<%NUMBERING1%>.<%NUMBERING2%>.<%NUMBERING3%> PRTG Manual: WMI Service Sensor

services

Select the services that you want to monitor. PRTG creates one sensor for each service that you select.

Enable check boxes in front of the respective lines to select the items. Use the check box in the table header to select all items or to cancel the selection. In large tables, use the search function in the upper-right corner.

The name and description appear in the language of the device's Windows installation.

After creation, the sensor shows the Down status if the service does not run.

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:

• wmiservicesensor
• servicesensor

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 ().

If Service is Not Running

Select whether you want PRTG to start or restart the service if it is stopped or paused:

• Start/Restart service: PRTG tries to start the service if it is not running when the device is scanned. In combination with a change trigger, you can use this mechanism to trigger a notification whenever PRTG (re)starts the service.
• Do not start/restart service: PRTG does not automatically start any service on the device.

If you select the Start/Restart service option and the sensor detects that the service does not run, PRTG tries to restart the service during this scan and postpones the next sensor scan for one interval. With the following scan, the sensor checks if the service runs now. If starting the service was not successful or if the service fails again, the sensor shows the Down status and does not try to start the service again. If the service runs after a (re)start attempt, the sensor continues monitoring as usual.

If Service is Restarted

This setting is only visible if you select Start/Restart service above. Define what to do if PRTG restarts the service:

• Ignore changes: No action is taken on change.
• Trigger 'change' notification: The sensor sends an internal message indicating that its value has changed. In combination with a change trigger, you can use this mechanism to trigger a notification whenever the sensor value changes.

Extended Monitoring

Select whether you want to monitor CPU usage and other performance counters:

• Only check if the service is running: PRTG only monitors the channel Sensor Execution Time.
• Monitor other performance counters: PRTG also monitors other performance counters.

Extended monitoring might cause a class not found error on some Windows systems.

Service

Shows the Windows service that this sensor monitors.

PRTG shows this value for reference purposes only. If you need to change this value, add the sensor anew.

Description

Shows the description of the Windows service that this sensor monitors.

PRTG shows this value for reference purposes only. If you need to change this value, add the sensor anew.

Result Handling

Define what PRTG does with the sensor result:

• Discard result: Do not store the sensor result.

• Store result: Store the last result of the requested data in the \Logs\sensors subfolder of the PRTG data directory on the probe system. The file names are Result of Sensor [ID].txt, Result of Sensor [ID]-A.txt, and Result of Sensor [ID].Data.txt. This setting is for debugging purposes, especially in combination with content checks. PRTG overwrites these files with each scanning interval.

In a cluster, PRTG stores the result in the PRTG data directory of the master node.

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.

CPU Usage

The CPU usage in percent

Enable Monitor other performance counters in the sensor settings to show this parameter.

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.

Handles

The number of handles

Enable Monitor other performance counters in the sensor settings to show this parameter.

Pagefile Usage

The pagefile usage in bytes

Enable Monitor other performance counters in the sensor settings to show this parameter.

Sensor Execution Time

The execution time of the monitoring request

This channel is the primary channel by default.

Threads

The number of threads

Enable Monitor other performance counters in the sensor settings to show this parameter.

Working Set

The working set in bytes

Enable Monitor other performance counters in the sensor settings to show this parameter.