WhatsUp Gold - Version 7.03 Release Notes

Answer/Solution: WhatsUp Gold - A Network Monitoring Utility Version 7.03 Release Notes

Description
===========
WhatsUp Gold is an award-winning software product used by thousands of customers to watch over their mission critical network infrastructures and services. You will be up and running within minutes with WhatsUp Gold's easy installation and intuitive interface. In a few simple steps, you will be able to:

- Auto-discover and map your network.

- Set up notifications to alert you the moment that WhatsUp Gold detects a problem.

- Generate out-of-the box reports to help you analyze your network uptime, and response time.

In addition, WhatsUp Gold allows users to view the status of a network map from a web browser. With WhatsUp Gold, you have a robust tool that offers the essential functionalities to ensure that you stay on-top of your network resources.

WhatsUp Gold is designed for PCs operating with:

- Windows NT 4.0 (SP6a or later).
- Windows 2000 (SP2 or later).
- Windows 98.
- Windows ME.
- Windows XP.

WhatsUp Gold can be installed wherever needed and does not require expensive, dedicated hardware. It will run in the background on your PC. WhatsUp Gold will work with any 32-bit TCP/IP stack, such as those bundled with Windows.

Upgrading
=========
If you are upgrading from a previous version of WhatsUp Gold or WhatsUp, you should note the following:

- Back up any network maps! These will have the file extensions .DB for WhatsUp and .WUP for WhatsUp Gold. NOTE: When you open a .DB file in WhatsUp Gold, the file is automatically converted to the WUP format and saved with a .WUP extension.

- Back up your SERVICES.INI and HOSTTYPES.INI files.

- Back up your Notifications subdirectory (new in version 6).

- For versions earlier than version 5, defined notifications are stored in a file named IPNOTIFY.INI in your Windows or NT directory. This file is shared by other Ipswitch products and is therefore not deleted or replaced when you upgrade.

- Back up your GALLERY.INI file (new in version 7).

- During installation, WhatsUp Gold will ask if you want to overwrite your old MIB.TXT and TRAPS.TXT files. If you choose not to overwrite, it will install the new files as MIB.NEW and TRAPS.NEW.

- Be sure that WhatsUp Gold has completely shut down before doing an upgrade installation. If you exit WhatsUp Gold during a poll, it may take up to 30 seconds for WhatsUp Gold to remove itself from memory. If you press Ctrl+Alt+Del, WhatsUp Gold will remain in the Windows task list until it is removed from memory.

- Note: The "SNMP Threshold" custom service plug-in has been replaced. 
If you have been using the custom service plug-in: "SNMP Threshold" (SNMPCHK.DLL) you are encouraged to migrate to the v7.00 version of this plug-in: "SNMP Monitoring" (SNMPMON.DLL). By doing this, you can take advantage of all updated SNMP monitoring features. "SNMP Threshold" will continue to work with v7.00. However, all future enhancements will occur in the new "SNMP Monitoring" plug-in. The new "SNMP Monitoring" plug-in is automatically installed with v7.00. Details on how to migrate can be found in the following Knowledge Base article:

WhatsUp Gold - Convert SNMP Threshold checks to version 7 SNMP Monitoring plug-in

New Features (WhatsUp Gold 7.00)
===============================
- Ability to Export and Import all map data and device data as ASCII files.

- Increased SNMP Monitoring: Constants, Ranges, and Rates.

- Unlimited scripting of TCP/UDP Monitors. Access to the way that standard services are checked (POP3, SMTP, FTP, etc).

- Continuous discovery of new devices on your network.

- More refined device typing during discovery.

- Simple ways to discover and monitor multiple interfaces on routers, switches, etc.

- Ability to customize the look of your web interface through web templates.

- Ability to use your computer to 'speak' any notification using Microsoft's Text To Speech Engine.

- Revamped Reporting interface: create report jobs, new export types, view reports via the web interface.

- Simpler management of Customized Services and Device Types.

- Simpler management of all Alerts for all devices on a map.

Known Issues
============
- Microsoft SAPI5 is bundled inside the WhatsUp Gold Text to Speech plug-in. If the installation of Microsoft SAPI5 fails then you will get an error when you attempt to use the Text to Speech Notification within WhatsUp Gold. Another cause of the same problem is when SAPI5 somehow gets uninstalled from your system after the Text to Speech plug-in is installed. We have found that SAPI5 will not install if there are soundcard problems. Not having a soundcard at all is the most obvious example.

- If you close WhatsUp Gold while a poll is in progress, it may take up to 30 seconds to be removed from memory. If a reboot takes place while a poll is in progress, a General Protection Fault (GPF) may occur.

- If you have 'Stack supports raw sockets' enabled, the traceroute tool may not work properly.

- Net tools Time Module will cause a GPF when querying a server running a date past 2036.

- Closing WhatsUp Gold while a Net tool is active may cause the application to cause a GPF.

- Changing the protocol of a device may cause incorrect statistics to be displayed on the Web page.

- You can not run Performance Graphs export jobs from the WhatsUp Gold Service, if the service is configured to log on with the default System Account. You can configure the WhatsUp Gold Service to Log on as your domain account to correct this error condition.

Fixed in Version 7.03
=====================
There have been numerous fixes in the 7.03 maintenance release including:

General
-------
- Under Windows 2000, some users experienced problems stopping WhatsUp Gold running as a service. The service manager could report that the service had been stopped but WhatsUp Gold remained active.

- Color options added to aid users with visual disabilities: all status colors in the web interface; dependency arrow colors; SNMP Trap indicator color; and SNMP View interface state colors.

- Acknowledging state changes in subnet maps will be noticed on subnet icons in parent maps on subsequent polls.

- Subnet map name field now respected on parent map loads and drilling down via the web.

Web Interface
-------------
- Telnet links restored in the Web interface for standard service definitions.

- Large entries in Info1 & 2 fields and Notes fields now accepted in the web interface.

- Added the ability to turn off web sounds from within the application. See: Configure | Web Server | General | Enable Sounds.

- Devices now listed in summary view via the web for guest users.

- Web tag IS_SERVICE_UP corrected.

- Web tag SERVICE_STATISTIC now ignored if not in context.

- Abbreviated service names used in the web interface.

- Web Templates now backed up to the WebTemplateArchive directory on upgrade installs.

- & and ? content processing in web fields improved.

- Passwords now use * characters to cover entries in source for password changes.

- Changing to NetBIOS poll type in device settings form now respected.

Notifications
-------------
- The format of %m (SNMP Trap text) rearranged to allow pagers and limited character display notifications to present important data first.

- %Z added as an option to Notifications to allow the use of abbreviated Down service names for space limited notifications such as pagers and email subject lines. For example, "FTP (File Transfer Protocol)" is abbreviated as "FTP" if %Z is used instead of %V in the Notification definition.

- %Y and %y added as an option for Notifications to list the Up services on a device (this is the opposite of %v). %y uses abbreviated service names for space limited notification methods.

- AbbreviatedName attribute added to SERVICES.INI definitions.

- Correction for handling very long subject lines in SMTP notifications.

- Japanese support for SMTP Notifications improved.

- Added the option to Alerts to provide an Up Notification on any Service Up (rather than just when all Services are Up).

- Correction to upgrading Notification names from v3/4/5 to v7.03 if the Notification names contain any of these characters *:?<>"|^[]

- Correction to v5 upgrade of default voice notification definition.

TCP/UDP Scripted Services
-------------------------
- The addition of "begins with" in scripted TCP/UDP checks for the Expect keyword. The symbol ^ specifies the expression should be required at the beginning of the service response.

- Base service checks updated to use begins with options.

- UDP Service Script processing improved for long UDP scripts.

- SimpleExpect keyword added as a simple alternate to Expect keyword syntax.

- Expect keyword now processes %000 correctly and allows for binary values greater than 127.

- %nnn parsing made stricter: i.e., %0012 will now be considered %001 followed by a character 2.

- Regular expressions allow the processing of DBCS information.

- Regular expression processing of {n,m} syntax improved.

Import/Export
-------------
- XML export updated to correctly parse the special XML characters <, > and &, thus allowing (for example) export and import of HTML tags in Device Notes and Info fields.

- INI file import corrected to preserve polling order.

Log View
--------
- Formatted log viewer tolerant of records over 1024 characters.

- SNMP trap payloads can no longer add blank lines to log files.

- SNMP trap log viewer formatted mode more tolerant of incoming traps.

Discovery
---------
- Ability to discover IP sub ranges in C class address blocks added to the Discovery Wizard.

- Active Discovery now recognizes NT Workstations and NT Servers.

- Autorun on device type discovery enabled.

- Discovery of interface instances for BinTec routers improved.

Misc
----
- Correction to upgrading of printer type from v5 files.

- The list of services to select from when defining a new service instance now displays properly under Windows XP.

- WhatsUp Gold now preserves the order of devices in HOSTTYPE.INI.

- Notifications View refreshed when alerts are added/removed from devices.

- Notifications and Status view redraw time sped up during polls.

Fixed in Version 7.02
=====================
- Corrections to the SNMP Trap Handler to address possible exploits resulting in a denial-of-service or service interruption. These fixes address issues outlined in the CERT Advisory CA-2002-03: "Multiple Vulnerabilities in Many Implementations of the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP)".

- Update to the v7.01 Performance Graph Reports to address a problem with the command line to a export report.

- The device log from the web interface now shows the most recent events first.

- Traps no longer trigger sound wave events in the web interface Top View (this fix is only pertinent to users of version 7.01).

Fixed in Version 7.01
=====================
There have been numerous fixes in the 7.01 maintenance release including:

General
-------
- The WhatsUp Gold Console Application will no longer run if WhatsUp Gold is detected as already running as a service. Stop the service before running WhatsUp Gold as a console application.

- Extended the customization of state colors and icons to aid users with visual disabilities.

- Added ability to lock a selected group of devices (helps anchor devices when Active Discovery is on).

- Long .DLL and .EXE filenames (i.e., greater than 8 characters) shortened to avoid backup and install problems on older operating systems.

Web Interface
-------------
- SNMP traps now included in device log data via the web interface.

- Added support to play the web down wave file from the Top View web page and the Device page.

- Adding a map to a user profile now inherits the default map security settings.

- Passwords now use * characters to cover entries in the console.

- Usernames can be renamed via web interface.

- IS_STRING_EMPTY tag corrected for use in IF tags.

- Parent map link added to web templates.

- Web IP access table preserved when adding an invalid subnet.

- Web interface respects the poll frequency min and max ranges.

- * indicator for unacknowledged events added to templates.

- Configuring startup maps via the web no longer disables web options.

- "Update statistics now" via web interface corrected.

- Web menus no longer append spaces if no arguments exist.

- Alerts added via the web interface now process normally.

- Notifications added via the web interface can use custom time period.

- SNMP trap field length increased in web templates to 128 characters.

- Notification types that do not have web configuration interfaces (for security reasons) can now be added to devices if they are preconfigured via the console.

- Web templates now include time to expire information in evaluation versions of WhatsUp Gold.

- Number of alerts statistic corrected in device summary information.

- Web interface now allows info lines with multiple lines.

- Unauthorized access message now customizable (401.ASP).

- Page not found error message now customizable (404.ASP).

- STANDARDPAGEHEADER.ASP added to allow users easy access to set custom headers and easier manipulation of header information.

- "Map Summary" mode only lists "Down Services" if any are down, 

Reports
-------
- Year to date option added to reports.

- New report "Daily RTT (3D Area Chart)" added.

- Added "Hourly RTT (Line Chart)" to report type list.

- F1 now opens help file in performance reports.

- Sort order now applied in Performance Graph Reports.

- Custom installation can now omit report components.

- Buffers used to accumulate device service down times have been increased.

Notifications
-------------
- Notification names now block problem characters *:?<>"|^[]

- Notification Groups can be renamed.

- Syslog notification now uses a human readable ASCII configuration file.

- Syslog notification limits message size to 960 bytes (1024 byte
total packet size).

- Syslog notification can be saved via the web.

- Beeper notification detection of "no dial tone" improved.

- Upgrade of v5 beeper notification now preserves default up/down codes.

- v5/4 notifications configurations detected and upgraded if Windows is installed in a nonstandard directory.

- Sounds notifications in groups can now play continuously.

Services
--------
- Scripted UDP services now support binary protocols.

- Basic service port checks yielding blank scripts now upgrade properly.

- Scripts with no content are now permitted.

- TCP Rules Editor now automatically adds condition characters and edits existing Expect commands.

- Scripted TCP/UDP checks allow the use of 'not contains' and 'not equals'.

- Fail count tolerance added to SNMP Monitor constant checks to help filter false alerts on congested networks.

Import/Export
-------------
- Services no longer duplicated on re-import.

- Z-order of annotations correctly preserved on INI re-import.

- INI re-import no longer duplicates Notes and Info fields.

- Polygons re-import: artifacts removed.

- User Customizable import/export plug-in example provided (on the Ipswitch website)

Log View
--------
- Extra CR/LF removed in raw mode display of logs.

- Logview find improved when extraneous characters are present.

- Logviewer improved to handle long records (>1024 characters).

SNMP Traps
----------
- SNMP trap received indicator resets on device acknowledge.

- SNMP trap received forces a map redraw in the console.

- SNMP trap handler uses agent IP for traps passed via proxies.

- SNMP trap handler more tolerant of multiple (50+) connection errors, and error text improved.

- Oversized SNMP traps tolerated (i.e., between 1024 and 1536 bytes in size).

Discovery
---------
- Active Discovery new device events can now be acknowledged.

- Routers with defined custom types by SNMP OID now ID correctly during SNMP SmartScan.

Misc.
-----
- Map load order respected by the GUI, no longer loads alphabetically.

- Router and Ascend Pipeline device icons updated for Windows 2000 Professional.

- Working directory corrected under Windows 2000 and after a host file import.

- Added support for very large 24 bit background images (greater than 1024x786).

For more information...
=======================
Download the WhatsUp Gold User's Guide (.PDF file) from: 
Ipswitch User's Guides Online

Note: You will need the Adobe Acrobat Reader to view the .PDF file. You can also download the Acrobat Reader from the same location on our Web site.

The Ipswitch web site has the User's Guide available in HTML format. It also contains a comprehensive Knowledge Base with hundreds of searchable articles. Both can be found at the WhatsUp Gold Support Center