per entry.

Subject for Summarized Messages

Define a subject that PRTG uses when sending summarized notifications. You can use the placeholder %SUMMARYCOUNT for the number of messages which are summarized.

Note: The subject you define is only used for Send Email and Amazon Simple Notification Service Message notifications.

Gather Notifications For (Minutes)

Define a time span in minutes to define how long PRTG collects notifications for summarization. Please enter an integer value.

Note: If you define a high value, for example, 60 minutes, PRTG sends out summarized notifications with a delay of up to one hour.

User Group Access

Define which user group(s) will have access to the object that you edit. A table with user groups and right is shown; it contains all user groups from your setup. For each user group you can choose from the following access rights:

• Inherited: Use the settings of the parent object.
• None: Users in this group cannot see or edit the object. The object does not show up in lists.
• Read: Users in this group can see the object and review its settings.
• Write: Users in this group can see the object, as well as review and edit its settings. However, they cannot edit access rights settings.
• Full: Users in this group can see the object, as well as review and edit its settings and edit access rights settings.

You can create new user groups in the System Administration—User Groups settings.

Note: This notification method uses notification contacts to deliver the messages. Please set up and check them for the desired user accounts in advance under Account Settings—Notification Contacts.

Note: The three options for recipients below (user, user group, email address) work simultaneously. Because of this, you can define more than one user as recipient of this notification. PRTG sends the notification email to the active email contacts of the user you select, to the active email contacts of all members of the user group you select, and to all email addresses you enter into the "Send to Email Address" field.

Note: You can include custom email headers and footers into PRTG's HTML emails. For details, please see section More.

Send to User

Select a user of your PRTG installation to send the notification email to. PRTG sends this notification to each email contact of this user account. You can add and edit email contacts of a user in Account Settings—Notification Contacts. Choose None to not use this feature.

Send to User Group

Select a user group to send an email with the notification to all members of this group. PRTG sends this notification to each email contact of every member of this group. You can edit user groups under System Administration—User Groups and email contacts under Account Settings—Notification Contacts. Choose None to not use this feature.

Note: If you select a user group and a specific member of this group as recipients at the same time, this user receives the email only one time. This also counts if you enter an individual email address below that is already defined as an email contact of the selected user.

Note: If you define individual email addresses (see below), a specific user (see above), and a user group, PRTG sends the message to the individual email addresses, to the individual user, as well as to the members of the selected user group. In all cases, PRTG sends one message with all recipients in the "To" field of the email.

Send to Email Address

Enter one or more recipient email addresses to which PRTG sends the notification email. If you enter more than one address, separate them by comma. Leave this field empty to send this notification only to the email contacts of the user or members of the user group you choose above.

We recommend that you use the options "Send to User" and/or "Send to User Group" instead because you can manage the notification contacts of users more easily this way.

Subject

Enter the subject of the email notification.

Several placeholders (variables) are used here by default: [%sitename] %device %name %status %down (%message)

Format

Define the kind of email that PRTG sends. Choose between:

• Text: The message part of the email is plain text.
• HTML: The message part of the email is HTML encoded.

Priority

Define the priority that PRTG sets for the email. Most email clients can show this priority flag. Choose between:

• highest
• high
• normal
• low
• lowest

Note: Push notifications work only with the apps PRTG for Android, PRTG for iOS, and PRTG for Windows Phone. You have to activate push notifications in the settings of your app first. Please see section More for details about the setup and further information.

Note: This notification method uses notification contacts to deliver the messages. Please set up and check them for the desired user accounts in advance under Account Settings—Notification Contacts.

Note: The PRTG server needs to communicate on port 443 to the PRTG Cloud to send push notifications, which is https://api.prtgcloud.com:443 (and the same as for the Cloud HTTP Sensor, the Cloud Ping Sensor and support tickets).

Note: The two options for recipients below (user, user group) work simultaneously. Because of this, you can define more than one user as recipient of this notification. PRTG sends the notification to the active push contacts of the user you select and to the active push contacts of all members of the user group you select.

Send to User

Select a user of your PRTG installation to send the push notification to. PRTG sends this notification to each push contact of this user account. You can edit push contacts of a user in Account Settings—Notification Contacts and add push contacts by activating push notifications in the Android or iOS app with this user. Choose None to not use this feature.

Send to User Group

Select a user group to send the push notification to all members of this group. PRTG sends this notification to each push contact of every member of this group. You can edit user groups under System Administration—User Groups and push contacts under Account Settings—Notification Contacts. Choose None to not use this feature.

Note: If you select a user group and a specific member of this group as recipients at the same time, this user receives the text message only one time.

Message

Define the message. A message with information about the sensor status is already predefined. Several placeholders (variables) are used here: [%sitename] %device %name %status %down (%message)

You can change the message to your liking. To reset this field to its default value, enter a single star symbol * (and nothing else).

Note: You have to set up this notification method in the System Administration—Notification Delivery settings first.

Note: This notification method uses the central proxy settings that you define for your PRTG core server. For details, please see System Administration—Core & Probes (section Proxy Configuration).

Note: This notification method uses notification contacts to deliver the messages. Please set up and check them for the desired user accounts in advance under Account Settings—Notification Contacts.

Note: The three options for recipients below (user, user group, email address) work simultaneously. Because of this, you can define more than one user as recipient of this notification. PRTG sends the notification to the active SMS contacts of the user you select, to the active SMS contacts of all members of the user group you select, and to every phone number you enter into the "Send to Number" field.

Send to User

Select a user of your PRTG installation to send the notification to. PRTG sends this notification to each SMS contact of this user account. You can add and edit SMS contacts of a user in Account Settings—Notification Contacts. Choose None to not use this feature.

Send to User Group

Select a user group to send a text message with the notification to all members of this group. PRTG sends this notification to each SMS contact of every member of this group. You can edit user groups under System Administration—User Groups and SMS contacts under Account Settings—Notification Contacts. Choose None to not use this feature.

Note: If you select a user group and a specific member of this group as recipients at the same time, this user receives the text message only one time. This also counts if you enter an individual phone number below that is already defined as an SMS contact of the selected user.

Recipient Number

Define the number to which PRTG sends the text message. The format depends on the SMS provider. Usually, you use a plus sign "+", followed by country code and number. For example, enter +1555012345. If you enter more than one number, separate them by comma. Leave this field empty to send this notification only to the SMS contacts of the user or members of the user group you choose above.

We recommend that you use the options "Send to User" and/or "Send to User Group" instead because you can manage the notification contacts of users more easily this way.

Message

Define the message. A message with information about the sensor status is already predefined. Several placeholders (variables) are used here: [%sitename] %device %name %status %down (%message)

You can change the message to your liking. To reset this field to its default value, enter a single star symbol * (and nothing else).

Logfile

Define the log file into which PRTG writes the message. Choose between:

• Application: Use the Windows application log file in the event log.
• PRTG Network Monitor: Write messages to the PRTG Network Monitor log file in the Windows event log.

Event Source

This setting is only relevant when using the Application log file. Enter the source for the event. Usually, this is the name of the application.

Event Type

Select the type of the event. Choose between:

• Error
• Warning
• Information

Event Log Message

Define the message. A message with information about the sensor status is already predefined. Several placeholders (variables) are used here. You can change it to your liking. To reset this field to its default value, enter a single star symbol * (and nothing else).

Host/IP

Define the IP address or DNS name of the computer running the syslog server.

Note: You can receive and analyze syslog messages with the Syslog Receiver Sensor.

Syslog Port

Enter the port number on which syslog messages are sent. By default, this is port number 514.

Note: Only User Datagram Protocol (UDP) is supported.

Facility

Define the facility information. There are several options available from the list.

Message

Define the message. A message with information about the sensor status is already predefined. Several placeholders (variables) are used here. You can change it to your liking. To reset this field to its default value, enter a single star symbol * (and nothing else).

Depending on the status of the sensor that triggers the syslog notification, PRTG sets the Severity level of the message automatically.

OK

Severity level: Notice (5)

Warning

Severity level: Warning (4)

Error

Severity level: Error (3)

For information about the OIDs that are used in the contents of the traps which PRTG sends, please see the SNMP Trap documentation in the More section below.

Host/IP

Define the IP address or DNS name of the computer running the trap receiver.

Note: You can receive and analyze trap messages with the SNMP Trap Receiver Sensor.

SNMP Port

Enter the port number on which trap messages are sent. By default, this is port number 162.

Community String

Enter the community string of the device. By default, this is set to public. Please enter a string or leave the field empty.

Specific Trap Code

Enter a code that can help you identify the purpose of the trap. Default value is 0. Please enter an integer value.

Message ID

This ID helps you identify the origin of the trap. For example, enter 1.3.6.1.4.1.32446.1.1.1

Message

Define the message. A message with information about the sensor status is already predefined. Several placeholders (variables) are used here. You can change it to your liking. To reset this field to its default value, enter a single star symbol * (and nothing else).

Agent IP

Define the IP address of the agent. Leave this field empty to use the IP address of your PRTG web server.

Note: Regardless of the Notification Summarization method chosen above, PRTG sends notifications of the type Execute HTTP Action always as soon as possible (ASAP). They are never summarized.

Note: This notification method uses the central proxy settings that you define for your PRTG core server. For details, please see System Administration—Core & Probes (section Proxy Configuration).

URL

Enter the URL to which PRTG sends the request.

Note: HTTP notifications work with and without SSL, also with servers which do not use SSLv3.

Postdata

Enter postdata if you want to send this data to the URL. You can use placeholders here. Line breaks are supported.

Note: Regardless of the Notification Summarization method chosen above, PRTG sends notifications of the type Execute Program always as soon as possible (ASAP). They are never summarized.

Program File

Select an executable file from the list. PRTG runs it every time the notification is triggered. In this list, you see the files which are in the corresponding /Notifications/EXE sub-directory of the probe system's PRTG installation. To appear in this list, store the files as BAT, CMD, DLL, EXE, PS1, or VBS. To find the corresponding path, please see Data Storage section.

Note: In a cluster setup, copy your files to every cluster node installation manually. This makes sure the notification can be executed even when the master node fails. If your custom notification executes an external program, install it on all cluster nodes as well. Please see also Application Programming Interface (API) Definition for detailed information.

Parameter

Enter parameters with which the program file will be started. You can use placeholders here. For example, is you use a batch file that contains a %1 variable, you can provide a value for this variable here.

Domain or Computer Name

Enter a Windows authority if you want to use another security context for the program than the security context of the PRTG probe service.

Username

Enter the username for Windows access.

Password

Enter the password for Windows access.

Timeout

Enter a timeout in seconds. After this time has passed, PRTG stops the process if it has not terminated yet. Please enter an integer value.

AWS Access Key ID

Enter your access key as shown in your login area at aws.amazon.com. Please enter a string.

AWS Secret Access Key

Enter your secret access key as shown in your login area at aws.amazon.com. Please enter a string.

Location

Define the location of your Amazon service. Choose one of the shown locations.

ARN

Enter the Amazon resource name. Please enter a string.

Subject

Enter the subject of the message. Please enter a string.

Message

Define the message. A message with information about the sensor status is already predefined. Several placeholders (variables) are used here. You can change it to your liking. To reset this field to its default value, enter a single star symbol * (and nothing else).

Note: The message part is only sent if you use email based notifications delivered by Amazon SNS. For SMS delivery, only the subject is sent while the message part is ignored because of SMS size restrictions.

Note: Regardless of the Notification Summarization method chosen above, PRTG sends notifications of the type Assign Ticket always as soon as possible (ASAP). They are never summarized.

For details about the ticket system, please see section Tickets.

Assign to User or User Group

Specify whether to assign the notification ticket to a user group or to a single user. Choose between:

• To User Group: Select a user group below to which PRTG assigns this ticket.
• To User: Select the dedicated user below to whom PRTG assigns this ticket.

Assign Ticket to this User Group / User

Select the user resp. user group to which PRTG assigns the notification ticket.

Subject

Enter the subject of the ticket. Several placeholders (variables) are used here by default. You can change it to your liking.

Content

Define the message in the ticket. A message with information about the sensor status is already predefined. Several placeholders (variables) are used here. You can change it to your liking.

When Condition Clears

Specify if PRTG closes the ticket automatically when the defined trigger condition clears. Choose between:

• Close ticket automatically (recommended): PRTG closes the ticket automatically if the trigger condition is not met anymore.
• Leave ticket open: PRTG does not close the ticket after the condition has cleared.