Rover is a network status monitor; it is one of a battery of tools we use to monitor key parts of Princeton's network infrastructure, as well as some of OIT's major host-based services.
Rover monitors the IP network. See An Introduction to Rover for more information.
Rover's primary mission is to test the reachability of the network infrastructure's components.
Although Rover is still used to test the reachability of selected OIT servers in OIT data centers, that functionality is deprecated. Such monitoring is better handled by Tivoli Monitoring, a service provided by the OIT Infrastructure Management Services group. Rover should no longer be used to test higher-layer functionality of servers; that has migrated to Tivoli Monitoring. Rover is not intended to provide monitoring of non-OIT devices, nor devices outside the OIT data centers; that service is provided by Tivoli Monitoring.
You may view the Rover Display in several ways:
Before trying to view the Rover Display with sound, be sure to see these instructions.
Each problem is displayed on a single line. The first field shows the Event Start or Event Age, depending on the display format you have selected. The name of the Network Device appears next; that's often (but not always) similar to the device's DNS entry-name. That's followed by the device's Net Address, normally an IP address. Following this is the Service, the name of the test which the device has failed. Sometimes a remark about the problem may be added by an OIT staff member; these terse statements are for the benefit of other members of the OIT networking and hardware support staff.
Clicking on the Net Address will attempt to lookup that address in the Princeton University Host Database. (The ability to perform this lookup is restricted to those computers that are members of the Princeton.EDU DNS domain.)
The Rover Display also shows the current Cycle Time, the time it took to complete the last test of all monitored devices. Under normal circumstances, this is under a minute. The display you see is automatically updated every 60 seconds, assuming you are using a recent version of Netscape.
Clients on Princeton University networks may view the Rover Configuration File, a list of the devices monitored by Rover, along with the tests it performs on each device.
Although OIT staff monitor the Rover Display, the Rover Notification Service may also notify appropriate staff of Rover events under some circumstances. Notifications may be sent via paging or email.
When Rover sends such a notification, the Remark in the Rover Display looks like "*Page Sent @ MM/YY HH:MM". (It uses the word "Page" regardless of whether the notification is truly sent as a page or email.) Any Remark that begins with an asterisk inhibits Rover from sending further notification for that problem.)
Rover Notification Service is intended for use by selected parts of the OIT network infrastructure. Rover Notification Service also is still used for a small number of OIT servers in OIT data centers; that functionality is deprecated. Such monitoring is better handled by Tivoli Monitoring, a service provided by the OIT Infrastructure Management Services group.
Clients on Princeton University networks may view the Rover Notification Configuration File, a list of those devices/tests for which Rover will send a notification.
Members of selected OIT groups may also view the sendpage configuration file.
Rover maintains logs of the problems from the Rover Display; you may view the Rover Event Logs.