Cisco Systems 3.3 Server User Manual


 
G-5
User Guide for Cisco Secure ACS for Windows Server
78-16592-01
Appendix G Internal Architecture
CSMon
Note CSMon is not intended as a replacement for system, network, or application
management applications but is provided as an application-specific utility that can
be used with other, more generic system management tools.
CSMon performs four basic activities, outlined in the following topics:
Monitoring, page G-5
Recording, page G-6
Notification, page G-7
Response, page G-7
Monitoring
CSMon monitors the overall status of Cisco Secure ACS and the system on which
it is running. CSMon actively monitors three basic sets of system parameters:
Generic host system state—CSMon monitors the following key system
thresholds:
Available hard disk space
Processor utilization
Physical memory utilization
All events related to generic host system state are categorized as “warning
events”.
Application-specific performance
Application viability—CSMon periodically performs a test login using
a special built-in test account (the default period is one minute).
Problems with this authentication can be used to determine if the service
has been compromised.
Application performance thresholds—CSMon monitors and records
the latency of each test authentication request (the time it takes to receive
a positive response). Each time this is performed, CSMon updates a
variable containing the average response time value. Additionally, it
records whether retries were necessary to achieve a successful response.
By tracking the average time for each test authentication, CSMon can