WINDOWS 2000 SERVER

RECEIVE AN E-MAIL NOTIFICATION WHEN A SERVICE GOES DOWN

Sooner or later, whether you're troubleshooting a server or just managing one, knowing when a particular service goes down can be a real lifesaver. Early notification can help you recognize that a problem has occurred so you can get to work on the problem as soon as possible to minimize disruption to users and/or customers.

A service's properties provide a handful of recovery options. To view these properties, open the Services console, double-click a service, and select the Recovery tab.

The Recovery tab sports three drop-down lists that let you specify which action Windows should take, if any, when the service fails the first, second, and subsequent times.

For example, you can configure Windows to send you an e-mail notification if the service goes down. To do so, create the following script using Notepad:

set objArgs = Wscript.Arguments
Set objEmail = CreateObject("CDO.Message")
objEmail.From = adminaddress@yourdomain.tld
objEmail.To = youraddress@yourdomain.tld
objEmail.Subject = objArgs(0) & " service is down"
objEmail.Textbody = "The service " & objArgs(0) & " has failed."
objEmail.Send
set objArgs = nothing
set objEmail = nothing

Save the script as Mail.vbs, and open the properties for the service from the Services console. In one of the three drop-down lists, choose the Run A File option. Click Browse to navigate to the Mail.vbs script you just created. In the Command Line Parameters field, enter the service name (without spaces) that you want passed to the script, and click OK.