Here we will look into a simple recipe that performs this action, as indicated by listing 14.1:

#!/usr/bin/env python 
# Python Network Programming Cookbook, Second Edition
  -- Chapter - 14 
# This program is optimized for Python 2.7.12 and
  Python 3.5.2. 
# It may run on any other version with/without modifications. 
  
import socket 
from sys import stdout 
from time import sleep 
import argparse 
  
def is_alive(address, port): 
    # Create a socket object to connect with 
    s = socket.socket() 
     
    # Now try connecting, passing in a tuple with
      address & port 
    try: 
        s.connect((address, port)) 
        return True 
    except socket.error: 
        return False 
    finally: 
        s.close() 
  
 
def confirm(addres, port): 
    while True: 
        if is_alive(address, port): 
            stdout.write(address + ":" +
            str(port) + ' is alive
') 
            stdout.flush() 
        else: 
            stdout.write(address + ":" +
            str(port) + ' is dead
') 
            stdout.flush() 
        sleep(10) 
 
 
if __name__ == '__main__': 
    # setup commandline arguments 
    parser = argparse.ArgumentParser
             (description='Health Checker') 
    parser.add_argument('--address', action="store",
    dest="address") 
    parser.add_argument('--port', action="store",
    dest="port", default=80, type=int) 
    # parse arguments 
    given_args = parser.parse_args() 
    address, port =  given_args.address, 
                     given_args.port 
    confirm(address, port) 

The following is the sample output of the program:

$ python 14_1_healthcheck.py --address=google.com --port=80
google.com:80 is alive
google.com:80 is alive