Munin is a great open-source monitoring solution for servers. I’ve used it in the past and was really happy with the results, but when I was using it my server was just a little VPS and running the server and node on the same box caused some system resource issues. But now having colo equipment in the rack at DimeNOC I decided to give it another go.
Installation was pretty much straightforward, the instructions on their website were sufficient to get the server up and running. There was some confusion, however, getting some plugins to play nicely. So, to pick up where the official installation instructions left off, I’ll go over some of the issues and solutions I was able to come up with.
What you’ll need to know from the installation
The location of the munin logfiles. You can set this in the munin.conf file. I used /var/log, seemed like the obvious choice. Your preferences may vary.
The location of your munin config files, and plugins.
Config files are typically placed in /etc/opt/munin/
Plugin files are typically in /etc/opt/munin/plugins
Plugin special configs are typically in /etc/opt/munin/plugin-conf.d
If you installed from source, you should have all that information in the installation scrollback. If you installed from an RPM, first try the paths above; if they’re not there then time to run the ‘ol trusty updatedb and do a locate.
Ok, so now that we have all that stuff taken care of, it’s time to dive right in. By default, there are no plugins enabled. In order to enable them we need to put them in the /etc/opt/munin/plugins directory. If you’d like some help determining what plugins to use, run the munin-node-configure script that came with the installation:
Plugin | Used | Suggestions
—— | —- | ———–
acpi | yes | yes
amavis | no | no
apache_accesses | yes | yes
apache_processes | yes | yes
apache_volume | yes | yes
apc_envunit_ | no | no [no units to monitor]
bonding_err_ | no
.....Continue reading Munin plugins and system configuration..
