HTTP Content

The HTTP Content monitor requests a URL and checks the HTTP response against the expected content. If the response does not return the expected content, the monitor fails. You can use this monitor to ensure web page/web server availability, to check if a page renders properly on specific browsers, or even to check for the presence/absence of specific content. If the monitor does not find the specified content, the monitor is considered Down.

Provide a unique name and description for the monitor, then configure the following:

URL. Location to check for HTTP content. The URL must begin with a proper URI, such as http:// or https://. The URL can include the full path to the document including the document's file name and any query string parameters. For example, http://www.example.com/reports.htm?ReportID=100.
Authentication username. Username the web site uses for authentication if applicable.
Authentication password. Password that coincides with the username the web site uses for authentication if applicable.

Note: This monitor only supports basic authentication.

Proxy server. If the specified content is behind a proxy server, enter the IP address of the proxy server.
Proxy port. Port on which the proxy server listens.
Timeout. Enter the length of time WhatsUp Gold attempts to connect to the selected device. When the specified time is exceeded without connecting, a timeout occurs and WhatsUp Gold stops trying to connect to the server. This is considered a failed connection.
Web page content to find. Content to search for on the specified website as either plain text or a regular expression. Enable Use regular expression when using a regular expression. Please note, this monitor uses standard regular expression processing as supported by the .NET framework.
Request URL contents. Click to populate the dialog box with the Web page contents of the URL you entered above.
Use in rescan. Enable this option to have the monitor appear in Device Properties. If enabled, clicking Refresh Connectivity within the Device Properties interface adds the monitor to the selected device if the applicable protocol or service is active on that device.

Click Advanced to configure the user agent and custom headers if desired:

User agent. Select a browser from the list. The user agent string identifies which web browser is making an HTTP request. Use this feature to imitate your website being visited by various browsers. The user agent from the latest version of the browser is populated for the browser you select.
Custom headers. Specify any headers for which you want to check. Enter a header as Field:Value.

Important: Errors can result when using invalid custom headers or when modifying headers which do not allow modification, such as the HTTP Host header. Click Request URL contents in the monitor configuration interface to test custom headers. If a problem with the header exists, WhatsUp Gold displays an error message. For example, the message "An error occurred with the requested website. Error: The 'Host' header cannot be modified directly. Parameter name: name." indicates the user entered Host:myhost.com as a custom header when the Host header cannot be modified.

Example Content URLs

To check content for the default page of a newly installed IIS server:

http://my-device/iisstart.htm

—where my-device is the hostname or IP address where a fresh instance of IIS is running.

To see how the HTTP Content monitor works, you can test it against one of the example documentation pages hosted by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA):

http://www.example.com