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PRTG Manual: HTTP Push Data Advanced Sensor

<%NUMBERING1%>.<%NUMBERING2%>.<%NUMBERING3%> PRTG Manual: HTTP Push Data Advanced Sensor

The HTTP Push Data Advanced sensor displays data from received messages that are pushed via an HTTP request to PRTG. It provides a URL that you can use to push messages to the probe system via HTTP (secured with TLS 1.2 or not secure).

HTTP Push Data Advanced Sensor

For more information about the sensor usage, see section How to Use.

For a detailed list and descriptions of the channels that this sensor can show, see section Channel List.

Sensor in Other Languages

Dutch: HTTP Push Data geavanceerd
French: Données avancé (HTTP Push)
German: HTTP Push-Daten (Erweitert)
Japanese: HTTP プッシュデータ（アドバンスト）
Portuguese: Dados de Push (avançado) (HTTP)
Russian: HTTP: Данные push-объекта (Расширенный)
Simplified Chinese: HTTP 高级推送数据
Spanish: Datos push (avanzado) (HTTP)

Remarks

If you use this sensor with multiple channels, we recommend that you simultaneously push the data for all your channels to PRTG. You can push data to only one of your channels but, in this case, all other channels record the value of 0 for this push message.
If you want to install this sensor on a remote probe and use an HTTPS connection to send push notifications, you need to make sure that you import the same Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates to the \cert subfolder of the PRTG program directory on the remote probe that you use on the PRTG core server. For more information, see the PRTG Manual: Using Your Own SSL Certificate with the PRTG Web Server
You cannot use this sensor in cluster mode. You can only set it up on a local probe or a remote probe but not on a cluster probe.
This sensor might result in false alerts if the parent probe disconnects from the PRTG core server. In this case, the sensor shows the error message: The latest push message that the sensor received is older than the specified time threshold allows. (code: PE222).
This sensor supports the IPv6 protocol.

This sensor has a low performance impact.

For more information about the sensor usage, see the PRTG Manual: How to Use.

You cannot add this sensor to the hosted probe of a PRTG Hosted Monitor instance. If you want to use this sensor, add it to a remote probe device.

Add Sensor

The Add Sensor dialog appears when you manually add a new sensor to a device. It only shows the settings that are required to create the sensor. You can change nearly all settings on the sensor's Settings tab after creation.

HTTP Push

Setting	Description
TLS Settings	Define the security of the incoming HTTP push requests: HTTP (unsecure): Send push messages to the probe system via HTTP (not secure). HTTPS (secured with TLS 1.2 only): Send push messages to the probe system via HTTPS. The sensor only supports connections secured with TLS 1.2. It uses the SSL certificate that is delivered with PRTG or your own trusted SSL certificate that you imported for the PRTG web server. If you install the sensor on a remote probe, make sure that you import the same SSL certificates to the remote probe that you use on the PRTG core server.
Port	This setting is only visible if you enable HTTP (unsecure) above. Enter the number of the port on which this sensor listens for incoming HTTP requests. The default port is 5050.
TLS Port	This setting is only visible if you enable HTTPS (secured with TLS 1.2 only) above. Enter the number of the port on which this sensor listens for incoming HTTPS requests. The default port is 5051.

Setting

Description

TLS Settings

Define the security of the incoming HTTP push requests:

HTTP (unsecure): Send push messages to the probe system via HTTP (not secure).
HTTPS (secured with TLS 1.2 only): Send push messages to the probe system via HTTPS. The sensor only supports connections secured with TLS 1.2. It uses the SSL certificate that is delivered with PRTG or your own trusted SSL certificate that you imported for the PRTG web server.
If you install the sensor on a remote probe, make sure that you import the same SSL certificates to the remote probe that you use on the PRTG core server.

Port

This setting is only visible if you enable HTTP (unsecure) above. Enter the number of the port on which this sensor listens for incoming HTTP requests. The default port is 5050.

TLS Port

This setting is only visible if you enable HTTPS (secured with TLS 1.2 only) above. Enter the number of the port on which this sensor listens for incoming HTTPS requests. The default port is 5051.

Basic Sensor Settings

Click the Settings tab of a sensor to change its settings.

Basic Sensor Settings

Setting	Description
Sensor Name	Enter a name to identify the sensor.
Parent Tags	Shows tags that the sensor inherits from its parent device, parent group, and parent probe. This setting is for your information only. You cannot change it.
Tags	Enter one or more tags. Confirm each tag with the Spacebar key, a comma, or the Enter key. You can use tags to group objects and use tag-filtered views later on. Tags are not case-sensitive. Tags are automatically inherited. It is not possible to enter tags with a leading plus (+) or minus (-) sign, nor tags with parentheses (()) or angle brackets (<>). For performance reasons, it can take some minutes until you can filter for new tags that you added. The sensor has the following default tags that are automatically predefined in the sensor's settings when you add the sensor: pushsensor pushdata httppushsensor
Priority	Select a priority for the sensor. This setting determines the position of the sensor in lists. The highest priority is at the top of a list. Choose from the lowest priority () to the highest priority ().

Usually, a sensor connects to the IP Address/DNS Name of the parent device. See the device settings for details. For some sensors, you can explicitly define the monitoring target in the sensor settings.

HTTP Push

Setting	Description
TLS Settings	Shows whether the sensor accepts push messages via HTTP or HTTPS.
Port	This setting is only visible for sensors that accept push messages via HTTP. It shows the port number on which this sensor listens for incoming HTTP requests.
TLS Port	This setting is only visible for sensors that accept push messages via HTTPS. It shows the port number on which this sensor listens for incoming HTTPS requests.
Request Method	Select the request method of the webhook: ANY: Do not use any filter for the request method. GET: Select this method if the webhook uses GET. POST: Select this method if the webhook sends POST data. POST data must be form-encoded request bodies with the same parameters as for GET requests.
Identification Token	This is the token that PRTG uses to find the matching sensor for the incoming message. When you create the sensor, this token is {__guid__}. PRTG replaces this token with an automatically generated token after sensor creation. If you want to use a different identification token, you can edit it during or after sensor creation. PRTG does not automatically replace the token if you change it already during sensor creation.
Request Handling	Define what PRTG does with the incoming messages: Discard request: Do not store the pushed messages. Store result: Store the last message received from the sensor in the \Logs\sensors subfolder of the PRTG data directory on the probe system. The file name is Request for Sensor [ID].txt. This setting is for debugging purposes. PRTG overwrites this file with each scanning interval.

HTTP Push Data

Setting	Description
No Incoming Data	Define which status the sensor shows if it does not receive a push message for at least two scanning intervals: Ignore and keep last status (default): Keep the status as defined by the last message that the sensor received. The parent probe must be connected to keep the last status. If the parent probe disconnects, the sensor shows the Unknown status. If the parent probe connects again, the sensor does not automatically switch from the Unknown status to the last status before the parent probe disconnected. Switch to unknown status: Show the Unknown status if the sensor does not receive a message for at least two scanning intervals. Switch to down status after x minutes: Show the Down status if the sensor does not receive a message within a specific time span. Define the time threshold below.
Time Threshold (Minutes)	This setting is only visible if you select Switch to down status after x minutes above. Enter a time threshold in minutes. If this time elapses, the sensor shows the Down status if it does not receive a push message within this time span. Enter an integer. The maximum threshold is 1440 minutes.

Setting

Description

No Incoming Data

Define which status the sensor shows if it does not receive a push message for at least two scanning intervals:

Ignore and keep last status (default): Keep the status as defined by the last message that the sensor received.
The parent probe must be connected to keep the last status. If the parent probe disconnects, the sensor shows the Unknown status. If the parent probe connects again, the sensor does not automatically switch from the Unknown status to the last status before the parent probe disconnected.
Switch to unknown status: Show the Unknown status if the sensor does not receive a message for at least two scanning intervals.
Switch to down status after x minutes: Show the Down status if the sensor does not receive a message within a specific time span. Define the time threshold below.

Time Threshold (Minutes)

This setting is only visible if you select Switch to down status after x minutes above. Enter a time threshold in minutes. If this time elapses, the sensor shows the Down status if it does not receive a push message within this time span.

Enter an integer. The maximum threshold is 1440 minutes.

Sensor Display

Setting	Description
Primary Channel	Select a channel from the list to define it as the primary channel. In the device tree, the last value of the primary channel is always displayed below the sensor's name. The available options depend on what channels are available for this sensor. You can set a different primary channel later by clicking below a channel gauge on the sensor's Overview tab.
Graph Type	Define how different channels are shown for this sensor: Show channels independently (default): Show a graph for each channel. Stack channels on top of each other: Stack channels on top of each other to create a multi-channel graph. This generates a graph that visualizes the different components of your total traffic. You cannot use this option in combination with manual Vertical Axis Scaling (available in the channel settings).
Stack Unit	This setting is only visible if you enable Stack channels on top of each other as Graph Type. Select a unit from the list. All channels with this unit are stacked on top of each other. By default, you cannot exclude single channels from stacking if they use the selected unit. However, there is an advanced procedure to do so.

Setting

Description

Primary Channel

Select a channel from the list to define it as the primary channel. In the device tree, the last value of the primary channel is always displayed below the sensor's name. The available options depend on what channels are available for this sensor.

You can set a different primary channel later by clicking below a channel gauge on the sensor's Overview tab.

Graph Type

Define how different channels are shown for this sensor:

Show channels independently (default): Show a graph for each channel.
Stack channels on top of each other: Stack channels on top of each other to create a multi-channel graph. This generates a graph that visualizes the different components of your total traffic.
You cannot use this option in combination with manual Vertical Axis Scaling (available in the channel settings).

Stack Unit

This setting is only visible if you enable Stack channels on top of each other as Graph Type. Select a unit from the list. All channels with this unit are stacked on top of each other. By default, you cannot exclude single channels from stacking if they use the selected unit. However, there is an advanced procedure to do so.

Inherited Settings

By default, all of these settings are inherited from objects that are higher in the hierarchy. We recommend that you change them centrally in the root group settings if necessary. To change a setting for this object only, click under the corresponding setting name to disable the inheritance and to display its options.

For more information, see section Inheritance of Settings.

Scanning Interval

For more information, see section Root Group Settings, section Scanning Interval.

Schedules, Dependencies, and Maintenance Window

You cannot interrupt the inheritance for schedules, dependencies, and maintenance windows. The corresponding settings from the parent objects are always active. However, you can define additional schedules, dependencies, and maintenance windows. They are active at the same time as the parent objects' settings.

Schedules, Dependencies, and Maintenance Window

For more information, see section Root Group Settings, section Schedules, Dependencies, and Maintenance Window.

Access Rights

For more information, see section Root Group Settings, section Access Rights.

How to Use

This function is known as webhook. Basically, a webhook works like a push notification. Webhooks are usually triggered by some event (for example, a new comment on a blog post) and send according information to a specified URL. The HTTP Push Data Advanced sensor then displays the data of pushed and received messages.

The data that is pushed to this sensor must be valid XML or JSON.

For details about the return value format, see section Custom Sensors.

The HTTP Push Data Advanced sensor uses the following URLs depending on the type of HTTP request.

GET requests: http://<probe_ip>:<port_number>/<token>?content=<valid XML_or_JSON>

The XML encoded value of the content parameter has to match the format as defined in section Custom Sensors.
POST requests: http://<probe_ip>:<port_number>/<token>

This HTTP request method sends the XML or JSON encoded HTTP body as POST data. The body has to match the format as defined in section Custom Sensors. For POST requests, use an HTTP content type other than application/x-www-form-urlencoded. We strongly recommend the HTTP content type application/xml or application/json.

Replace the parameters <probe_ip>, <port_number>, <token>, and <valid XML_or_JSON> (for GET requests) with the corresponding values:

You can define port number and identification token in the sensor settings.
The probe IP is the IP address of the probe system with this sensor.
The content of GET requests has to be valid XML or JSON in the PRTG API format.
The content has to be URL encoded (for example, the whitespaces in the sample URL below). Most browsers do URL-encoding automatically.

Minimum example for the GET method that returns one static channel value:

http://127.0.0.1:5050/XYZ123?content=<prtg><result><channel>MyChannel</channel><value>10</value></result><text>this%20is%20a%20message</text></prtg>

By default, values within the <value> tags in the returned XML or JSON must be integers to be processed. If float values are returned, you must explicitly define this value type as defined in section Custom Sensors with <float> tags, otherwise the sensor shows 0 values in affected channels. Example:

http://127.0.0.1:5050/XYZ123?content=<prtg><result><channel>MyChannel</channel><value>10.45</value><float>1</float></result><text>this%20is%20a%20message</text></prtg>

You can use several sensors with the same port and identification token. In this case, the data of push messages is shown in each of these sensors.

Channel List

Which channels the sensor actually shows might depend on the target device, the available components, and the sensor setup.

Channel	Description
Downtime	In the channel table on the Overview tab, this channel never shows any values. PRTG uses this channel in graphs and reports to show the amount of time in which the sensor was in the Down status in percent.
[Value]	The data received from the message encoded in valid Extensible Markup Language (XML) or JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) in several channels This channel is the primary channel by default. For details about the return value format, see section Custom Sensors.

Channel

Description

Downtime

In the channel table on the Overview tab, this channel never shows any values. PRTG uses this channel in graphs and reports to show the amount of time in which the sensor was in the Down status in percent.

[Value]

The data received from the message encoded in valid Extensible Markup Language (XML) or JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) in several channels

This channel is the primary channel by default.

For details about the return value format, see section Custom Sensors.

Knowledge Base

What security features does PRTG include?

https://kb.paessler.com/en/topic/61108

My HTTP sensors don't work. What can I do?

https://kb.paessler.com/en/topic/85284