HTTP Monitor - Documentation

What is HTTP Monitor?

It tracks a website or URL regularly to make sure that it is up and running. This is done by sending HTTP requests to your web server and expecting an HTTP response code such as 200. A different response such as 500 (Internal Server Error) causes the monitor to fail and notifications to be sent via Email, SMS, Slack, etc.

Why use HTTP monitoring?

A monitoring solution from outside your network is the best option to make sure your Website and APIs are functional. Also, our HTTP monitors have global checkpoints to make sure your website is accessible from different locations.

Adding a Monitor

• Goto the Monitors Area by selecting it from the left sidebar
• Click on the Add Monitor button to get to the Add Monitor screen
• Select HTTP as the Monitor Type
• Specify the monitor parameters such as URL
• Specify the Interval
• Give the monitor a Name
• Click on Add

Parameters

Given below is the list of parameters:-

• Name: The unique name for the monitor to identify it
• URL: The URL to monitor. Must begin with http:// or https://
• Interval: Controls how frequently to monitor the URL. You can select a range from 1 minute to 24 hours. The free plan is restricted to a 3 minute minimum interval.

Response Time

Response time is the time from when the request started and the first byte was received from the server. The technical term for response time is Time to First Byte (TTFB).

SSL Certificate Monitoring Tool

You can enable SSL monitoring for URLs starting with https://. Once enabled, Pinger Man will validate the SSL certificates on the target server. Any SSL issues such as host name mismatch or certificate chain errors will cause the monitor to go down. All alerts you have associated with the monitor will be sent out.

Pinger Man will also send out email notifications 1 day, 7 days and 15 days before the SSL certificate expires.

Email alerts must be configured on the monitor for expiry alerts to work.

Self Hosted Website Monitoring

Pinger Man is excellent for monitoring your self hosted website. You have full control of your website and web server. You want to set everything up the right way, do SEO right, and make sure your website is performing optimally. However, downtime monitoring is not something you should do on your own. Your website might seem up from your own checking solutions. But, how do you know it can be accessed from different networks across the world?

Pinger Man's global monitoring system will ensure that your website is up and running. The website's performance will also be monitored

Custom HTTP Headers

You can send custom HTTP headers along with the request. All headers must specify a Key and a Value. You can use this feature to specify things like HTTP Authorization headers, Client IDs or anything else your server requires.

Custom HTTP Codes

You can customize the HTTP status codes by choosing the ones that should be considered for a monitor to be up. By default 20x and 30x HTTP status codes are considered to be up.

HTTP Authentication

Password protected websites can be monitored by specifying a username and password. Pinger Man will perform the HTTP request using basic authentication.

For Bearer tokens, use a custom HTTP header specifying your API token.