Health Check System

The health check system is the core of Pulsimo's monitoring capabilities. It actively checks the health of your services at configurable intervals and immediately detects failures.

Key Features

Multiple Protocols

HTTP, GraphQL, gRPC, WebSocket, PostgreSQL, MySQL, Redis, Elasticsearch, and more

Flexible Authentication

None, Basic, Bearer Token, API Key, OAuth, Custom Headers

Auto-Detection

Automatically detects service type from URL pattern

Configurable Intervals

10 seconds to 1 hour check intervals with timeout control

Check Intervals

Choose the right check interval based on your service criticality:

Interval	Use Case	Resource Impact
10 seconds	Critical services	High
30 seconds	Standard services (Recommended)	Medium
60 seconds	Background services	Low
5 minutes	Batch jobs	Very Low
1 hour	Scheduled tasks	Minimal

Timeout Settings

Set appropriate timeouts based on service type:

Timeout	Use Case
3 seconds	Cache (Redis, Memcached)
5 seconds	Databases (PostgreSQL, MySQL)
10 seconds	HTTP APIs
30 seconds	Complex queries, heavy endpoints

⚠️ Rule of Thumb: Timeout should be less than check_interval to prevent check overlap.

Authentication Methods

No Authentication

For public endpoints and health check endpoints

{
  "auth_type": "None"
}

Basic Authentication

Username and password sent with each request

{
  "auth_type": "Basic",
  "auth_credentials": {
    "username": "monitor",
    "password": "secret123"
  }
}

Header: Authorization: Basic <base64(username:password)>

Bearer Token

For JWT-protected APIs and OAuth 2.0 APIs

{
  "auth_type": "Bearer",
  "auth_credentials": {
    "token": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9..."
  }
}

Header: Authorization: Bearer <token>

API Key

Custom API key header (default X-API-Key)

{
  "auth_type": "ApiKey",
  "auth_credentials": {
    "api_key": "sk_live_abc123xyz",
    "header_name": "X-API-Key"
  }
}

Header: X-API-Key: <api_key> (or custom header name)

Best Practices

⏱️ Start Conservative: Begin with 30-second intervals for new services. Increase frequency only for critical endpoints that require sub-minute detection.

🔒 Secure Credentials: Use environment variables or secrets management for authentication credentials. Never hardcode passwords in endpoint configurations.

📊 Monitor Impact: Watch your infrastructure load when adding many endpoints with short intervals. Consider staggering checks or increasing intervals if needed.