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The Network server executes the tasks assigned to it via a multithreaded queuing system, it can work with other network servers (HA mode).
You must have full visibility (IP addresses and ports) over which tests are going to be performed. This chapter also covers the Plugin server and WMI server.
The Network server is the one who executes the different network tests assigned to each agent. Each agent is assigned to a network server, and it is this that is in charge of its execution, inserting the results in the Pandora FMS database.
To remotely monitor a computer or a computer service (FTP, SSH, etc.), the corresponding agent must first be created, accessed through the Management menu → Resources → Manage agents → Create agent. Fill in the details for your new agent and press the Create button.
Once you have created the agent, click on the upper tab of the modules (Modules). There select to create a new network module by pressing the Create button. In the next form that is displayed select Create a new network server module, and when the dropdown menu on the right loads, select the desired check.
These are the most basic checks that provide important and accurate information.
TCP is connection-oriented, so a TCP Send will correspond to a TCP Receive response that indicates the status of a port or a service to be monitored. Optionally, you can send a text string and wait to receive a response that will be directly treated by Pandora FMS as data.
|
character; supports the string ^M
to be replaced by sending a carriage return.|
character.Example:
TCP Send
HELO myhostname.com^M|MAIL FROM: ^M| RCPT TO: ^M
TCP Receive
250|250|250
In order to successfully use these modules, the connection credentials of the agent to be monitored are required. Therefore, all this must be registered in the secure credential store. The instructions for the generic configuration of a module are repeated but one of the following is selected:
remote_execution_data
: numeric.remote_execution proc
: boolean (0 FALSE, non-zero TRUE).remote_execution_data_string
: alphanumeric (string).remote_execution_data_inc
: incremental (ratio).In addition, the following parameters must be defined:
The behavior of the module is identical when it comes to assigning alerts, generating events or viewing reports.
As of version 743, the pandora_server.conf
file must have tokens for configuring the following parameters related to remote module execution: ssh_launcher
, rcmd_timeout
and rcmd_timeout_bin
.
get
command against an SNMP device.Pandora FMS works with SNMP managing individual Object Identifiers or Object IDentifiers (OID), so each OID is a network module.
Necessary steps to work with SNMP
remote_snmp_inc
if it is to be monitored properly.Pandora FMS includes some OIDs in its database that you can use directly. MIBs are a collection of definitions that define the properties of the managed object within the device to be managed.
There are more MIBs included in Pandora FMS and with the Enterprise version MIB packages are included for different devices.
To be able to monitor any other element via SNMP, its SNMP community must be known. During module creation you must select Manual setup. In the Type field there are three options for SNMP, selecting one of them will expand the form showing the additional fields for SNMP.
A Software Agent is generally used to obtain local data, however it can also perform SNMP monitoring.
On GNU/Linux®
snmpget is usually installed by default, so it can be called from themodule_exec line.
module_exec snmpget -v <version> -c <community> <IP address> <numeric OID>
It should be noted that only “basic” OIDs are translatable by their numerical equivalent, and that it is advisable to always use numerical OIDs, since it is not known if the tool will know how to translate it or not. In any case you can always load the MIBs in the directory:
/usr/share/snmp/mibs.
On MS Windows®
snmpget.exe (which is part of the net-snmp project, licensed under the BSD license) is added to the Software Agent along with the basic MIBs, plus a wrapper to encapsulate the call. Similar to Linux, you can load the MIBs into the directory:
/util/mibs.
Pandora FMS by default uses the MIBs that are hosted by the operating system in:
/usr/share/snmp/mibs.
New MIBs can be added (and managed later) via the MIB uploader functionality from the Operation menu → Monitoring → SNMP.
These MIBs are only used by Pandora FMS and are stored in the route:
{PANDORA_CONSOLE}/attachment/mibs.
This functionality only manages the MIBs for SNMP Polling, in the case of SNMP Traps see the chapter Monitoring with SNMP traps.
The SNMP Browser performs a complete walk-through of the device tree. This operation can take several minutes, and it is possible to traverse precise branches and shorten the traversal. It is accessed from Monitoring → SNMP → SNMP Browser.
The system will request that information from the system and will also display (if available) the requested OID information. If there is no information about the OID of the device, it is displayed only in numeric format. The descriptive information of the OIDs is stored by the managed information bases or MIB. If you don't have a MIB for the device you want to explore, you probably have to resort to looking for “pieces of information” in the information displayed by Pandora FMS, which is complex and takes time.
The SNMP browser also allows you to search for a text string both in the obtained OID values and in the translated values of the OID themselves (if available). This is especially useful for searching for specific known strings and locating their OID. If it locates several entries, it will allow us to jump from one occurrence to another, and it will show them highlighted in yellow.
It is possible to select several OID and add them to an agent by clicking the Create agent modules button. To do this, the agents that will be monitored with said OID are selected and added to the box on the right. You can also select multiple OID to add to a monitoring policy.
SNMP Wizard
Administration view of an agent.
You must define the destination IP address, community and other optional parameters (SNMP v3 is supported) to do an SNMP Walk to the target. Once the information is received correctly, a form will appear for the creation of modules such as Devices, Processes, Free space on disk, Temperature sensors and Other SNMP data.
The type of module is selected and added to the creation list. When this process is finished, you can click on the Create Modules button.
This wizard will create two types of modules:
For plugin type modules we will use the remote SNMP plugin, so if the plugin is not installed on the system, these features will remain disabled. The plugin should have the name snmp_remote.pl regardless of its location.
In order for the SNMP wizard to be able to obtain data from an SNMP device thanks to the remote components, it is necessary to meet 2 requirements:
If the scanned device meets these requirements, all modules from which data could be obtained will be displayed to give the opportunity to select which to create and which not.
Once the Create modules button is pressed, a summary list of the chosen modules will be displayed.go with your setup. In this list you will see the modules that cannot be created, either because they already exist in the agent or because 2 or more modules with the same name have been configured in the wizard itself.
Take into account that if the value of the Module collected by the wizard is of type incremental or absolute incremental, said value is not the increment itself but a reference value. To obtain an incremental value, two readings are necessary, for this reason the value of the Module will indicate “zero” until the next reading is performed.
Before they are added to the agent, there will be one last chance to confirm the creation of these modules or to cancel it and continue modifying the output of the wizard.
SNMP interface wizard
This Wizard navigates the SNMP branch IF-MIB::interfaces, offering the possibility to create multiple modules of various interfaces with multiple selection. After selecting the destination IP address, community, etc., the system will make an SNMP query to the destination machine and fill in the module creation form.
In order for the interface SNMP wizard to obtain data from an SNMP device, the SNMP device must return data from the IF-MIB branch.
Once the creation of the modules has been confirmed, it will be re-evaluated one by one if they can be created or not, to avoid duplicate modules in the event that the same modules have been created by another means during the confirmation time.
We will be notified if the process could be completed successfully or, on the contrary, there has been a module that could not be created.
WMI is a technology used in the Microsoft® operating system (O.S.) to obtain remote information from computers running Windows®; It is available from the Windows XP version up to the latest versions. WMI allows you to obtain all kinds of information from the OS, applications and even hardware. WMI queries can be made locally with the Software Agent (by calling the OS API) or remotely.
In some systems, remote access to WMI is not activated and it must be activated to be able to be consulted from the outside.
It is necessary to enable the wmiserver component in the Pandora FMS server configuration file.
# wmiserver : 1 or 0. Set to 1 to activate WMI server with this setup # DISABLED BY DEFAULT wmiserver 1
Queries are made in WQL, a kind of Microsoft®-specific SQL language, for any object that appears in the WMI system database.
To start monitoring by WMI, you must first create the corresponding agent, then click on the upper tab of the modules (Modules). Once there, select Create a new WMI server module and press the Create. button
WMI specific fields:
Used to navigate and create modules with WMI queries to a specific agent. In the Agent Wizard (tab in the administration view of an agent), click on the icon:
You must specify the username and password that have permissions to make WMI queries (or, failing that, the Administrator's) on the destination server to make the first WMI queries. This information will be used for the creation of modules.
With the WMI Wizard it is possible to create modules of different types of WMI information:
You must have WMI wizard components registered and enabled in Pandora: in this way, all the modules from which data could be obtained will be displayed in order to have the opportunityd to create them or not.
These modules will be shown organized in blocks based on the group to which the component of the wizard that generated them belongs.
All the blocks will be shown compressed at first to facilitate the visualization and they can be expanded to modify the selected ones or the data. In addition, in each block where modules have been marked for creation, you will see an informative icon that will indicate.
If we deploy a block, it will be possible to choose the modules that will be added and those that will not be added, as well as the option to modify the name, the description or the thresholds of each module individually.
Once the Create modules button is pressed, a list will be displayed with a summary of the chosen modules with their configuration. In this list you will see the modules that cannot be created, either because they already exist in the agent or because two or more modules with the same name have been configured in the same wizard.
Despite all the modifications that are made, there will be one last opportunity to confirm the creation of these modules or to cancel it and continue modifying the wizard result.
Once the creation of the modules has been confirmed, it will be re-evaluated one by one if they can be created or not, to avoid duplicate modules in the event that the same modules have been created by another means during the confirmation time.
The wizard will notify you if the process could be completed successfully or if, on the contrary, there has been a module that could not be created.
A remote plugin is a script or executable file that takes parameters and returns a single and unique value. The result could be a number, a boolean value (0 = error, OK <> 0 ), or a text string. A remote plugin usually allows input parameters. By default several server plugins come installed and ready to use and the user can always add the ones he needs.
There are two kinds of remote plugin: standard and type Nagios. The difference is mainly that the Nagios type respond with an error level and also, optionally, with a descriptive string.
It is accessed by Management → Servers → Plugins, a new window will open with a list of registered plugins. Each item has its corresponding edit and delete buttons, except if it has modules in use which can be listed using the Lock button.
When editing a plugin:
In a similar way to alerts, you can also use internal macros in plugin settings. The supported macros are the following:
_agent_
or _agentalias_
: Alias of the agent to which the module belongs._agentname_
: Name of the agent to which the module belongs._agentdescription_
: Description of the agent to which the module belongs._agentstatus_
: Current status of the agent._address_
: Address of the agent to which the module belongs._module_
: Name of the module._modulegroup_
: Module group name._moduledescription_
: Description of the module._modulestatus_
: Module status._moduletags_
: Labels (tags) associated to the module._id_agent_
: Agent ID, useful to directly build the URL or redirect to the Pandora FMS Console._id_module_
: Module ID._policy_
: Name of the policy to which the module belongs if one is established._interval_
: Module execution interval._target_ip_
: IP address of the destination of the module._target_port_
: Module destination port._plugin_parameters_
: Module plugin parameters.* _email_tag_
: emails associated with module tags.Custom field macros allow you to use the agent custom fields as macros for certain module configuration options.
Custom field macros work with SNMP, WMI, plug-in, and inventory type modules. They can be used in stand-alone modules, network components, and in policy modules.
It is accessed by Management → Resources → Custom fields → Create field in this new custom field the SNMP community string will be stored. Note its ID, as it will later be part of the macro, and fill in the community string with the appropriate value in your SNMP agents.
Then you must create a componentes_de_red_componente_network SNMP to which you must enter _agentcustomfield_<n>_
as a string in SNMP community, where n is the ID of the custom field created.
Only for PFMS servers installed on GNU/Linux.
This feature allows to execute some actions in remote Pandora FMS servers from Pandora FMS console.
Once you have configured at least one Exec server you may choose from:
Depending on the server selected when launching each wizard, the modules adapted for server or Satellite Server will be created. In the latter case, the modules will be written in the remote configuration file so that they can be executed by the server.
The Exec servers work internally through the execution of remote SSH commands from Pandora FMS console to the enabled servers, called Exec Server. These can be Network servers or Pandora FMS Satellite servers.
The configuration process will require the assistance of the person in charge of network administration to configure both PFMS servers and the target computers and the connection and data traffic, among other aspects such as firewalls and VLAN to increase security.
Without remote configuration enabled you will lack the ability to create Satellite modules from the wizards (wizards).
See the technical annex for more information.
Pandora FMS offers by default the monitoring of complete routes between two points in the network, visually indicating the path that is being followed at all times to communicate between these two points. Pandora FMS route analyzer uses an agent plugin to map the route.
To use this system you need:
Optionally, if you want to do route scans over the Internet, it is recommended that you deploy the MTR application on the route source computer.
Access the agent plugins configuration tab and add the following line:
route_parser -t <target_address>
Finally activate the execution of the plugin.