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Also, a server can still be reachable, even if software running on it has suffered a failure and isn't working.
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What More Can We Do?
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There are some techniques that would allow us to engage in more active, service-level monitoring - actually making sure that pages can be read from web servers, print jobs can be handled by network print services, files can be read from network drives, etc. Designing and configuring these tests is time consuming, however, and we haven't been able to devote the effort needed. Also, without a method of automated alerts that doesn't relying on the Learning Center or our internet connection to reach phones or BlackBerry handhelds, the investment may not make sense. We are investigating some "out-of-band" methods of notification that don't depend on the campus internet connection or the Learning Center, but that will not happen in the near future.