I'm looking for a monitor service with the following features:

-http monitoring by checking for presence of a word/phrase?
-sms notification
-limiting false positives

So far I've found alertra and websitepulse, I've looked at some others but it didn't say exactly how they do http monitoring.

Also regarding false positives. Are there services that don't notify after one failed connection, but instead after 2 or 3 failed connections? (don't like to wake up in the middle of the night unless I have to :) )

Alertra will only alert if they can not reach your service from several locations. This will reduce the possibility of false alerts.

Originally posted by FHDave
Alertra will only alert if they can not reach your service from several locations. This will reduce the possibility of false alerts.

Just make sure that if you are comparing these that you are comparing apples to apples.

For example if one provides a ping to your domain. That does not mean that http is up that means your domain is able to be pinged. Alertra for example it is called HTTP/S that will actually load the page which costs more then a PING.

Originally posted by MH-Gary
Just make sure that if you are comparing these that you are comparing apples to apples.

For example if one provides a ping to your domain. That does not mean that http is up that means your domain is able to be pinged. Alertra for example it is called HTTP/S that will actually load the page which costs more then a PING.

Very right Sir..

You might need to check Hybodus where you can configure monitoring for different services depending on their respective operating ports.

And yes it sends sms alerts too.

Originally posted by MH-Gary
Just make sure that if you are comparing these that you are comparing apples to apples.

For example if one provides a ping to your domain. That does not mean that http is up that means your domain is able to be pinged. Alertra for example it is called HTTP/S that will actually load the page which costs more then a PING.

And thats what we do. We only use ping to monitor our network uptime.

In anycase, Alertra will not alert you just because a HTTP check fails from one location. If HTTP check failed from several different locations, then it will send you an alert. That's my point.

Take a look on "nagios".

Originally posted by MMEDV
Take a look on "nagios".

ditto

Thanks all for the advice, I am trying Alertra now. I know of Nagios, but I'm looking for a "hosted" solution in this case.

I've been using siteuptime.com - can't beat the price and it does have SMS alerts. You can also select http, ftp, pop or pinging test to check if your site is up and running.

Michael