About N-able N-central services
services about services services overview service
For more information, watch Services Overview.
N-able N-central services monitor customer devices, generate email alerts and PSA tickets, and enable technicians to view the status of devices and troubleshoot errors.
Services are composed of metrics that monitor one aspect of a device. For example, the CPU service monitors the overall device CPU usage and the top five CPU-consuming processes. The Process service monitors not only if a specific process is running, but also the CPU, Memory and Disk I/O that the process is consuming.
For a full list of services available, see the N-able N-central Services List.
N-able N-central services use Reverse Polish Notation (RPN) for all calculation formulae.
Service types
| Service Type | Description |
|---|---|
| AMP | Reports on results generated when running Automation Manager Policies using Global Output Parameters. |
| Backup | Monitors backup applications such as Backup Exec and Asigra for the device classes:
|
| Backup Manager | Monitors integrated backup functionality based on D2D backup software. |
| EDF | Customized services use a Java agent - External Data Feed - to monitor devices and applications through scripts. |
| ESXi | Monitors aspects of ESXi servers, including power consumption, logical drives, and related properties using the CIM services/ports. |
| Local | Services monitored by agents, including CPU, Disk, Memory and Process services. |
| Log File | Agents for Windows,macOS and Linux can scan log files. Agents can scan the entire log file time or only the lines in the log file that have been added since the log file was scanned. This category includes both the Log Append and Log Batch service types. |
| Maint | Monitor internal N-able N-central processes and should not be modified. |
| ODBC | Windows probes and agents can make ODBC queries to SQL databases. This service retrieves data from an SQL database and alerts you if the data does not match expectations. |
| QST | Uses Intel Quiet System Technology to monitor computer operating temperatures. |
| Security Log (Syslog) | Unique services that wait for a device to report a problem. Commonly found on network infrastructure devices such as firewalls, switches, and routers, Syslog-based services, for example, FW-Cisco, can only be monitored by a Windows probe. Agents cannot monitor Syslog-based services. |
| SNMP | Gathers data by sending SNMP "GET" queries to the target device. As SNMP is a common protocol used on both Windows and non-Windows devices. Many services such as the APC UPS service use SNMP to get data. |
| System | Based on the License Compliance service, monitors the number of software licenses allowed for a customer based on thresholds specified for individual applications. |
| TCP | By querying the TCP port that an application is using, N-able N-central can tell you if that application is responding and available for your customers to use. The HTTP service and the FTP services both use TCP queries. The HTTP service monitors the status of a website, and the FTP service monitors whether or not an FTP server is online. This category includes both the TCP and GenericTCP service types. |
| VMware | Monitor elements of a VMware virtualization environment. |
| WMI | Gathers data by sending WMI queries to the target device. All services that use WMI are available only on devices classed as Laptop - Windows, Server - Windows, or Workstation - Windows. Monitors MS applications, such as SQL, Exchange, IIS, and ISA. This category includes the WMIWorkstation and WMIServer service types. |
| WSUS | Interacts with a WSUS server to monitor patch compliance and generate reports. |
Service types by device class
Each N-able N-central service uses one of several service types to gather information: SNMP, WMI, or TCP. Each device class has different Service Types associated to it. If you are not able to add a service to a device, its because the Service Type for that service is not linked to the Device Class.
The table below lists the device classes and their associated Service types.
| Device Class | Service Types |
|---|---|
| Laptop - Windows | WSUS, Local Log, Append Log, Batch Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, WMI Workstation, QST, Backup, Backup Manager, AMP |
| Workstations - Windows | Local Log, Append Log, Batch Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, WMI Workstation, Maint WSUS, QST, Backup, Backup Manager, AMP |
| Workstations -Mac | Local Log, Append Log, Batch Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, Maint, QST, Backup |
| Workstations - Linux | Local, Log Append, Log Batch, SNMP, TCP, Security Log, Generic TCP, Maint, ODBC, QST, Backup |
Workstations - Generic | Local Log, Append Log, Batch Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, Maint, QST, Backup |
| Servers - Windows | Local Log, Append Log, Batch Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, WMI Server, WMI Workstation, Maint ODBC, WSUS, QST, Backup, Vmware, Backup Manager, AMP |
| Servers - Linux | Local, Log Append, Log Batch, SNMP, TCP, Security Log, Generic TCP, Maint, ODBC, QST, Backup |
| Printer | Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, Maint, QST |
| Scanner/Camera | Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, Maint, QST |
| SaaS | TCP, Generic TCP |
| ESXi | ESXi Vmware, TCP, Security Log, Generic TCP, ODBC, QST |
| Generic | Local Log, Append Log, Batch Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, Maint, ODBC, QST, Backup |
Management Interface | SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP |
| Storage | SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP |
| Switch/Router | Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, Maint, QST |
| Other | Security Log, SNMP, TCP, Generic TCP, Maint, QST |
Why services change state
When N-able N-central receives data about a service, it compares that data against the thresholds defined for that service and changes the state of the service based on what threshold range the data falls into. For example, if the agent reported back a value of 3, N-able N-central transitions the service into a Warning state:
- Normal: 0-2
- Warning: 3 -5
- Failed: 6-10
There are cases where the service may not report a Normal, Warning, or Failed state:
- If the data reported does not fall into the Normal, Warning, or Failed ranges, the service will transition to a Misconfigured state.
- If the agent or probe wasn’t able to gather the requested data, the service will transition to a Misconfigured state.
- If the data doesn’t match what it expects, for example, if it’s expecting text, but receives an integer), the service will transition to a No Data state.
- If N-able N-central stops receiving data for the service, the service will transition to a Stale state.
- If the device enters a downtime period, the service will transition to a Disconnected state.
- If a user disables the service, the service will transition to a No Data state.
More about service states
- Normal changes the service to Failed when the service stops running.
- Reversed inverts the monitoring process. For example, a process that should not be running on a device can be monitored by the Process service using this method. After the process starts running, the state for the Process service changes to Failed.
- Custom enables you to set up values for the Normal, Warning, and Failed states. For example, threshold settings for scan details, such as file size, average round trip time, and time to live (TTL) can be customized.
- Off stops processing the scan detail for a state. If one scan detail is set to Off, the service is processed for a state based on the thresholds of the rest of the scan details. If all of the scan details are set to Off, the service is processed for its availability.