Netoscope

If your job involves keeping an eye on a server and receiving angry calls if it fails while you weren't looking, Netoscope can make your life easier. The purpose of this lightweight application is quite simple. It monitors one or more given services, which can be web, FTP or mail and it sends out notifications if something fails. As a result, you don't have to be tied down in front of a computer all day, just in case a service fails.

The application is free to try, but you won't encounter any restricted functions. It comes in a small package and it can be installed quickly, on any popular Windows version. Furthermore, you don't have to meet any special requirements and you don't have to sacrifice too many resources.

Netoscope's functionality is straightforward. You only need to specify a host and choose how you wish to be notified, after which you can let the software take care of the rest. Its clean and efficient user interface is divided in two halfs, on which you can add monitoring jobs and view an events log. A few options are available on a toolbar, which can be used to start or stop monitoring jobs, add new ones, edit or remove existing ones and for other simple actions.

Creating a new monitoring job is quite easy. First, you need to specify a host's address, choose a detection method and a checking frequency. The software can either ping the host or connect to a specific port and it can check the server's availability every few minutes. Furthermore, you can set it to send out alerts after a specific number of failures.

Alerts can be configured globally or for individual monitors. If a monitored service fails, the software can play a sound file of your choice, open a file or URL and send out an alert via email.

You don't need to stand in front of your computer all day and watch out for service failures while Netoscope is on the job. Even if you are away, you will always know if something goes wrong.