We run a number of domains (around 50) on different servers (around half a dozen) in various locations in Englnd, Germany and the USA. How can I keep track of them all / do a quick test to chek that - at the least - they're all online to the Internet? And how can I do that test from anywhere I happen to be with a net connection ... even if I'm in a remote location at an Internet cafe or customers's machine?

There's a script on our main web site (and various backup copies on other sites) that uses Expect to "ping" around a domain on each server ... and it then reports the results to the browser. Because expect can support a number of processes in parallel, performance is fast, even if a number of the servers are down.

We're trainers. Love to tell people how we do things. So you can read a bit more about it in our resources centre, try the script out in our programs directory and even view the source code. If you want to learn how to write this sort of thing for yourself, have a look at our Tcl course.

P.S. The script actually doubles up ... run on our own network, it provides a quick and easy way to see, at a click, which training systems are on the network and whether we're connected to the Internet at the current time.
(written 2005-04-22 15:00:58)

 T212 - Tcl/Tk - Expect Processes

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