Hi

I'm running PRTG 15.1.13.1382. And have a question on how to order channels on stacked graphs.

I have setup a custom Exe/Advanced sensor with a couple of channels. As an example: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?> <prtg> <result> <channel>Executing</channel> <value>5</value> </result> <result> <channel>Idle</channel> <value>10</value> </result> </prtg>

Now sometime later i find out that i need to include more data for his sensor, so i edit my script, and it adds another channel to the XML output named Initializing with some value. <result> <channel>Initializing</channel> <value>3</value> </result>

PRTG recognizes this and the channel now appears on the sensor.

I have set the sensor graph to show as a stacked graph with the "stack channels on top of each other" setting on the sensor. The problem is that i always need my "Idle" channel to be the top stacked part of the graph, and the new "Initializing" channel is now showing up as the top stacked part of the graph. How can i change the ordering of how channels are stacked in graphs to achieve this?

I may in fact want the Initializing channel to be the bottom part of the stacked graph, but for now i can live with simply making sure my "Idle" channel always goes on the top of the stacked graph.

Can anyone offer some insight/help?

Best Regards Peter


Article Comments

You could try to use the factory sensor - you can set the channel ID manually and it should stack properly with it. Can you give it a try? :)


May, 2015 - Permalink

Hi Stephan

Thank you for your reply!

I've implemented a factory sensor as you said, basically mirroring the existing "script advanced" sensors channels. We've set the channel ID of the Idle channel on the factory sensor to a high number. This allows us to extend the number of channels on the script sensor, and then insert the new channels in the factory sensor with lower IDs than the Idle channel, thus retaining the Idle channel on top of the stacked graph on the factory sensor.

NB: If other people need to do this, be aware that it was necessary for me to specify the <Unit> tag for the different channels in the XML output from the script. If I didn't do this the factory sensor could not recognize the channels to stack based on their unit ("Stack Unit" under "Sensor Display" under the sensor settings), and the graph would not stack in the factory sensor.

Having to go through creating a factory sensor basically 1to1 mirroring another sensor does seem somewhat troublesome. It seems like a lot of manual work and duplicated effort to achieve a relatively simple thing, i.e. channel sorting in a particular sequence. The fact hat PRTG is simple and easy to work with and usually does not require these odd "hacks" or "double implementations" was one of the reasons we chose to use PRTG rather than other products.

To me it feels sort of like a missing "basic feature", to be able to reorder channels on sensors and thus affect the stacking order on a stacked graph. Is this a feature you would consider implementing for a future version?

Best Regards Peter


May, 2015 - Permalink

I'll add it as a feature request, so it will be considered for development in the future (if enough people want it, that is). That's all I can do I'm afraid :/


May, 2015 - Permalink

Especially for sensors with lots of channels this would be useful.


Nov, 2016 - Permalink