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PRTG Manual: HTTP IoT Push Data Advanced Sensor

The HTTP IoT Push Data Advanced sensor displays data from messages that are received from Internet of Things (IoT) capable devices (for example, Sigfox devices) and that are pushed via an HTTPS request to PRTG. It provides a URL that you can use to push messages to the probe system via HTTPS (secured with TLS 1.3 and weak ciphers).

This sensor is especially useful when you want to push data to a PRTG Hosted Monitor instance.

For more information about the sensor usage, see section How to Use.

HTTP IoT Push Data Advanced Sensor

For a detailed list and descriptions of the channels that this sensor can show, see section Channel List.

Sensor in Other Languages

Dutch: HTTP IoT Push Data Geavanceerd
French: Données IoT avancé (HTTP Push)
German: HTTP IoT Push-Daten (Erweitert)
Japanese: HTTP IoT プッシュデータ（アドバンスト）
Portuguese: Dados de push IoT (avançado) (HTTP)
Russian: Дополнительные данные push-объекта HTTP IoT
Simplified Chinese: HTTP IoT 高级推送数据
Spanish: Datos push IoT (avanzado) (HTTP)

Remarks

Consider the following remarks and requirements for this sensor:

Remark	Description
Fixed port	This sensor has a fixed port (5051). You cannot change it.
Fixed SSL/TLS version	This sensor has a fixed SSL/TLS version (HTTPS (secured with TLS 1.3 and weak ciphers)). You cannot change it.
Remote probe	If you want to add this sensor to a remote probe and use an HTTPS connection to send push notifications, you must import a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate into the \cert subfolder of the PRTG program directory on the remote probe. However, this certificate does not have to match the certificate that you use on the PRTG core server. For more information about SSL certificates, see the Paessler website: How to use your own SSL certificate with the PRTG web server
Cluster probe	This sensor does not support cluster probes. You can only set it up on local probes or remote probes.
IPv6	This sensor supports IPv6.
Performance impact	This sensor has a low performance impact.
Multiple channels	If you use this sensor with multiple channels, we recommend that you simultaneously push the data for all your channels to PRTG. You can push data to only one of your channels. However, all other channels record the value of 0 for this push message.
False alerts	This sensor might result in false alerts if the parent probe disconnects from the PRTG core server. In this case, the sensor shows the error message: The latest push message that the sensor received is older than the specified time threshold allows. (code: PE222).

Basic Sensor Settings

The sensor has the following default tags that are automatically predefined in the sensor's settings when you add the sensor:

HttpPushSensor
IoT
PushData
PushSensor
Sigfox

For more information about basic sensor settings, see section Sensor Settings.

TLS Settings

Setting	Description
TLS Port	The number of the port on which this sensor listens for incoming HTTPS requests. This is always 5051.

HTTP Push Authentication

Setting	Description
Identification Token	This is the token that PRTG uses to find the matching sensor for the incoming message. When you create the sensor, this token is {__guid__}. PRTG replaces this token with an automatically generated token after sensor creation. If you want to use a different identification token, you can edit it during or after sensor creation. PRTG does not automatically replace the token if you change it already during sensor creation.

Setting

Description

Identification Token

This is the token that PRTG uses to find the matching sensor for the incoming message. When you create the sensor, this token is {__guid__}.

PRTG replaces this token with an automatically generated token after sensor creation. If you want to use a different identification token, you can edit it during or after sensor creation.

PRTG does not automatically replace the token if you change it already during sensor creation.

HTTP Push Data

Setting	Description
No Incoming Data	Define which status the sensor shows if it does not receive a push message for at least two scanning intervals: Ignore and keep last status (default): Keep the status as defined by the last message that the sensor received. The parent probe must be connected to keep the last status. If the parent probe disconnects, the sensor shows the Unknown status. If the parent probe connects again, the sensor does not automatically switch from the Unknown status to the last status before the parent probe disconnected. Switch to unknown status: Show the Unknown status if the sensor does not receive a message for at least two scanning intervals. Switch to down status after x minutes: Show the Down status if the sensor does not receive a message within a specific time span. Define the time threshold below.
Time Threshold (Minutes)	This setting is only visible if you select Switch to down status after x minutes above. Enter a time threshold in minutes. If this time elapses, the sensor shows the Down status if it does not receive a push message within this time span. Enter an integer. The maximum threshold is 1440 minutes.

Setting

Description

No Incoming Data

Define which status the sensor shows if it does not receive a push message for at least two scanning intervals:

Ignore and keep last status (default): Keep the status as defined by the last message that the sensor received.
The parent probe must be connected to keep the last status. If the parent probe disconnects, the sensor shows the Unknown status. If the parent probe connects again, the sensor does not automatically switch from the Unknown status to the last status before the parent probe disconnected.
Switch to unknown status: Show the Unknown status if the sensor does not receive a message for at least two scanning intervals.
Switch to down status after x minutes: Show the Down status if the sensor does not receive a message within a specific time span. Define the time threshold below.

Time Threshold (Minutes)

This setting is only visible if you select Switch to down status after x minutes above.

Enter a time threshold in minutes. If this time elapses, the sensor shows the Down status if it does not receive a push message within this time span. Enter an integer. The maximum threshold is 1440 minutes.

Sensor Display

Setting	Description
Primary Channel	Select a channel from the list to define it as the primary channel. In the device tree, PRTG displays the last value of the primary channel below the sensor's name. The available options depend on what channels are available for this sensor. You can set a different primary channel later by clicking below a channel gauge on the sensor's Overview tab.
Graph Type	Define how this sensor shows different channels: Show channels independently (default): Show a graph for each channel. Stack channels on top of each other: Stack channels on top of each other to create a multi-channel graph. This generates a graph that visualizes the different components of your total traffic. You cannot use this option in combination with manual Vertical Axis Scaling (available in the channel settings).
Stack Unit	This setting is only visible if you select Stack channels on top of each other above. Select a unit from the list. PRTG stacks all channels with this unit on top of each other. By default, you cannot exclude single channels from stacking if they use the selected unit. However, there is an advanced procedure to do so.

Setting

Description

Primary Channel

Select a channel from the list to define it as the primary channel. In the device tree, PRTG displays the last value of the primary channel below the sensor's name. The available options depend on what channels are available for this sensor.

You can set a different primary channel later by clicking below a channel gauge on the sensor's Overview tab.

Graph Type

Define how this sensor shows different channels:

Show channels independently (default): Show a graph for each channel.
Stack channels on top of each other: Stack channels on top of each other to create a multi-channel graph. This generates a graph that visualizes the different components of your total traffic.
You cannot use this option in combination with manual Vertical Axis Scaling (available in the channel settings).

Stack Unit

This setting is only visible if you select Stack channels on top of each other above.

Select a unit from the list. PRTG stacks all channels with this unit on top of each other. By default, you cannot exclude single channels from stacking if they use the selected unit. However, there is an advanced procedure to do so.

Inherited Settings

By default, all of these settings are inherited from objects that are higher in the hierarchy. We recommend that you change them centrally in the root group settings if necessary. To change a setting for this object only, click under the corresponding setting name to disable the inheritance and to display its options.

For more information, see section Inheritance of Settings.

How to Use

This function is known as a webhook. Basically, a webhook works like a push notification. Webhooks are usually triggered by an event (for example, a new comment on a blog post) and send according information to a specified URL. The HTTP IoT Push Data Advanced sensor then displays the data of pushed and received messages.

The data that is pushed to this sensor must be valid XML or JSON.

For more information about the return value format, see section Custom Sensors.

The HTTP IoT Push Data Advanced sensor uses the following URLs depending on the type of HTTPS request:

GET (default) requests: https://<probe_ip>:5051/<token>?content=<valid XML_or_JSON>

The XML-encoded value of the content parameter has to match the format defined in section Custom Sensors.
POST requests: https://<probe_ip>:5051/<token>

This HTTPS request method sends the XML-encoded or JSON-encoded HTTPS body as POST data. The body has to match the format defined in section Custom Sensors. We strongly recommend the HTTPS content type application/xml or application/json.

Replace the parameters <probe_ip>, <token>, and <valid XML_or_JSON> (for GET requests) with the corresponding values:

For PRTG Network Monitor, the probe IP is the IP address of the probe system.

For PRTG Hosted Monitor instances, the probe IP is the Domain Name System (DNS) name of the instance.

The port number is always 5051. You cannot change this.
You can define identification token in the sensor settings.
The content of GET requests has to be valid XML or JSON in the PRTG API format.
The content has to be URL encoded (for example, the whitespaces in the sample URL below). Most browsers do the URL-encoding automatically.

Minimum example for the GET method that returns one static channel value:

https://127.0.0.1:5051/XYZ123?content=<prtg><result><channel>MyChannel</channel><value>10</value></result><text>this%20is%20a%20message</text></prtg>

By default, values within the <value> tags in the returned XML or JSON must be integers for them to be processed. If float values are returned, you must explicitly define this value type as defined in section Custom Sensors with <float> tags, otherwise the sensor shows 0 values in affected channels. Example:

https://127.0.0.1:5051/XYZ123?content=<prtg><result><channel>MyChannel</channel><value>10.45</value><float>1</float></result><text>this%20is%20a%20message</text></prtg>

You can use several sensors with the same port and identification token. In this case, push message data is shown in each of these sensors.

Channel List

Which channels the sensor actually shows might depend on the target device, the available components, and the sensor setup.

Channel	Description
Downtime	In the channel table on the Overview tab, this channel never shows any values. PRTG uses this channel in graphs and reports to show the amount of time in which the sensor was in the Down status.
[Value]	The data received from the message encoded in valid XML or JSON in several channels This channel is the primary channel by default. For more information about the return value format, see section Custom Sensors.

Channel

Description

Downtime

In the channel table on the Overview tab, this channel never shows any values. PRTG uses this channel in graphs and reports to show the amount of time in which the sensor was in the Down status.

[Value]

The data received from the message encoded in valid XML or JSON in several channels

This channel is the primary channel by default.

For more information about the return value format, see section Custom Sensors.

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