Checklist of webmaster error notifications
After reading ‘The Quick Website Launch Checklist’ after finding it on Hacker News I wanted to share my thoughts on one of the checklist points that was discussed:
4. Admins get error emails when site error happens.
If you are the admin of a site what type of error emails would you be interested in getting? In my case it is everything possible. If you are going to do this I would suggest setting up an additional mailbox or filtering the emails because you will get a lot. The right approach might be an email digest of some sort delivered once or twice a day.
So what would I have on the list. It is possible to divide into two categories.
User Triggered
What sort of things can users generate that we as admins would be interested in. A hell of a lot. These people are the lifeblood of your business. Their actions decide if you live or die. You should be paying attention.
1. Failed Logins
Easy to record. You can tell how many people are having a problem getting into your site. If they can’t get in they are not using your product. A spike in failed logins might also indicate a security threat of some sort.
2. Parallel Logins
Sites that provide access to some type of content need to look at this one. What can normally happen is that one user will sign up and pay and then email out the log in details to his whole department or group of friends to use. Stopping parallel logins might be hard but at least you know who is doing it.
3. 404 Pages
Real time emails of 404 pages that hit a certain threshold can help you identify a traffic source. If you all of a sudden hit 20 404′s for the same URI you know something isn’t right.
4. SQL injection style searches
Search data analytics should be pretty important to anyone with a search box on their site. So should detecting any kind security breach or attempt. Running a simple regex over you search terms should allow you detect any funny business here.
5. Registration Milestones
See how well things are going by getting your site to email you every x amount of new sign ups. Getting a few of these each day might make you smile.
Server Triggered
1. High CPU load
Stay informed when your server is working hard. Get the balance right and this one could tell you when things are about to get busy – giving you plenty of warning to roll out the contingency plan.
2. Bandwidth Alert
You might pay heavily for extra bandwidth consumed. I know bandwidth costs a fortune in some countries. If you still have half the month to go it might be worth negotiating a better deal.
3. Site Down
There can be many reasons for this but knowing that while you sleep you have an alert system setup. Try Siteuptime.com or Pingdom.com
4. Database not connected
Another potential break point is the database connectivity. It is possible for the database to fail independently of the web server, so its always reassuring to have this one covered too.