Administrator Services

The Administrator Services provides many of the standard server and network administration options. These provided settings allow the SoftNAS administrator to monitor the SoftNAS deployment, review logs, perform key management tasks, and configure backup services.

General Settings

Session Timeout

Setting which controls how long an inactive session SoftNAS browser session will remain up before the server terminates the connection. Default setting is 15 minutes and the maximum is 90 minutes.

Proxy Settings

Allows you to connect to SoftNAS instances using a proxy server intermediary.

Parameter	Description
Use proxy	Enable/disable connection to SoftNAS via proxy server.
Address	IP Address of the proxy server.
Port	Port to connect to the proxy server.
Username	Username to connect to the proxy server.
Password	Password to connect to the proxy server.
Exclude Hosts	Exclude hosts from connecting to the proxy via comma separated values

Other Settings

The following other settings can be configured:

Parameter	Description
Getting Started	Enables/disables the Getting Started panel from launching when logging into SoftNAS.
Welcome panel on start	Enables/disables Welcome panel when logging into SoftNAS.
Track Activity	Checkbox allowing or disallowing SoftNAS to send anonymous usage data to SoftNAS

Monitoring

Basic Monitoring Settings

SoftNAS performs monitoring of system resources, services and SoftNAS logging by polling the system based on the Polling Interval (secs). The default setting is 30 seconds.

Notification Email

The Notification settings are used to specify the administrator email address that will be sent monitoring alerts. You can also send monitoring alerts to the corporate SMTP server.

SMTP Settings

If "Use SMTP" is enabled the following fields are available for the SMTP server configuration:

Field	Description
SMTP Mailserver	FQDN of the mail server.
SMTP Port	SMTP Port that will be used to send email notifications (25, 587, 465)
SMTP Username	Username required for SMTP server authentication
SMTP Password	Password required for SMTP server authentication.
SMTP Encryption	Encryption setting for the SMTP server connection. The following settings are possible: SSLV2 SSLV3 TLSV1

Custom Notification

SoftNAS support the use of webhooks for both Slack and Microsoft Teams for customers wanting to leverage these commonly used tools.

Monitoring System Resources

These thresholds control the percentage usage levels above which monitoring notifications will be issued. The following independent thresholds can be sent:

Parameter	Description
% CPU	Threshold setting above which a monitoring notification will be issued for the system resource.
%CPU System	Threshold setting above which a monitoring notification will be issued for the system resource.
% Memory	Threshold setting above which a monitoring notification will be issued for the system resource.
% Disk space	Threshold setting above which a monitoring notification will be issued for the system resource.
% CPU Wait	Threshold setting above which a monitoring notification will be issued for the system resource.

Services Monitoring

You can setup SoftNAS to monitor the core system services and issue monitoring notifications accordingly. The following services can be monitored by SoftNAS:

Parameter	Description
Apache	Apache web server service running on SoftNAS
SSH	secure shell service running on SoftNAS, enabling secure data communication.
Sendmail	Sendmail email routing facility running on SoftNAS.
Winbind	samba service running on SoftNAS which enables connections to domain controllers.
NTP	Alerts if there are issues with Network Time Protocol (if virtual machines and databases are not in chronological sync)
S3 Retry Error	Alerts if there are Object storage connectivity retry errors
Deltasync Error	Alerts for errors in Deltasync
HA Warning	Alerts if HA fails or reports issues
NFS	Distributed file system protocol running on SoftNAS.
SMB	Server Message Block service.
NMB
HotSpare	Failure of a SoftNAS HotSpare volume
S3 Retry Warning	Sends alerts not only for errors regarding object storage connectivity but warnings as well.
Deltasync Warning	Sends alerts not only for errors regarding DeltaSync connectivity but warnings as well.

SoftNAS Monitoring

SoftNAS Monitoring can be used to monitor a variety of logs. By default, when enabled an email notification is sent any time the word "ERROR" appears in the log.

Parameter	Definition
Monitor SNSERV:	(Yes/No) Allows for enabling or disabling monitoring of the StorageCenter server log located in /var/www/softnas/logs/snserv.log. By default, when enabled an email notification is sent any time the word "ERROR" appears in the log
Excluded Terms	Allows for suppression of emails for errors in the StorageCenter server log that include the keywords entered. Valid entries are in regular expression form. For example, to suppress email notifications for any error including the word "foo" or "bar" enter "foo\|bar"
Monitor SNAP	(Yes/No) Allows for enabling or disabling monitoring of the snapreplicate log located in /var/www/softnas/logs/snapreplicate.log. By default, when enabled an email notification is sent any time the word "ERROR" appears in the log.
Excluded Terms	Allows for suppression of emails for errors in the snapreplicate log that include the keywords entered. Valid entries are in regular expression form. For example, to suppress email notifications for any error including the word "foo" or "bar" enter "foo\|bar"

Backup/Restore

In Amazon Web Services, it is possible to set up Consistent Backup and Restore. To do so, perform the following steps:

In order to configure consistent backup and restore within SoftNAS StorageCenter, navigate down to Settings in the left Storage Administrator pane, and select Administrator.

Support Tab

Support Report Email Submission

By providing your email address in the space above, a copy of the support report received by SoftNAS support will also be sent to you, to allow you to participate in the support process, and have on hand a frame of reference for a given solution or explanation.

Send Support Report

Click send to send your support logs to Buurst support.

You can also generate a support report via command line, either through SoftNAS' Command Shell (accessed via General System Settings, and the Webmin Panel, and expanding Others) or by connecting to your instance via SSH, and running the following command:

su -l root -c "curl https://www.softnas.com/getsupport/ | php -- ticket-3606@softnas.com"

Logs

Log-level Settings

Log Level Settings enable you to set the logging verbosity for the SoftNAS StorageCenter software and its modules (eg. SnapReplicate). You can configure separate logging verbosity levels for each module that is available from this page.

The following settings are possible:

Parameter	Description
DEBUG	Debug, Informational, Warning and Error Messages (All Messages)
INFO	Informational, Warning and Error Messages (Default)
WARN	Warning and Error Messages
ERROR	Error Messages Only
FATAL	Fatal Messages Only
OFF	No Messages (Not Recommended)

Log level settings can be set for the following:

Parameter	Description
StorageCenter	Setting which determines logging verbosity for the indicated service/module.
SnapReplicate	Ibid.

Authentication

Select Dual Authentication

SoftNAS supports authentication via Google or Facebook, in order to provide the improved security of dual authentication. By requiring both SoftNAS credentials and your selected social media account credentials to authenticate, your login security is improved, while simultaneously making repeated sign-ins simpler. Your Google or Facebook credentials allow you to login to a saved session and by-pass the login screen through cached credentials.