Rules vs. Monitors

Back in the days of MOM2005, all monitoring was done under a terminology called 'Rules'. We would create a rule to track events and alerts

In Ops Manager 2007, a new component of Management Packs is introduced... 'Monitors'!..

So this is how I understand it...

MONITORS:
Used to assess various conditions that can occur on monitored objects

• performance counter
• the existence of an event
• the occurrence of data in a log file
• the status of a Windows Service
• the occurrence of a SNMP trap

The result of this assessment determines the health state of a target and the alerts that are generated

RULES:

Used to collect data, such as events, generated by managed objects.
Can be used instead of monitors to generate alerts when data collected from managed objects DOES NOT indicate the health state of the managed objects.