Robert_in_MTL, I like the way you think!
Alex,
First of all you know I'm completely sold here - a great product with great support for an unbelievable price! I know, as well, that the focus lately has rightfully been on the core product (v8 release soon!). BUT. . .
If you are intent on selling to the enterprise, a primary goal must be to ensure the reliability of your own product while ensuring the reliability of the devices/services you monitor.
Of course you can provide a 'lite' license to allow administrators to do this for themselves, but we don't need 60 test types for AHM. Additionally, this approach lacks the elegance that a more focused solution would have in order to make it a low-maintenance, better integrated, self-correcting system. To do that you would need (in my opinion):
- An outbound channel of communication directed at the watchdog, in much the way that Active RMA agents communicate to RMA Manager, would provide similar 'Not connected' or 'Operable' statuses for the Host server.
-The added benefit to port level comms between the two is that legitimate changes to the Host system - ones that might affect monitoring the host (IP Address, administrator contact info, log file type, etc.) - could be communicated to the watchdog instead of depending on the administrator to make these changes to the 'lite license' config manually.
- This would also allow the info to be 'pushed' across a firewall to the 'watchdog' if necessary. - Other tests, such as Service, ping, URL (for web services if enabled), and log file (or log query for DB logs), could be triggered to provide additional diagnostic information.
- OK, so there are a number of tests listed here 
, still - it's not 60.
I hope you will at least consider this for a (near) future enhancement of v8. It will give AHM an additional appearance of maturity that might attract more attention ($$$) to the product.
(Feedback from peers, collegues and clients I've pointed your direction)
If you are still intent on the 'lite license' approach, at least include instructions for the uninitiated (in the Help would be fine) or, better yet, a clear and discernable template for monitoring AHM.
.
Sidenote: As for myself, I'll soon be setting up a 2nd Enterprise license (Two divisions that can't 'meet in the middle'
), so for now I'll have one monitor the other. Given the choice though, I'd still prefer an independant watchdog.
Which brings up another, maybe obvious, watchdog feature - the ability to monitor multiple Host servers if necessary.
