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Overtime Solo

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What is Overtime Solo?

OverTime collects SNMP statistics from network devices and prepares HTML pages to graph the results. See all your network statistics OverTime.

How does OverTime Solo work?

  1. For I/O devices like routers, switches and hubs, OverTime uses SNMP to query the selected devices to see what Input/Output interfaces they have and sets up a Round Robin Database (RRD from Tobias Oetiker, the creator of MRTG and RRDTool). The RRD does not grow in size once setup. OverTime Solo performs its own SNMP data collections. OverTime updates an index HTML page with the new devices. When you want to see the information collected, you simply drill down from the index page and OverTime graphs the collected data. An HTML page showing the most recent and detailed graphs for each interface on the device is displayed, along with IO Errors for each interface and CPU utilisation on supported devices. All of the graphs on this device page are linked to more detailed views with four graphs being generated that show the information over progressively longer periods.

    2. Example of OverTime output
  2. OverTime Solo can collect any numeric SNMP data and follows the same process as above except that you specify which SNMP data to collect. This flexibility allows OverTime to record and graph such diverse information as Temperature & Humidity from an environmental monitor, Mail Queues from an e-mail system and disk space usage from servers. Labels for titles, legends and y-axis are automatically generated, but are easily modifiable by the user.
  3. OverTime Solo now automatically detects the SNMP version of your devices. OverTime Solo supports both SNMP V2 and V1 devices.
  4. OverTime Solo can collect any numeric value embedded in an SNMP string. This is called MIB coerce-ing and it allows OverTime to record and graph values from within SNMP strings like "60°C/141°F" (either value, 60 or 141, can be extracted from the string).
  5. OverTime is used to display PingTime collected response time information.
  6. You can have your own data collections added into, kept and displayed by OverTime. Any information, not just SNMP data, can then be kept and displayed. Maybe you need to know how well your web server is running or maybe you need to count cars passing your front door. With External Collections you can do these and more.
  7. Customise OverTime to your specifications. Template collections specify what you want collected by OverTime for each kind of device. Define what you want collected and how it should be labelled using the information from the device. New devices are added or updated quickly and show relevant information for your site. Customising OverTime for specific devices is easy with the device templates kept in an XML file. An example is for the Motorola Canopy Wireless broadband systems, Solo for Canopy.
  8. Template output alloys you to completely customize your html ouput pages. Create completly custom output pages and have OverTime fill in the details. Add company logos, backgrounds, colors. Create simple lists and tables. Add or exclude optional html based on the data. Customise OverTime to your specifications.
  9. OverTime Security controls access to either the complete list of OverTime device graphs or groups of device graphs can be controlled using OverTime security. Devices can be arbitarily grouped. Users require a password to view the graphs.

Monitoring of device/s by OverTime can be stopped as easily as they were started.

OverTime makes the most efficient usage of the host system's resources by performing the least amount of work. SNMP collections are performed in bulk across the network, saving bandwidth. OverTime does not waste system time generating never-to-be-seen graphs. Graphs and HTML pages are only produced on user request. Indeed, if two users are viewing the same page, only one of them will produce new graphs and the other views the graphs already generated.

OverTime Solo collects your SNMP data via its own multi-threaded NT service that schedules itself.
  1. The user does not have to worry about loggin in and/or starting the collector because it is a system service. When the system is up, OverTime Solo is collecting.
  2. Most of the elapsed time during a collection is spent waiting on responses. A mutli-threaded collector can wait on as many devices as there are threads. Collections are performed in the shortest possible time without a major increase in CPU usage. More collections can then be performed for any given timeframe.
  3. When the user modifies a collection, the collector recognises this and automatically adjusts its scheduling to perform collections as required. No more worrying about modifying "at" schedules or other scheduling mechanisms.

Platforms

OverTime Solo runs on Windows 200x and Windows XP.