Email Round-Trip Monitoring Policies

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Email Round-Trip Monitoring Policies monitor round-trip email delivery. Each policy generates performance data for the time between SL1 sending an email to a device and SL1 receiving a reply email from the device.

To configure an Email Round-Trip Monitoring Policy, you must create the policy in SL1 and then configure the external device to reply to the emails from SL1.

Use the following menu options to navigate the SL1 user interface:

  • To view a pop-out list of menu options, click the menu icon ().
  • To view a page containing all of the menu options, click the Advanced menu icon ().

Viewing the List of Email Round-Trip Monitoring Policies

The Email Round-Trip Monitoring page (Registry > Monitors > Email Round-Trip) displays the following about each email policy:

  • Policy Name. Name of the policy.
  • Send Address. Address to which the policy sends test messages.
  • Policy ID. Unique, numeric ID assigned to the policy automatically by SL1.
  • Device Name. Name of the device associated with the policy.
  • IP Address. IP address of the device associated with the policy. This is the IP address SL1 uses to communicate with the device.
  • Device Category. Device category of the device associated with the policy.
  • Organization. Organization for the device associated with the policy.

Filtering the List of Email Round-Trip Monitoring Policies

The Email Round-Trip Monitoring page (Registry > Monitors > Email Round-Trip) includes seven filters. You can filter the list of policies by one or multiple of the following parameters: policy name, send address, policy ID, device name, IP address, device category, and organization. You can specify one or more parameters to filter the display of policies. Only policies that meet all the filter criteria will be displayed in the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page.

You can filter by one or more of the following parameters. The list of policies is dynamically updated as you select each filter.

  • For each filter, you must enter text to match against. SL1 will search for policies that match the text, including partial matches. Text matches are not case-sensitive. You can use the following special characters in each filter:
  • , (comma). Specifies an "or" operation. For example:

dell, micro

would match all values that contain the string "dell" OR the string "micro".

 

  • ! (exclamation point). Specifies a "not" operation. For example:

!dell

would match all values that do not contain the string "dell".

  • Policy Name. You can enter text to match, including special characters, and the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page will display only policies that have a matching name.
  • Send Address. You can enter text to match, including special characters, and the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page will display only policies that have a matching send address.
  • Policy ID. You can enter text to match, including special characters, and the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page will display only policies that have a matching policy ID.
  • Device Name. You can enter text to match, including special characters, and the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page will display only policies aligned with a device with a matching device name.
  • IP Address. You can enter text to match, including special characters, and the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page will display only policies aligned with a device with a matching IP address.
  • Device Class. You can enter text to match, including special characters, and the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page will display only policies aligned with a device with a matching device class.
  • Organization. You can enter text to match, including special characters, and the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page will display only policies that have a matching organization.

Creating an Email Round-Trip Monitoring Policy

Perform the following steps to configure an Email Round-Trip Monitoring policy:

  1. Go to the Email Round-Trip Monitoring page (Registry > Monitors > Email Round-Trip).
  2. Click the Create button. The Create Email Round-Trip Policy modal window is displayed.
  3. To create an Email Round-Trip policy, supply a value in the following fields:
  • Select Device. From the drop-down list, select the device to monitor. By default, the current device is selected in this field.

NOTE: Before you can define an Email Round-Trip policy, you must decide which managed device you want to associate with the policy. You might want to associate the policy with the device to which SL1 will send test messages, but you aren't required to do so. Alternately, you might want to create a virtual device to associate with an Email Round-Trip policy (for details on defining a virtual device, see the Managing Devices section). Although SL1 will use only the Send To Address to execute the policy, the reports that result from the Email Round-Trip policy will be aligned with the device you specify in the Select Device field.

  • Policy Name. Enter a name for the policy.
  • Validation Type. Can select only Email Round Trip.
  • Send To Address. Email address for external email server. Must be a valid email address. This mailbox must be configured to auto-respond to messages from the Email Round-Trip policy.
  • Address Masquerade. Email address to use as From address. Must be a valid email address. You should choose an address that allows the external email client to easily identify the incoming email as one from the Email Round-Trip policy.
  • Timeout. Number of seconds SL1 should wait for a response email message. If SL1 does not receive a response message after the specified number of seconds, SL1 generates an event.
  • State. Specifies whether SL1 should start collecting data specified in this policy from the device. Choices are:
  • Enabled. SL1 will collect the data specified in this policy, from the device, at the frequency specified in the Process Manager page (System > Settings > Processes) for the Data Collection: E-Mail round-Trip process.
  • Disabled. SL1 will not collect the data specified in this policy, from the device, until the State field is set to Enabled.
  • Message Body Body of the email message to be sent. In some cases, the auto-responder on the external email server may search this message body. Therefore, you should choose a message body that allows the external email client to easily identify the incoming email as one from the Email Round-Trip policy.
  1. Click Save.

SL1 will begin sending email to the specified address when the policy is created. You may wish to configure the monitored device before saving the policy.

Configuring the Monitored Device

For an Email Round-Trip Monitoring policy to work correctly, the monitored device must forward the received email back to the SL1 system. You must configure the monitored device to automatically forward the email when policy emails are received. Most email systems allow you to define rules that will automatically forward a received email when the received email meets certain criteria; refer to the documentation for the specific email system on your device for instructions on how to set up a rule for the Email Round-Trip policy. Follow these guidelines when defining your rule:

  • Email received from SL1 for Email Round-Trip policies can be identified by the "from" address you defined in the Address Masquerade field and the body text you entered in the Message Body text area.
  • The email generated by the monitored device must be sent from the same address the policy email was delivered to.
  • The email generated by the monitored device must be sent to the following address:
  • notify@domain-name-of-SL1

    Where "domain-name-of-SL1" is one of the fully qualified domain names of the Database Server or All-In-One Appliance, i.e., one of the domain names you entered in the Authorized Email Domains field in the Email Settings page.

  • The subject of the email sent by SL1 must be included in the email generated by the monitored device.
  • The body of the email sent by SL1 must be included in the email generated by the monitored device.