How to test new XI server

[sutenag]

Have imported over all cfg files (hosts,services, groups,templates) from our production XI 2012 R1 7.1 to new XI 5.2.3 server(will replace the old) and all is up and running. Now i want to test the new server with alerts report thru email. What is the best practice here, i have no email config setup yet. The old one is still the online prod server and handle all alerts and email reports. I just wanna create some errors on services and hosts and make the new server send email's trigger from these alerts without have any affects to the real environment.

[hsmith]

In your case, I would set up another email address if possible, assign that to a user, and then assign that contact to some hosts. When I want to test things like this, I usually block ICMP on one of my cloud VPS machines, that way the ping fails and I get an alert.

[sutenag]

I have to make the test to our real mail server that is connected to the servicedesk, is it anyway in Nagios i can disable all alert settings temporary and test one host or service to my own email adress?

[rkennedy]

Can you create a new user in XI, and assign an email address to someone on your mail server?

From there, add that contact to a host / service. Then, construct a way to make that service cause an alert and notification. As @hsmith mentioned, blocking ICMP is fairly simple from your host machine.

[sutenag]

What im think and it cannot happen its if i enable email on this new server all imported services and hosts that have been imported with contacts and contacts groups begin to report/send email to servicedesk then we have 2 Nagios servers sending alerts to our desk

[hsmith]

You could disable all of the notifications using the bulk modification tool except for one or two. Maybe not ideal, but if you're looking for a real testing scenario, it is an option. Otherwise, another thing you could do is disable all of the notifications from the admin menu, and then try to send a test email. The problem with this is that the test notification isn't going to be a 'realistic' scenario, as it's just a test email. Let us know if these are not ideal.