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Using NMIS to monitor services

Using NMIS to monitor services

Jul 17, 2024

Who watches the watcher?  It is important when using a monitoring/management system that you know it is operational, with some level of beneficial recursion, NMIS supports many techniques for managing servers and applications.  You should ensure that something in your environment is watching NMIS.

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Table of Contents

Introduction

NMIS can be used to monitor many services, including the services that it depends on itself. This can be useful in root cause analysis if NMIS has problems.

Common services to monitor for FirstWave NMIS servers are listed below. We also keep an up to date copy of the Services.nmis (the mapped file for NMIS services) file, which can be found in our GitHub: https://github.com/Opmantek/nmis9/blob/nmis9_dev/conf-default/Services.nmis.

The current services shipping with NMIS9 at this time are:

  • NMIS9 Workers

  • NMIS9 Scheduler

  • MongoDB

  • Opmantek Web Daemon

  • "OMK Stack HTTP" or "OMK Stack HTTPS"

  • SSL Expiry Check

  • opEvents Daemon

  • opConfig Daemon

  • opCharts Daemon

Also, it is good to monitor:

  • crond

  • syslog

  • ssh

opHA

When running multiple servers utilizing opHA, it is common practice to have the Main Primary monitor all the pollers and itself.

If available it is also recommend to have a primary "watch the watcher", i.e. monitor the Main Primary and the pollers as well.

Accessing the Services List

In the NMIS GUI navigate to the node you’re interested in.  At the top of the node, click “service list”.

This will bring up a list of the services that particular node is monitoring.

Configuring NMIS to monitor a service

Step 1

When in the NMIS GUI click System, then System Configuration then NMIS Nodes (devices)

Step 2

Scroll down the list and find the node you wish to monitor services on.  Click “edit” in the actions column.

Step 3

Scroll down in the widget that pops up until you reach the Services section and select the services you wish to begin monitoring.  Note that you can select multiple services by holding Ctrl/Control (for PC/Linux) or Command (macOS).

Step 4

Click “Edit and Update Node”.  After the next polling cycle (usually about five minutes) you should see that the new services are being monitored.

Services Required for NMIS Modules

NMIS

NMIS requires the following services to run:

  • snmpd

  • mongod

  • omkd

  • nmis9d

  • httpd/apache (or nginx)

  • crond

opCharts

opCharts requires the same services as NMIS, with the addition of the below service:

  • opchartsd

opEvents

opEvents requires the same services as NMIS, with the addition of the below service:

  • opeventsd

opConfig

opConfig requires the same services as NMIS, with the addition of the below service:

  • opconfigd

opFlow

opFlow requires the same services as NMIS, with the addition of the below service:

  • opflowd