Website Monitoring NewsLatest posts and articles on website monitoring services.

Uptrends publishes the website uptime report for 928 online retailers in the USA
Go to Source

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-10737" title="middle east" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/f0ea5_middle-east.jpg” alt=”" width=”580″ height=”156″ />

The Middle East is perhaps not what many people think of as one of the hottest telecom market in the world but new numbers by Informa Telecoms & Media may change your mind.

In total, the Middle East will see over 250 million mobile phone subscriptions by the end of 2012. Iran, by far the biggest market in the Middle East for mobile phone subscriptions, will account for around 90 million by end of 2011, predicted to grow to 122 million by end of 2016.

In terms of smartphones, the UAE is predicted to have over 70% smartphone penetration by 2016, up from 47% today. Compare this with the United States, with a smartphone penetration of 40% as of September 2011.

Let’s have a look at some of the other numbers to see what else is interesting.

Massive growth predicted

According to Informa, the Middle East will see a massive growth in the number of mobile subscriptions over the next few years. In the report Informa has included Afghanistan, Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, UAE and Yemen. Informa predicts:

• The number of mobile subscriptions in the Middle East will exceed 250 million in 2012.
• This will increase to total of over 350 million by end of 2016.
• Average mobile phone penetration in the region is estimated to exceed 100% in 2012, thereby exceeding the North America market for the first time. To clarify, this means that there will be more mobile subscriptions than there are actual mobile users.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-10775" title="Massive growth predicted" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/9e516_informa-middle-east.001.jpg” alt=”" width=”580″ height=”435″ />

Considering that the countries included in Informa’s report have a current combined population of almost 210 million, the numbers are pretty amazing. Iran’s population alone is just over 75 million.

However, if you put this in relation to mobile giants like India and China the Middle East numbers pale in comparison:

• China had 859 million mobile subscriptions (64% of the population) in December 2010.
• India had just over 840 million subscriptions (70% of the population) in May 2011.

2G still going strong

It comes as no surprise that over the next four years included in Informa’s predictions, 2G will still be going strong. Iran will see a substantial drop, both in absolute user numbers as well as measured as percentage of users. The same is true for Saudi Arabia. The only country that keeps rising in 2G connections to 2016 is Yemen.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-10776" title="2G still going strong" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/1125f_informa-middle-east.002.jpg” alt=”" width=”580″ height=”435″ />

Iraq emerges as third largest 3G market in the Middle East

Yemen’s increase in 2G may be explained by the lack of 3G. Informa hasn’t included any 3G numbers for Yemen all the way to 2016. Most other countries in the Middle East will see a rise in 3G connections over the coming four years, Informa predicts. The sharpest rise, as you can see from the chart below, is for Iran, which is predicted to bypass Saudi Arabia in late 2016 sometime, and become the biggest 3G country in the region.

Another surprising detail in the 3G numbers is that Informa predicts that Iraq will become the third largest 3G country in the Middle East sometime in late 2015, bypassing Syria.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-10777" title="Iraq emerges as third largest 3G market" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/2e0a3_informa-middle-east.003.jpg” alt=”" width=”580″ height=”435″ />

Saudi Arabia will dominate 4G

It’s of course early days yet for 4G in all of the Middle East, with only a few countries having active implementations. In terms of growth Informa predicts that Saudi Arabia will be the leading 4G market in the Middle East for the period covered, with just over 11 million 4G subscriptions by 2016.

Even though the UAE is much smaller than Saudi Arabia if you compare populations, it comes in on a clear second place by 2016 in Informa’s prediction.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-10778" title="Saudi Arabia will dominate 4G" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/5641f_informa-middle-east.004.jpg” alt=”" width=”580″ height=”435″ />

Iran, biggest market but few smartphones

As we already mentioned, in terms of mobile phone subscriptions Iran is by a wide margin the largest market in the Middle East. But it appears Iranians haven’t taken to smartphones in quite the same way as people in some neighboring countries.

Informa tracks smartphone subscription growth in only four countries in the Middle East: Iran, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and UAE.

Out of the four, UAE is the country with the highest smartphone penetration, predicted to rise from 47% in 2011 to over 70% in 2016. Saudi is also predicted to grow quickly as a market for smartphones, reaching almost 50% by 2016. Iran and Jordan trail behind according to Informa’s predictions, but see an increased growth in smartphone penetration toward the end of the period.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-10779" title="Iran biggest market but few smartphones" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/4b054_informa-middle-east.005.jpg” alt=”" width=”580″ height=”435″ />

Middle East: a heterogeneous region in transition

Informa’s report adds to the common picture of the Middle East as a very heterogeneous region in terms of a range of factors like economical, social, political, and more.

In the Middle East region we find big a big country like Iran, which is transitioning from 2G to 3G, managing a large user base. We also find countries like UAE, which doesn’t have as many users, but a tremendous smartphone penetration predicted to reach over 70% by 2016.

With such amazing smartphone numbers, clearly among the highest anywhere in the world, we’re bound to see more of the Middle East in terms of mobile news going forward. And if the numbers from Saudi Arabia, Iran and some of the other countries are anything to go by, we’ll se the mobile revolution continue to spread across the Middle East.

Middle East map courtesy of Norman B. Leventhal Map Center at the BPL.

This was a post from the guys at Pingdom, a site monitoring service that makes sure you’re the first to know when your site is down. Check it out for free.

<img src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/4b054_1u95YQZtnqQ” height=”1″ width=”1″ />
<a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/RoyalPingdom/~3/1u95YQZtnqQ/” rel=”nofollow”>Go to Source

Level3 and AT&T appear to be having ongoing issues over the last couple days .  The outage you have experienced is centered around one of their route-servers located in the DFW area.  We are continuing to track the issue and continuing to track the resolution.  The Level3 Communications master case number is 40976066

Go to Source

Some Dotcom-Monitor clients  may have experienced alerts due to a Level3 connectivity issue. For details see the statement below from Level3 explaining the event and the resolution.

“Much of the internet connectivity in and to the Continental United States was degraded by an outage within the Level3 Communications backbone that began at approximately 17:22 1 August 2011 UTC.  The impact of this event was felt not only on the Level3 backbone but also on other carriers as providers shifted large amounts of traffic that would have normally transited the Level3 network onto alternate network paths, causing increased latency and congestion and packet loss.

Many providers who utilize Level3 Communications for transport services, both telephone and IP,  were also impacted as these transport services utilize the same converged backbone as the Level3 transit product.

The Level3 Communications master case number is 40976066.

The Level3 Communications official statements regarding the unscheduled network event are:

8/1/11 7:12:56 PM GMT The IP NOC reports that the network equipment self restored, resolving the routing issue and restoring services at approximately 17:55 GMT. The IP NOC states that they will continue to work with Level 3 OPS Engineers and the equipment vendor to isolate the root cause of the service interruption. The Level 3 TSC has confirmed that all customer services have been restored and the IP NOC will continue to monitor for stability.

8/1/11 6:29:26 PM GMT The IP NOC reports that a routing issue failure between Dallas, TX and Los Angeles, CA is impacting IP services in multiple markets. The IP NOC has engaged the equipment vendor, as well as Level 3 OPS Engineers and continues to investigate to isolate the issue at this time.”

Go to Source

External monitoring for IPv6-Enabled Services

As highlighted by the upcoming IPv6 Day on June 8, the need for a new Internet Protocol (IP) is well understood and accepted in the networking industry.

Requirements for more address space, simpler address design and handling at the IP layer, better Quality of Service (QoS) support, greater security, and an increasing number of media types and Internet-capable devices have all contributed to drive the development of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6).

What is less well understood certainly are aspects of how external monitoring helps  identify key challenges for businesses using IPv6, specific areas for IPv6 performance monitoring, and the benefits of external IPv6 performance monitoring. Firstly, for brevity sake some of the basic aspects of IPv6-related monitoring are noted in the grid below. After the grid is a longer, detailed note on aspects of IPv6 as related to external monitoring.

Introduction

IPv4, the current version of IP deployed worldwide, has proven remarkably robust, easy to implement, and interoperable with a wide range of protocols and applications. But, due to the Internet’s current scale and complexity, the ongoing explosive growth of the Internet and Internet services exposed serious deficiencies in IPv4. IPv6 is designed to specifically address these deficiencies, enabling further Internet growth and development.

IPv6 Features

 New standardized header format

 Larger address space

 Multicast and any cast

 Stateless address configuration

 Built-in security

 Better support for QoS

 Extensibility

How is IPv6 better than IPv4?

IPv6 has a number of features that overcome the limitations of IPv4. A significant improvement is that the additional addresses remove the need for Network Address Translation (NAT). NAT has extended the life of IPv4 by allowing multiple devices to sit behind a router and share the same globally unique IP address. However, NAT also introduced a number of undesirable side effects, including specific difficulties in network troubleshooting, network administration, and the implementation of security protocols such as Internet Protocol Security (IPSec). IPv6 removes the need for NAT, allowing flawless and transparent end-to-end security.

Benefits of IPv6

 Improved efficiency in routing and packet handling

 Support for auto configuration and plug and play

 Support for embedded IPSec

 Enhanced support for Mobile IP and mobile computing devices

 Elimination of the need for NAT

 Support for widely deployed routing protocols

 Increased number of multicast addresses, and improved support for multicast

Why is IPv6 Performance monitoring needed?

As IPv6 is becoming the essential backbone protocol for next-generation networking, native IPv6 performance monitoring is essential to determine whether performance issues are originating in the transition phase to IPv6, or in the end-to-end IPv6 environment.

IPv6 websites can be accessed using dual stacks, tunneling and protocol translation, but IPv6 performance monitoring is essential to determine whether performance issues are originating in the end-to-end IPv6 environment. Companies that have deployed IPv6 websites must utilize native IPv6 performance monitoring to isolate Service-Level Agreement (SLA) issues for these sites as IPv4 monitoring alone cannot isolate IPv6 QoS issues.

External IPv6 Performance monitoring Benefits

To prevent the aforementioned problems, some companies hire a full-time, onsite professional to regularly perform diagnostics and monitoring on network systems. Safer than leaving the health of critical systems unmonitored and data unmaintained, the costs, however, are sometimes a painful liability.

The cost of a full-time network professional is high, especially when the benefits, taxes, cost of necessary equipment and software to perform the job, etc…is factored into the cost along with salary. Often, companies do not have large enough network systems to fully occupy a full-time network employee, or to justify the added cost.

In short, this method is risky and problematic, as it fails to address the specific IPv6 monitoring needs of the business in a cost-effective and targeted manner.  For many companies working with an external IPv6 performance monitoring service provider is an excellent option.

IPv6 performance management and SLA monitoring becomes more important for businesses and organizations deploying IPv6 websites, while at the same time it is more complicated due to the co-existence of IPv4 and IPv6, the exponential size of IPv6 addressing and routing, and the lack of a killer application to drive wide-scale and accelerated IPv6 deployment.

While adding a network employee is an option,  organizations and business opting for the external performance monitoring services  avoid the long-term costs of added resources,  and hiring for the IPv6 expertise needed to monitor the network system.

Moreover the services offered external IPv6 performance monitoring providers are targeted and on-demand, including:

 A proven, experienced team of IPv6 performance monitoring professionals working behind the scenes

 Specific equipment and software tools needed to monitor IPv6 and maintain the network

 Regular maintenance and performance tuning, alarms

 Fast response times in the event of a system issue

 Multi-tiered, on-demand, affordable services customized to a company’s size and needs

 Less downtime/revenue loss due to network problems

 The peace of mind that comes with knowing the IPv6 monitoring system was specifically designed for its purpose

With the ongoing switch to IPv6 occurring, most network professionals recognize the need to properly backup, maintain, and perform the network system that organizations are dependent on. However, these same network professionals are also hampered by the time, complexity, and high costs required to both maintain incumbent IT systems and address challenges brought by new technologies, like IPv6. Adding additional onsite personnel to address IPv6 issues is a costly approach. Therefore, having an external IPv6 performance monitoring service is an efficient and cost-effective option for many organizations and businesses.

IPv6 Performance monitoring Challenges

While the benefits of IPv6 are apparent, performance management will becomes inherently more difficult in part because a single IPv6 subnet is as large as the entire Internet today.

Many performance monitoring solutions that worked for IPv4, will not work with IPv6. As with IPv4, IPv6 QoS is implemented at Layer 2 and Layer 3 of the TCP/IP stack.

A number of passive network management vendors support IPv6, but while these tools may comply with IPv6, some may not include the evolving feature set needed for IPv6 support. Also, passive monitoring is unlikely to properly detect IPv6 performance issues experienced by an end user, or a web-enabled business. And for many businesses deploying IPv6 the end user experience is the most critical element of QoS. Finally, some external performance monitoring services are not IPv6-enabled, in which case, their monitoring will not detect IPv6-related website, nor network issues.

Benefits of monitoring IPv6

There are several reasons to actively monitor IPv6 websites in a native environment:

 Because there’s a gap between IPv6 capabilities and current network management tools, active monitoring is essential.

 As with any new technology, there is the potential for flaws, which may impact uptime and performance.

 IPv6 will lead to larger networks that directly address more network devices, increasing overall system complexity and potential for errors.

 IPv6 end-to-end security features, while improving security, will make it harder to analyze network traffic.

Where does Dotcom-Monitor fit in?

Businesses that adapt IPv6 can monitor and report on the availability and performance of their IPv6-enabled websites and web applications by using Dotcom-MonitorIPv6 Performance monitoring. IPv6 vastly expands address and routing capabilities. Dotcom-Monitor IPv6 Performance monitoring provides IPv6 network professionals with access to the necessary tools to monitor all aspects of their systems during their transition to IPv6.

As with all Dotcom-Monitor services, IPv6 Performance monitoring is simple to use and easy to access, which enables users to custom-configure notification and escalation parameters, 1-minute, 3, 5, 10 15-minute monitoring frequencies, as well as the automated performance alerts sent via email, SMS, phone etc. Full reporting functionality with real-time dashboards, water-fall charts and interactive drill-down reports are also included in the user’s account.

Products Features

 Monitors can be set up to target IPv4, IPv6, or both

 Advanced DNS monitoring

 Detailed Root Cause Analysis, including automated webpage snapshots and trace-routes

 Automated alerting via email, SMS, Phone etc.

 Extensive real-time reporting

 Transaction monitoring for IPv6 sites – to verify login pages and shopping carts etc

 Access to IPv6 enabled diagnostic tools for ping, trace route and site checks.

Conclusion

With the advent of extensive IPv6 usage a certainty, an active external IPv6 performance monitoring service is critical. With ongoing tests and monitoring network and website managers will have a view into end-user connectivity related to IPv6 issues and the ability to receive instant notifications whenever a problem occurs resulting in reduced impacts to company revenues and reputation, as well as peak performance.

Useful Links

For free IPv6 instant tests conducted from worldwide locations:

Pings, here

Trace-routes, here

To try a free trial monitoring account http://tinyurl.com/monitor-trial

For more information about Dotcom-Monitor see http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/

Go to Source

Tweet this:

I’d like to win a year of Dotcom-Monitor website monitoring & application monitoring @dotcom_monitor #IRCE Booth 1827 http://wp.me/p1070N-3S

The more tweets, the more chances to win….. 1-year of Dotcom-Monitor  services – either (you pick) UserView monitoring (Standard I package), a browser driven Application monitoring service, or ServerView monitoring (Standard I package). The <a href="http://www.website-monitoring.com/blog/2010/05/04/twitter-facts-and-figures-history-statistics/”>twitter campaign is as part of Dotcom-Monitor’s exhibiting activities (Booth 1827) at the 2011 Internet Retailer Conference and Exhibition (IRCE), June 13-17 . Dotcom-Monitor automatically monitors website applications and notifies users when errors occur, sends diagnostic information, and provides real-time and detailed reporting. To enter the competition, just (re)tweet the following:

I’d like to win a year of Dotcom-Monitor website monitoring & application monitoring @dotcom_monitor #IRCE Booth 1827 http://wp.me/p1070N-3S

You can also receive a fully-functional <a href="http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/sign-up.asp?monitoring=Free%2030-Day%20Trial&UserView=Free%2030-Day%20Trial&DataCollection=Free%2030-Day%20Trial” target=”_blank”>free trial version of the Dotcom-Monitor application and website monitoring to try out. Since 1998, Dotcom-Monitor has provided a true on-demand service, for website and internet application and infrastructure monitoring.

Winner will be chosen and awarded the service via <a href="http://www.website-monitoring.com/blog/2010/05/04/twitter-facts-and-figures-history-statistics/”>twitter during the IRCE event June 14-17, 2011 so good luck!

<a href="http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/blog/index.php/2011/05/tweet-and-retweet-monitoring-competition/” rel=”nofollow”>Go to Source

Dotcom-Monitor is currently operating normally.

<a href="http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/blog/index.php/2011/04/in-process-issue-monitoring/” rel=”nofollow”>Go to Source

IPv6 monitoring

Introduction

Dotcom-Monitor’s IPv6 monitoring Network

Agents with IPv6 address have native IPv6 connectivity. Agents with “Teredo” tunnel through Teredo brokers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teredo_tunneling

The switch to IPv6 is jumping to light speed.  On June 8, 2011 several large organizations, including google, Yahoo, and <a href="http://www.website-monitoring.com/blog/2010/03/17/facebook-facts-and-figures-history-statistics/”>facebook will run a comprehensive test for switching to IPv6. If all goes well most companies will start making the switch. However, the advent of IPV6 is not without problems and the performance monitoring solutions that worked for IPv4, will not work with IPv6.

Benefits of Native IPv6 monitoring

Moreover, there are several other reasons to actively monitor IPv6 websites in a native environment:

• Because there’s a gap between IPv6 capabilities and current network management tools, active monitoring is essential.
• As with any new technology, there is the potential for flaws, which may impact uptime and performance.
• IPv6 will lead to larger networks that directly address more network devices, increasing the overall complexity.
• IPv6 end-to-end security features, while improving security, will make it harder to analyze network traffic.

IPv6 Header Challenges

While IPv4 is a best-effort service where all packets are treated equally; IPv6 implements quality-of-service (QOS) by classifying IP packets using an 8-bit traffic class field and a 20-bit flow label field in the header. With the flow label in place, transit routers will not need to open the inner packet to identify the flow. This will enhance flow identification when encryption is used.

However, though IPv6 web sites can be accessed using dual stacks, tunneling and protocol translation, native IPv6 performance monitoring is essential to determine whether performance issues are originating in the end-to-end IPv6 environment. Therefore, companies that have deployed IPv6 websites must utilize native IPv6 performance monitoring to isolate service-level agreement (SLA) issues for these sites as IPv4 monitoring alone will not help isolate IPv6 quality-of-service (QoS) issues.

IPv6 monitoring Challenges

While the benefits of IPv6 are apparent, performance management will becomes inherently more difficult as a single IPv6 subnet is as large as the entire Internet today. Performance monitoring solutions that worked for IPv4, will not work with IPv6.

As with IPv4, IPv6 quality of service is implemented at Layer 2 and Layer 3 of the TCP/IP stack. A number of network management vendors support IPv6, but while passive network management tools may comply with the new version, some may not include the evolving set of features for IPv6 support. Alone, passive monitoring may be unable to properly detect performance issues experienced by the end user, and for web-enabled businesses, the end user experience is the most critical element of service quality, therefore active external monitoring is increasingly important.

For business and organizations deploying IPv6 websites, performance management and service-level agreement monitoring becomes more complicated due to the coexistence of IPv4 and IPv6, the exponential size of IPv6 addressing and routing, and the lack of a killer application to drive wide-scale and accelerated deployment.

monitoring IPv6 Security Concerns

IPv6 security issues are not yet fully understood. In the early stages of IPv6 deployment, it is likely that there will be less security, not more due to issues around dual-IP stacks and inevitable mistakes with the newness of IPv6 . Weaknesses in how these networks may interoperate will cause security issues. IP spoofing continues to be a possible security concern with IPv6 networks. While not impossible, IP flooding, or scanning for valid host addresses and services is going to much more difficult than with IPv4. The concept of mobility is a feature of IPv6 networks that was available with IPv4. This is a very complex function that must be considered when evaluating IPv6 security.

Therefore, active performance monitoring of IPv6 websites and networks is critical. It will be some time before all of the possible weaknesses of IPv6 are fully exposed. In the interim, performance monitoring will prove to be extremely effective at limiting any security threats to your IPv6 website.

Dotcom-Monitor^® Native IPv6 monitoring Bureau

Dotcom-Monitor^® has deployed a native IPv6 monitoring bureau to offer end-to-end IPv6 performance monitoring for QoS and SLA management from the end-user perspective. Dotcom-Monitor^® IPv6 native IPvP includes both a HTTP/S synthetic monitor agent process called ServerView monitoring™ as well as a real browser-based  monitoring service called UserView monitoring™.

ServerView monitoring™, the HTTP/S is a synthetic monitoring service – active computer agents log onto targeted URLs as often as once per minute and execute scripts that simulate real end-user connections to a website. Dotcom-

Monitor^® performs URL monitoring for performance, accessibility and availability, checks content, monitors forms and provides basic and NT LAN (NTLM) authentication support. It provides monitoring for both HTTP sites, which typically use port 80, as well as for HTTPS which by default uses port 443 unless another port is specified.

UserView monitoring™ is employed to monitor transactional processes such as shopping carts, member log-ins and sign-up processes, as well as for websites with a predominance of dynamic Web 2.0 elements like Flash, Ajax etc… UserView monitoring™ simulates end-user interactions, and supports cookies, dynamic variables, client-side certificates and password-protected pages. The collected data is aggregated by each step and by the overall transaction for complete reporting.

With active monitoring using native IPv6, companies deploying IPv6 website can ensure that SLAs are being met specific to IPv6 performance. End-to-end IPv6 performance monitoring is crucial to maximize the return on investment of the deployment and to understand its effects on the IT operations and the business.

Therefore, Dotcom-Monitor^® provides instantaneous notification of IPv6 website and web application performance issues, based on customer configured notification and escalation parameters. Dotcom-Monitor^® also provides extensive real-time reporting using graphical charts that explain success/failure rates for specific performance checks, response/download times, uptime/downtime, load variations by hour/day/week and much more. For e-commerce sites, Dotcom-Monitor^® will measure quality of service for each phase of the transaction process as well as performance comparisons among different geographic areas.

monitoring IPv6: Conclusion

Using an active external performance monitoring service will be critical with the advent of IPv6. Network and website managers must have a true view into end-user connectivity and the ability to receive instant notification whenever a problem occurs. For instant free test tools for IPv6 performance see ServerView monitoring™ http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/task_instant_test.aspx and UserView monitoring™ http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/technical-tools-browser-test.aspx .

<a href="http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/blog/index.php/2011/03/ipv6-monitoring/” rel=”nofollow”>Go to Source

 Wayzata, Minnesota – Mar. 22, 2011 –  Dotcom-Monitor, (www.Dotcom-Monitor.com), today announced the immediate availability a browser-based instant online full-page test tool – UserView Snapshot -for measuring the performance of Web 2.0 websites from 13 worldwide monitoring locations. To try it go here: http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/technical-tools-browser-test.aspx

 UserView Snapshot is a free online test that uses Dotcom-Monitor’s browser-based UserView monitoring™ platform. The test produces a detailed waterfall chart – from each of the 13 worldwide locations – that displays the time it takes to render individual webpage objects, including dynamic Web 2.0 page elements (such as Ajax, Flash, etc..). UserView Snapshot has the most comprehensive worldwide network of monitoring locations currently available.                                                     

“UserView Snapshot is an absolutely free service that provides extremely useful information about website speed and performance at the webpage object level” said Vadim Mazo, founder and chief technical officer of Dotcom-Monitor, “It will help website administrator’s understand areas where they can improve their website’s performance from the perspective of user’s coming to their website from all over the world.” 

UserView Snapshot is the only free browser-based tool that provides such a comprehensive user’s view of website’s performance. To try it go here: http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/technical-tools-browser-test.aspx 

The regular Dotcom-Monitor UserView monitoring™ service is used to monitor online transactions and web applications services on an ongoing basis – as fast as once per minute. It uses a regular browser acting like a visitor to the website to test performance, including: clicking on links, filling out forms, hovering over page elements, and submitting data. 

When a problem is detected, the notification feature sends alerts via phone, pager, email, or SMS. Additionally, detailed reports and real-time status reports are available via a Live Dashboard interface with in-depth analysis of “every step” in the user experience to help pinpoint where the error condition is occurring. This user experience monitoring helps to ensure website performance, uptime, and online revenues.

“UserView monitoring™ is a powerful and affordable solution for quickly resolving user experience issues that affect uptime performance and online revenues,” noted Mazo. Dotcom-Monitor UserView monitoring™ is available immediately at www.Dotcom-Monitor.com. “UserView Snapshot puts the power of this type of user experience monitoring in the hands of anyone who wants to improve their website.”

Go to Source

The suspicion that site speed might be a ranking factor for google was just a suspicion; that is, until April of last year. google plainly stated <a href="http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2010/04/using-site-speed-in-web-search-ranking.html”>site speed as a factor in SERP (Search Engine Results Page) ranking. What does this mean? Website performance monitoring needs to become part of your SEO process – if it isn’t already.

A while back, we published an infographic to help explain the <a href="http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/index.php/2011/02/website-monitoring-escalation-infographic/”>various levels and tools of website monitoring. Using this infographic, let’s discuss how website monitoring relates to SEO, and how it can strengthen your SEO campaign and response time.

Website monitoring: The Questions to Answer

<a href="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/ca065_speedjpg.jpg”><img class="alignright" title="speed,jpg" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/ca065_speedjpg.jpg” alt=”" width=”281″ height=”169″ />It’s easy to check site speed, thanks to browser extensions like <a href="http://code.google.com/speed/page-speed/”>Page Speed for Firefox, WebPagetest and <a href="http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools”>google Webmaster Tools. Lucky site owners and SEOs can look at these tools and smile, because their site is speeding along at 1-second load times.

Most aren’t that lucky. Most find out their site is slower than a turtle stampeding through peanut butter. For those SEOs and site owners, it’s time to go down the list of potential issues, like these four:

1. Is the web server up or down?

This seems easy to answer. You go online and enter the URL of the site. If it’s up, it’s up; if it’s down, it’s down.

You can’t stay online 24/7, however; if your site goes down at 1 am every morning, chances are you’re not going to know about it. Website monitoring works around the clock. What you’ll get is an email saying, “Psst… Your site is down at least 10% of the time.” In most cases, the problem is your hosting provider.

If you consistently have a high down time, you usually have two choices:

1. Upgrade your hosting account – it could be caused by using a shared server
2. Change your hosting provider – some hosting providers just don’t provide high quality services. You may have found one of them. Utilize a web hosting service that places a high priority on customer service.

If website monitoring shows your web server is working correctly, it’s time to look at your pages.

2. How long does it take to load a page?

You probably know by now that site speed matters in more places than SEO and search rankings. Let’s talk visitors. Studies show most visitors are either lost or kept in the first six seconds. If your page takes longer than 6 seconds to load, you haven’t had a chance to make an impression at all.

If it does take a long time to load a page, you have to understand part of your on page SEO probably isn’t working. It’s a definite your marketing lingo isn’t working. In other words, you have some severe issues that need to be fixed.

Your job is now to find out why the page is loading slowly. To find that out, you have to go down the list of questions and answer them with your website monitoring reports:

3. Is the content loading as it’s supposed to?

<a href="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/d21cd_loading.jpg”><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-206" title="loading" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/d21cd_loading.jpg” alt=”" width=”300″ height=”234″ />As much as you may hate to hear it, slow loading sites are most likely because of JavaScript files, images, flash or other “eye candy” goodies. It could also be because of something as simple as one image – referenced in the code but not found. In other words, it could be one problem or many.

In website monitoring reports, problem files stick out like sore thumbs. You can’t miss them.

4. Are the site functions loading correctly?

“Site functions” can be classified as functional extras. Shopping cart functions are a good example. If other files are loading properly, there could be compatibility issues with your site functions and server.

Improving You Site’s Speed

If you’re already monitoring your website and the reports say your site is slow but it isn’t your server, you have a hard road ahead. Even professional web developers want to throw their hands in the air sometimes. However, here are a few pointers that can give you a little boost and start you on your way to a faster loading site:

• You have to know what parts of the code do what. For example, if you have a google Analytics tracking code on your client’s site, you – as the SEO – should know that ga.js is part of that code. If you see “jquery.jcarousel.js”, you have to know what program that file is attached to.

• For each issue, you have to decide whether site speed or usability is more important. Ask – does this file provide essential additions to the visitor experience, or is it just eye candy?

• You have to be unemotional about your site design. Whether you’re digging through the code or your SEO is telling you about it, you have to be willing to cull things you may really like. Usually, the “extras” are causing the site to slow down.

• You have to be willing to change programs. Program XYZ may be your favorite forum program, but recent server updates have made Program XYZ load extremely slowly. It’s time to make a change.

• Always make sure your images are optimized for the web. This doesn’t necessarily mean all should be PNGs (many think PNG means optimized). It means all should be optimized to the smallest file size. If a .jpeg has the smallest file size and faster load time, use a .jpeg.

Will Your Site Win the Race?

<a href="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/b4931_runner.jpg”><img class="alignright size-full wp-image-205" title="runner" src="http://www.website-monitoring.eu/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/b4931_runner.jpg” alt=”" width=”207″ height=”283″ />What do your reports say about your site? Does it drag behind the rest? If everything is great, should you continue using website monitoring as part of your SEO process?

Well, just as SEO is a continual process, monitoring your website should also be continual. Even if you don’t change anything on your site, things could begin to slow because of things like server or browser updates. Remember – the more fancy stuff you have on your site (including images), the slower it can get. That’s just how websites work.

Keeping your site in tip-top shape is the best way to succeed in online business. Website monitoring is a good way to make sure your site isn’t getting flabby. Run a site speed check on your site; we’d love to hear how you’re doing!

<a href="http://www.dotcom-monitor.com/blog/index.php/2011/03/website-monitoring-site-speed-and-seo/” rel=”nofollow”>Go to Source