97 KiB
Monitoring Basics
This part of the Icinga 2 documentation provides an overview of all the basic monitoring concepts you need to know to run Icinga 2.
Hosts and Services
Icinga 2 can be used to monitor the availability of hosts and services. Hosts and services can be virtually anything which can be checked in some way:
- Network services (HTTP, SMTP, SNMP, SSH, etc.)
- Printers
- Switches / routers
- Temperature sensors
- Other local or network-accessible services
Host objects provide a mechanism to group services that are running on the same physical device.
Here is an example of a host object which defines two child services:
object Host "my-server1" {
address = "10.0.0.1"
check_command = "hostalive"
}
object Service "ping4" {
host_name = "my-server1"
check_command = "ping4"
}
object Service "http" {
host_name = "my-server1"
check_command = "http"
}
The example creates two services ping4
and http
which belong to the
host my-server1
.
It also specifies that the host should perform its own check using the hostalive
check command.
The address
attribute is used by check commands to determine which network
address is associated with the host object.
Details on troubleshooting check problems can be found here.
Host States
Hosts can be in any of the following states:
Name | Description |
---|---|
UP | The host is available. |
DOWN | The host is unavailable. |
Service States
Services can be in any of the following states:
Name | Description |
---|---|
OK | The service is working properly. |
WARNING | The service is experiencing some problems but is still considered to be in working condition. |
CRITICAL | The service is in a critical state. |
UNKNOWN | The check could not determine the service's state. |
Hard and Soft States
When detecting a problem with a host/service Icinga re-checks the object a number of
times (based on the max_check_attempts
and retry_interval
settings) before sending
notifications. This ensures that no unnecessary notifications are sent for
transient failures. During this time the object is in a SOFT
state.
After all re-checks have been executed and the object is still in a non-OK
state the host/service switches to a HARD
state and notifications are sent.
Name | Description |
---|---|
HARD | The host/service's state hasn't recently changed. |
SOFT | The host/service has recently changed state and is being re-checked. |
Host and Service Checks
Hosts and Services determine their state from a check result returned from a check
execution to the Icinga 2 application. By default the generic-host
example template
will define hostalive
as host check. If your host is unreachable for ping, you should
consider using a different check command, for instance the http
check command, or if
there is no check available, the dummy
check command.
object Host "uncheckable-host" {
check_command = "dummy"
vars.dummy_state = 1
vars.dummy_text = "Pretending to be OK."
}
Service checks could also use a dummy
check, but the common strategy is to
integrate an existing plugin as
check command and reference
that in your Service object definition.
Configuration Best Practice
The Getting Started chapter already introduced various aspects of the Icinga 2 configuration language. If you are ready to configure additional hosts, services, notifications, dependencies, etc, you should think about the requirements first and then decide for a possible strategy.
There are many ways of creating Icinga 2 configuration objects:
- Manually with your preferred editor, for example vi(m), nano, notepad, etc.
- Generated by a configuration management too such as Puppet, Chef, Ansible, etc.
- A configuration addon for Icinga 2
- A custom exporter script from your CMDB or inventory tool
- your own.
In order to find the best strategy for your own configuration, ask yourself the following questions:
- Do your hosts share a common group of services (for example linux hosts with disk, load, etc checks)?
- Only a small set of users receives notifications and escalations for all hosts/services?
If you can at least answer one of these questions with yes, look for the apply rules logic instead of defining objects on a per host and service basis.
- You are required to define specific configuration for each host/service?
- Does your configuration generation tool already know about the host-service-relationship?
Then you should look for the object specific configuration setting host_name
etc accordingly.
Finding the best files and directory tree for your configuration is up to you. Make sure that the icinga2.conf configuration file includes them, and then think about:
- tree-based on locations, hostgroups, specific host attributes with sub levels of directories.
- flat
hosts.conf
,services.conf
, etc files for rule based configuration. - generated configuration with one file per host and a global configuration for groups, users, etc.
- one big file generated from an external application (probably a bad idea for maintaining changes).
- your own.
In either way of choosing the right strategy you should additionally check the following:
- Are there any specific attributes describing the host/service you could set as
vars
custom attributes? You can later use them for applying assign/ignore rules, or export them into external interfaces. - Put hosts into hostgroups, services into servicegroups and use these attributes for your apply rules.
- Use templates to store generic attributes for your objects and apply rules making your configuration more readable. Details can be found in the using templates chapter.
- Apply rules may overlap. Keep a central place (for example, services.conf or notifications.conf) storing the configuration instead of defining apply rules deep in your configuration tree.
- Every plugin used as check, notification or event command requires a
Command
definition. Further details can be looked up in the check commands chapter.
If you happen to have further questions, do not hesitate to join the community support channels and ask community members for their experience and best practices.
Object Inheritance Using Templates
Templates may be used to apply a set of identical attributes to more than one object:
template Service "generic-service" {
max_check_attempts = 3
check_interval = 5m
retry_interval = 1m
enable_perfdata = true
}
template Service "ipv6-service {
notes = "IPv6 critical != IPv4 broken."
}
apply Service "ping4" {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "ping4"
assign where host.address
}
apply Service "ping6" {
import "generic-service"
import "ipv6-service"
check_command = "ping6"
assign where host.address6
}
In this example the ping4
and ping6
services inherit properties from the
template generic-service
. The ping6
service additionally imports the ipv6-service
template with the notes
attribute.
Objects as well as templates themselves can import an arbitrary number of templates. Attributes inherited from a template can be overridden in the object if necessary.
You can import existing non-template objects into objects which requires you to use unique names for templates and objects sharing the same namespace.
Example for importing objects:
object CheckCommand "snmp-simple" {
...
vars.snmp_defaults = ...
}
object CheckCommand "snmp-advanced" {
import "snmp-simple"
...
vars.snmp_advanced = ...
}
Apply objects based on rules
Instead of assigning each object (Service,
Notification, Dependency,
ScheduledDowntime)
based on attribute identifiers for example host_name
objects can be applied.
Before you start using the apply rules keep the following in mind:
- Define the best match.
- A set of unique custom attributes for these hosts/services?
- Or group memberships, e.g. a host being a member of a hostgroup, applying services to it?
- A generic pattern match on the host/service name?
- Multiple expressions combined with
&&
or||
operators
- All expressions must return a boolean value (an empty string is equal to
false
e.g.)
Note
You can set/override object attributes in apply rules using the respectively available objects in that scope (host and/or service objects).
Custom attributes can also store nested dictionaries and arrays. That way you can use them for not only matching for their existance or values in apply expressions, but also assign ("inherit") their values into the generated objected from apply rules.
- Apply services to hosts
- Apply notifications to hosts and services
- Apply dependencies to hosts and services
- Apply scheduled downtimes to hosts and services
A more advanced example is using apply with for loops on arrays or dictionaries for example provided by custom atttributes or groups.
Tip
Building configuration in that dynamic way requires detailed information of the generated objects. Use the
object list
CLI command after successful configuration validation.
Apply Rules Expressions
You can use simple or advanced combinations of apply rule expressions. Each
expression must evaluate into the boolean true
value. An empty string
will be for instance interpreted as false
. In a similar fashion undefined
attributes will return false
.
Returns false
:
assign where host.vars.attribute_does_not_exist
Multiple assign where
condition rows are evaluated as OR
condition.
You can combine multiple expressions for matching only a subset of objects. In some cases,
you want to be able to add more than one assign/ignore where expression which matches
a specific condition. To achieve this you can use the logical and
and or
operators.
Match all *mysql*
patterns in the host name and (&&
) custom attribute prod_mysql_db
matches the db-*
pattern. All hosts with the custom attribute test_server
set to true
should be ignored, or any host name ending with *internal
pattern.
object HostGroup "mysql-server" {
display_name = "MySQL Server"
assign where match("*mysql*", host.name) && match("db-*", host.vars.prod_mysql_db)
ignore where host.vars.test_server == true
ignore where match("*internal", host.name)
}
Similar example for advanced notification apply rule filters: If the service
attribute notes
contains the has gold support 24x7
string AND
one of the
two condition passes: Either the customer
host custom attribute is set to customer-xy
OR
the host custom attribute always_notify
is set to true
.
The notification is ignored for services whose host name ends with *internal
OR
the priority
custom attribute is less than 2
.
template Notification "cust-xy-notification" {
users = [ "noc-xy", "mgmt-xy" ]
command = "mail-service-notification"
}
apply Notification "notify-cust-xy-mysql" to Service {
import "cust-xy-notification"
assign where match("*has gold support 24x7*", service.notes) && (host.vars.customer == "customer-xy" || host.vars.always_notify == true
ignore where match("*internal", host.name) || (service.vars.priority < 2 && host.vars.is_clustered == true)
}
Apply Services to Hosts
The sample configuration already ships a detailed example in hosts.conf and services.conf for this use case.
The example for ssh
applies a service object to all hosts with the address
attribute being defined and the custom attribute os
set to the string Linux
in vars
.
apply Service "ssh" {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "ssh"
assign where host.address && host.vars.os == "Linux"
}
Other detailed scenario examples are used in their respective chapters, for example apply services with custom command arguments.
Apply Notifications to Hosts and Services
Notifications are applied to specific targets (Host
or Service
) and work in a similar
manner:
apply Notification "mail-noc" to Service {
import "mail-service-notification"
user_groups = [ "noc" ]
assign where host.vars.notification.mail
}
In this example the mail-noc
notification will be created as object for all services having the
notification.mail
custom attribute defined. The notification command is set to mail-service-notification
and all members of the user group noc
will get notified.
Apply Dependencies to Hosts and Services
Detailed examples can be found in the dependencies chapter.
Apply Recurring Downtimes to Hosts and Services
The sample confituration ships an example in downtimes.conf.
Detailed examples can be found in the recurring downtimes chapter.
Using Apply For Rules
Next to the standard way of using apply rules there is the requirement of generating apply rules objects based on set (array or dictionary). That way you'll save quite of a lot of duplicated apply rules by combining them into one generic generating the object name with or without a prefix.
The sample configuration already ships a detailed example in hosts.conf and services.conf for this use case.
Imagine a different example: You are monitoring your switch (hosts) with many interfaces (services). The following requirements/problems apply:
- Each interface service check should be named with a prefix and a running number
- Each interface has its own vlan tag
- Some interfaces have QoS enabled
- Additional attributes such as
display_name
ornotes,
notes_urland
action_url` must be dynamically generated
By defining the interfaces
dictionary with three example interfaces on the core-switch
host object, you'll make sure to pass the storage required by the for loop in the service apply
rule.
object Host "core-switch" {
import "generic-host"
address = "127.0.0.1"
vars.interfaces["0"] = {
port = 1
vlan = "internal"
address = "127.0.0.2"
qos = "enabled"
}
vars.interfaces["1"] = {
port = 2
vlan = "mgmt"
address = "127.0.1.2"
}
vars.interfaces["2"] = {
port = 3
vlan = "remote"
address = "127.0.2.2"
}
}
You can also omit the "if-"
string, then all generated service names are directly
taken from the if_name
variable value.
The config dictionary contains all key-value pairs for the specific interface in one
loop cycle, like port
, vlan
, address
and qos
for the 0
interface.
By defining a default value for the custom attribute qos
in the vars
dictionary
before adding the config
dictionary we''ll ensure that this attribute is always defined.
After vars
is fully populated, all object attributes can be set. For strings, you can use
string concatention with the +
operator.
You can also specifiy the check command that way.
apply Service "if-" for (if_name => config in host.vars.interfaces) {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "ping4"
vars.qos = "disabled"
vars += config
display_name = "if-" + if_name + "-" + vars.vlan
notes = "Interface check for Port " + string(vars.port) + " in VLAN " + vars.vlan + " on Address " + vars.address + " QoS " + vars.qos
notes_url = "http://foreman.company.com/hosts/" + host.name
action_url = "http://snmp.checker.company.com/" + host.name + "if-" + if_name
assign where host.vars.interfaces
}
Note that numbers must be explicitely casted to string when adding to strings. This can be achieved by wrapping them into the string() function.
Tip
Building configuration in that dynamic way requires detailed information of the generated objects. Use the
object list
CLI command after successful configuration validation.
Use Object Attributes in Apply Rules
Since apply rules are evaluated after the generic objects, you can reference existing host and/or service object attributes as values for any object attribute specified in that apply rule.
object Host "opennebula-host" {
import "generic-host"
address = "10.1.1.2"
vars.hosting["xyz"] = {
http_uri = "/shop"
customer_name = "Customer xyz"
customer_id = "7568"
support_contract = "gold"
}
vars.hosting["abc"] = {
http_uri = "/shop"
customer_name = "Customer xyz"
customer_id = "7568"
support_contract = "silver"
}
}
apply Service for (customer => config in host.vars.hosting) {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "ping4"
vars.qos = "disabled"
vars += config
vars.http_uri = "/" + vars.customer + "/" + config.http_uri
display_name = "Shop Check for " + vars.customer_name + "-" + vars.customer_id
notes = "Support contract: " + vars.support_contract + " for Customer " + vars.customer_name + " (" + vars.customer_id + ")."
notes_url = "http://foreman.company.com/hosts/" + host.name
action_url = "http://snmp.checker.company.com/" + host.name + "/" + vars.customer_id
assign where host.vars.hosting
}
Groups
Groups are used for combining hosts, services, and users into accessible configuration attributes and views in external (web) interfaces.
Group membership is defined at the respective object itself. If
you have a hostgroup name windows
for example, and want to assign
specific hosts to this group for later viewing the group on your
alert dashboard, first create the hostgroup:
object HostGroup "windows" {
display_name = "Windows Servers"
}
Then add your hosts to this hostgroup
template Host "windows-server" {
groups += [ "windows" ]
}
object Host "mssql-srv1" {
import "windows-server"
vars.mssql_port = 1433
}
object Host "mssql-srv2" {
import "windows-server"
vars.mssql_port = 1433
}
This can be done for service and user groups the same way. Additionally
the user groups are associated as attributes in Notification
objects.
object UserGroup "windows-mssql-admins" {
display_name = "Windows MSSQL Admins"
}
template User "generic-windows-mssql-users" {
groups += [ "windows-mssql-admins" ]
}
object User "win-mssql-noc" {
import "generic-windows-mssql-users"
email = "noc@example.com"
}
object User "win-mssql-ops" {
import "generic-windows-mssql-users"
email = "ops@example.com"
}
Group Membership Assign
If there is a certain number of hosts, services, or users matching a pattern
it's reasonable to assign the group object to these members.
Details on the assign where
syntax can be found here
object HostGroup "prod-mssql" {
display_name = "Production MSSQL Servers"
assign where host.vars.mssql_port && host.vars.prod_mysql_db
ignore where host.vars.test_server == true
ignore where match("*internal", host.name)
}
In this inherited example from above all hosts with the vars
attribute mssql_port
set will be added as members to the host group mssql
. All *internal
hosts or with the test_server
attribute set to true
will be ignored.
Notifications
Notifications for service and host problems are an integral part of your monitoring setup.
When a host or service is in a downtime, a problem has been acknowledged or the dependency logic determined that the host/service is unreachable, no notifications are sent. You can configure additional type and state filters refining the notifications being actually sent.
There are many ways of sending notifications, e.g. by e-mail, XMPP, IRC, Twitter, etc. On its own Icinga 2 does not know how to send notifications. Instead it relies on external mechanisms such as shell scripts to notify users.
A notification specification requires one or more users (and/or user groups)
who will be notified in case of problems. These users must have all custom
attributes defined which will be used in the NotificationCommand
on execution.
The user icingaadmin
in the example below will get notified only on WARNING
and
CRITICAL
states and problem
and recovery
notification types.
object User "icingaadmin" {
display_name = "Icinga 2 Admin"
enable_notifications = true
states = [ OK, Warning, Critical ]
types = [ Problem, Recovery ]
email = "icinga@localhost"
}
If you don't set the states
and types
configuration attributes for the User
object, notifications for all states and types will be sent.
Details on troubleshooting notification problems can be found here.
Note
Make sure that the notification feature is enabled on your master instance in order to execute notification commands.
You should choose which information you (and your notified users) are interested in case of emergency, and also which information does not provide any value to you and your environment.
An example notification command is explained here.
You can add all shared attributes to a Notification
template which is inherited
to the defined notifications. That way you'll save duplicated attributes in each
Notification
object. Attributes can be overridden locally.
template Notification "generic-notification" {
interval = 15m
command = "mail-service-notification"
states = [ Warning, Critical, Unknown ]
types = [ Problem, Acknowledgement, Recovery, Custom, FlappingStart,
FlappingEnd, DowntimeStart, DowntimeEnd, DowntimeRemoved ]
period = "24x7"
}
The time period 24x7
is shipped as example configuration with Icinga 2.
Use the apply
keyword to create Notification
objects for your services:
apply Notification "notify-cust-xy-mysql" to Service {
import "generic-notification"
users = [ "noc-xy", "mgmt-xy" ]
assign where match("*has gold support 24x7*", service.notes) && (host.vars.customer == "customer-xy" || host.vars.always_notify == true
ignore where match("*internal", host.name) || (service.vars.priority < 2 && host.vars.is_clustered == true)
}
Instead of assigning users to notifications, you can also add the user_groups
attribute with a list of user groups to the Notification
object. Icinga 2 will
send notifications to all group members.
Note
Only users who have been notified of a problem before (
Warning
,Critical
,Unknown
states for services,Down
for hosts) will receiveRecovery
notifications.
Notification Escalations
When a problem notification is sent and a problem still exists at the time of re-notification you may want to escalate the problem to the next support level. A different approach is to configure the default notification by email, and escalate the problem via SMS if not already solved.
You can define notification start and end times as additional configuration
attributes making the Notification
object a so-called notification escalation
.
Using templates you can share the basic notification attributes such as users or the
interval
(and override them for the escalation then).
Using the example from above, you can define additional users being escalated for SMS notifications between start and end time.
object User "icinga-oncall-2nd-level" {
display_name = "Icinga 2nd Level"
vars.mobile = "+1 555 424642"
}
object User "icinga-oncall-1st-level" {
display_name = "Icinga 1st Level"
vars.mobile = "+1 555 424642"
}
Define an additional NotificationCommand for SMS notifications.
Note
The example is not complete as there are many different SMS providers. Please note that sending SMS notifications will require an SMS provider or local hardware with a SIM card active.
object NotificationCommand "sms-notification" {
command = [
PluginDir + "/send_sms_notification",
"$mobile$",
"..."
}
The two new notification escalations are added onto the local host
and its service ping4
using the generic-notification
template.
The user icinga-oncall-2nd-level
will get notified by SMS (sms-notification
command) after 30m
until 1h
.
Note
The
interval
was set to 15m in thegeneric-notification
template example. Lower that value in your escalations by using a secondary template or by overriding the attribute directly in thenotifications
array position forescalation-sms-2nd-level
.
If the problem does not get resolved nor acknowledged preventing further notifications
the escalation-sms-1st-level
user will be escalated 1h
after the initial problem was
notified, but only for one hour (2h
as end
key for the times
dictionary).
apply Notification "mail" to Service {
import "generic-notification"
command = "mail-notification"
users = [ "icingaadmin" ]
assign where service.name == "ping4"
}
apply Notification "escalation-sms-2nd-level" to Service {
import "generic-notification"
command = "sms-notification"
users = [ "icinga-oncall-2nd-level" ]
times = {
begin = 30m
end = 1h
}
assign where service.name == "ping4"
}
apply Notification "escalation-sms-1st-level" to Service {
import "generic-notification"
command = "sms-notification"
users = [ "icinga-oncall-1st-level" ]
times = {
begin = 1h
end = 2h
}
assign where service.name == "ping4"
}
Notification Delay
Sometimes the problem in question should not be notified when the notification is due
(the object reaching the HARD
state) but a defined time duration afterwards. In Icinga 2
you can use the times
dictionary and set begin = 15m
as key and value if you want to
postpone the notification window for 15 minutes. Leave out the end
key - if not set,
Icinga 2 will not check against any end time for this notification. Make sure to
specify a relatively low notification interval
to get notified soon enough again.
apply Notification "mail" to Service {
import "generic-notification"
command = "mail-notification"
users = [ "icingaadmin" ]
interval = 5m
times.begin = 15m // delay notification window
assign where service.name == "ping4"
}
Disable Re-notifications
If you prefer to be notified only once, you can disable re-notifications by setting the
interval
attribute to 0
.
apply Notification "notify-once" to Service {
import "generic-notification"
command = "mail-notification"
users = [ "icingaadmin" ]
interval = 0 // disable re-notification
assign where service.name == "ping4"
}
Notification Filters by State and Type
If there are no notification state and type filter attributes defined at the Notification
or User
object Icinga 2 assumes that all states and types are being notified.
Available state and type filters for notifications are:
template Notification "generic-notification" {
states = [ Warning, Critical, Unknown ]
types = [ Problem, Acknowledgement, Recovery, Custom, FlappingStart,
FlappingEnd, DowntimeStart, DowntimeEnd, DowntimeRemoved ]
}
If you are familiar with Icinga 1.x notification_options
please note that they have been split
into type and state to allow more fine granular filtering for example on downtimes and flapping.
You can filter for acknowledgements and custom notifications too.s and custom notifications too.
Time Periods
Time Periods define time ranges in Icinga where event actions are
triggered, for example whether a service check is executed or not within
the check_period
attribute. Or a notification should be sent to
users or not, filtered by the period
and notification_period
configuration attributes for Notification
and User
objects.
Note
If you are familar with Icinga 1.x - these time period definitions are called
legacy timeperiods
in Icinga 2.An Icinga 2 legacy timeperiod requires the
ITL
provided templatelegacy-timeperiod
.
The TimePeriod
attribute ranges
may contain multiple directives,
including weekdays, days of the month, and calendar dates.
These types may overlap/override other types in your ranges dictionary.
The descending order of precedence is as follows:
- Calendar date (2008-01-01)
- Specific month date (January 1st)
- Generic month date (Day 15)
- Offset weekday of specific month (2nd Tuesday in December)
- Offset weekday (3rd Monday)
- Normal weekday (Tuesday)
If you don't set any check_period
or notification_period
attribute
on your configuration objects Icinga 2 assumes 24x7
as time period
as shown below.
object TimePeriod "24x7" {
import "legacy-timeperiod"
display_name = "Icinga 2 24x7 TimePeriod"
ranges = {
"monday" = "00:00-24:00"
"tuesday" = "00:00-24:00"
"wednesday" = "00:00-24:00"
"thursday" = "00:00-24:00"
"friday" = "00:00-24:00"
"saturday" = "00:00-24:00"
"sunday" = "00:00-24:00"
}
}
If your operation staff should only be notified during workhours
create a new timeperiod named workhours
defining a work day from
09:00 to 17:00.
object TimePeriod "workhours" {
import "legacy-timeperiod"
display_name = "Icinga 2 8x5 TimePeriod"
ranges = {
"monday" = "09:00-17:00"
"tuesday" = "09:00-17:00"
"wednesday" = "09:00-17:00"
"thursday" = "09:00-17:00"
"friday" = "09:00-17:00"
}
}
Use the period
attribute to assign time periods to
Notification
and Dependency
objects:
object Notification "mail" {
import "generic-notification"
host_name = "localhost"
command = "mail-notification"
users = [ "icingaadmin" ]
period = "workhours"
}
Commands
Icinga 2 uses three different command object types to specify how checks should be performed, notifications should be sent, and events should be handled.
Environment Variables for Commands
Please check Runtime Custom Attributes as Environment Variables.
Check Commands
CheckCommand objects define the command line how a check is called.
CheckCommand objects are referenced by
Host and Service objects
using the check_command
attribute.
Note
Make sure that the checker feature is enabled in order to execute checks.
Integrate the Plugin with a CheckCommand Definition
CheckCommand objects require the ITL template
plugin-check-command
to support native plugin based check methods.
Unless you have done so already, download your check plugin and put it
into the PluginDir directory. The following example uses the
check_disk
plugin shipped with the Monitoring Plugins package.
The plugin path and all command arguments are made a list of double-quoted string arguments for proper shell escaping.
Call the check_disk
plugin with the --help
parameter to see
all available options. Our example defines warning (-w
) and
critical (-c
) thresholds for the disk usage. Without any
partition defined (-p
) it will check all local partitions.
icinga@icinga2 $ /usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_disk --help
...
This plugin checks the amount of used disk space on a mounted file system
and generates an alert if free space is less than one of the threshold values
Usage:
check_disk -w limit -c limit [-W limit] [-K limit] {-p path | -x device}
[-C] [-E] [-e] [-f] [-g group ] [-k] [-l] [-M] [-m] [-R path ] [-r path ]
[-t timeout] [-u unit] [-v] [-X type] [-N type]
...
Note
Don't execute plugins as
root
and always use the absolute path to the plugin! Trust us.
Next step is to understand how command parameters are being passed from a host or service object, and add a CheckCommand definition based on these required parameters and/or default values.
Passing Check Command Parameters from Host or Service
Check command parameters are defined as custom attributes which can be accessed as runtime macros by the executed check command.
Define the default check command custom attribute disk_wfree
and disk_cfree
(freely definable naming schema) and their default threshold values. You can
then use these custom attributes as runtime macros for command arguments
on the command line.
Tip
Use a common command type as prefix for your command arguments to increase readability.
disk_wfree
helps understanding the context better than justwfree
as argument.
The default custom attributes can be overridden by the custom attributes
defined in the service using the check command my-disk
. The custom attributes
can also be inherited from a parent template using additive inheritance (+=
).
object CheckCommand "my-disk" {
import "plugin-check-command"
command = [ PluginDir + "/check_disk" ]
arguments = {
"-w" = "$disk_wfree$%"
"-c" = "$disk_cfree$%"
"-W" = "$disk_inode_wfree$%"
"-K" = "$disk_inode_cfree$%"
"-p" = "$disk_partitions$"
"-x" = "$disk_partitions_excluded$"
}
vars.disk_wfree = 20
vars.disk_cfree = 10
}
Note
A proper example for the
check_disk
plugin is already shipped with Icinga 2 ready to use with the plugin check commands.
The host localhost
with the applied service basic-partitions
checks a basic set of disk partitions
with modified custom attributes (warning thresholds at 10%
, critical thresholds at 5%
free disk space).
The custom attribute disk_partition
can either hold a single string or an array of
string values for passing multiple partitions to the check_disk
check plugin.
object Host "my-server" {
import "generic-host"
address = "127.0.0.1"
address6 = "::1"
vars.local_disks["basic-partitions"] = {
disk_partitions = [ "/", "/tmp", "/var", "/home" ]
}
}
apply Service for (disk => config in host.vars.local_disks) {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "my-disk"
vars += config
vars.disk_wfree = 10
vars.disk_cfree = 5
assign where host.vars.local_disks
}
More details on using arrays in custom attributes can be found in this chapter.
Command Arguments
By defining a check command line using the command
attribute Icinga 2
will resolve all macros in the static string or array. Sometimes it is
required to extend the arguments list based on a met condition evaluated
at command execution. Or making arguments optional - only set if the
macro value can be resolved by Icinga 2.
object CheckCommand "check_http" {
import "plugin-check-command"
command = [ PluginDir + "/check_http" ]
arguments = {
"-H" = "$http_vhost$"
"-I" = "$http_address$"
"-u" = "$http_uri$"
"-p" = "$http_port$"
"-S" = {
set_if = "$http_ssl$"
}
"--sni" = {
set_if = "$http_sni$"
}
"-a" = {
value = "$http_auth_pair$"
description = "Username:password on sites with basic authentication"
}
"--no-body" = {
set_if = "$http_ignore_body$"
}
"-r" = "$http_expect_body_regex$"
"-w" = "$http_warn_time$"
"-c" = "$http_critical_time$"
"-e" = "$http_expect$"
}
vars.http_address = "$address$"
vars.http_ssl = false
vars.http_sni = false
}
The example shows the check_http
check command defining the most common
arguments. Each of them is optional by default and will be omitted if
the value is not set. For example if the service calling the check command
does not have vars.http_port
set, it won't get added to the command
line.
If the vars.http_ssl
custom attribute is set in the service, host or command
object definition, Icinga 2 will add the -S
argument based on the set_if
numeric value to the command line. String values are not supported.
If the macro value cannot be resolved, Icinga 2 will not add the defined argument to the final command argument array. Empty strings for macro values won't omit the argument.
That way you can use the check_http
command definition for both, with and
without SSL enabled checks saving you duplicated command definitions.
Details on all available options can be found in the CheckCommand object definition.
Apply Services with Custom Command Arguments
Imagine the following scenario: The my-host1
host is reachable using the default port 22, while
the my-host2
host requires a different port on 2222. Both hosts are in the hostgroup my-linux-servers
.
object HostGroup "my-linux-servers" {
display_name = "Linux Servers"
assign where host.vars.os == "Linux"
}
/* this one has port 22 opened */
object Host "my-host1" {
import "generic-host"
address = "129.168.1.50"
vars.os = "Linux"
}
/* this one listens on a different ssh port */
object Host "my-host2" {
import "generic-host"
address = "129.168.2.50"
vars.os = "Linux"
vars.custom_ssh_port = 2222
}
All hosts in the my-linux-servers
hostgroup should get the my-ssh
service applied based on an
apply rule. The optional ssh_port
command argument should be inherited from the host
the service is applied to. If not set, the check command my-ssh
will omit the argument.
The host
argument is special: skip_key
tells Icinga 2 to ignore the key, and directly put the
value onto the command line. The order
attribute specifies that this argument is the first one
(-1
is smaller than the other defaults).
object CheckCommand "my-ssh" {
import "plugin-check-command"
command = [ PluginDir + "/check_ssh" ]
arguments = {
"-p" = "$ssh_port$"
"host" = {
value = "$ssh_address$"
skip_key = true
order = -1
}
}
vars.ssh_address = "$address$"
}
/* apply ssh service */
apply Service "my-ssh" {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "my-ssh"
//set the command argument for ssh port with a custom host attribute, if set
vars.ssh_port = "$host.vars.custom_ssh_port$"
assign where "my-linux-servers" in host.groups
}
The my-host1
will get the my-ssh
service checking on the default port:
[2014-05-26 21:52:23 +0200] notice/Process: Running command '/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_ssh', '129.168.1.50': PID 27281
The my-host2
will inherit the custom_ssh_port
variable to the service and execute a different command:
[2014-05-26 21:51:32 +0200] notice/Process: Running command '/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_ssh', '-p', '2222', '129.168.2.50': PID 26956
Notification Commands
NotificationCommand objects define how notifications are delivered to external interfaces (E-Mail, XMPP, IRC, Twitter, etc).
NotificationCommand objects are referenced by
Notification objects using the command
attribute.
NotificationCommand
objects require the ITL template
plugin-notification-command
to support native plugin-based notifications.
Note
Make sure that the notification feature is enabled on your master instance in order to execute notification commands.
Below is an example using runtime macros from Icinga 2 (such as $service.output$
for
the current check output) sending an email to the user(s) associated with the
notification itself ($user.email$
).
If you want to specify default values for some of the custom attribute definitions,
you can add a vars
dictionary as shown for the CheckCommand
object.
object NotificationCommand "mail-service-notification" {
import "plugin-notification-command"
command = [ SysconfDir + "/icinga2/scripts/mail-notification.sh" ]
env = {
NOTIFICATIONTYPE = "$notification.type$"
SERVICEDESC = "$service.name$"
HOSTALIAS = "$host.display_name$"
HOSTADDRESS = "$address$"
SERVICESTATE = "$service.state$"
LONGDATETIME = "$icinga.long_date_time$"
SERVICEOUTPUT = "$service.output$"
NOTIFICATIONAUTHORNAME = "$notification.author$"
NOTIFICATIONCOMMENT = "$notification.comment$"
HOSTDISPLAYNAME = "$host.display_name$"
SERVICEDISPLAYNAME = "$service.display_name$"
USEREMAIL = "$user.email$"
}
}
The command attribute in the mail-service-notification
command refers to the following
shell script. The macros specified in the env
array are exported
as environment variables and can be used in the notification script:
#!/usr/bin/env bash
template=$(cat <<TEMPLATE
***** Icinga *****
Notification Type: $NOTIFICATIONTYPE
Service: $SERVICEDESC
Host: $HOSTALIAS
Address: $HOSTADDRESS
State: $SERVICESTATE
Date/Time: $LONGDATETIME
Additional Info: $SERVICEOUTPUT
Comment: [$NOTIFICATIONAUTHORNAME] $NOTIFICATIONCOMMENT
TEMPLATE
)
/usr/bin/printf "%b" $template | mail -s "$NOTIFICATIONTYPE - $HOSTDISPLAYNAME - $SERVICEDISPLAYNAME is $SERVICESTATE" $USEREMAIL
Note
This example is for
exim
only. Requires changes forsendmail
and other MTAs.
While it's possible to specify the entire notification command right
in the NotificationCommand object it is generally advisable to create a
shell script in the /etc/icinga2/scripts
directory and have the
NotificationCommand object refer to that.
Event Commands
Unlike notifications event commands for hosts/services are called on every check execution if one of these conditions match:
- The host/service is in a soft state
- The host/service state changes into a hard state
- The host/service state recovers from a soft or hard state to OK/Up
EventCommand objects are referenced by
Host and Service objects
using the event_command
attribute.
Therefore the EventCommand
object should define a command line
evaluating the current service state and other service runtime attributes
available through runtime vars. Runtime macros such as $service.state_type$
and $service.state$
will be processed by Icinga 2 helping on fine-granular
events being triggered.
Common use case scenarios are a failing HTTP check requiring an immediate restart via event command, or if an application is locked and requires a restart upon detection.
EventCommand
objects require the ITL template plugin-event-command
to support native plugin based checks.
Use Event Commands to Restart Service Daemon
The following example will triggert a restart of the httpd
daemon
via ssh when the http
service check fails. If the service state is
OK
, it will not trigger any event action.
Requirements:
- ssh connection
- icinga user with public key authentication
- icinga user with sudo permissions for restarting the httpd daemon.
Example on Debian:
# ls /home/icinga/.ssh/
authorized_keys
# visudo
icinga ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: /etc/init.d/apache2 restart
Define a generic EventCommand object event_by_ssh
which can be used for all event commands triggered using ssh:
/* pass event commands through ssh */
object EventCommand "event_by_ssh" {
import "plugin-event-command"
command = [ PluginDir + "/check_by_ssh" ]
arguments = {
"-H" = "$event_by_ssh_address$"
"-p" = "$event_by_ssh_port$"
"-C" = "$event_by_ssh_command$"
"-l" = "$event_by_ssh_logname$"
"-i" = "$event_by_ssh_identity$"
"-q" = {
set_if = "$event_by_ssh_quiet$"
}
"-w" = "$event_by_ssh_warn$"
"-c" = "$event_by_ssh_crit$"
"-t" = "$event_by_ssh_timeout$"
}
vars.event_by_ssh_address = "$address$"
vars.event_by_ssh_quiet = false
}
The actual event command only passes the event_by_ssh_command
attribute.
The event_by_ssh_service
custom attribute takes care of passing the correct
daemon name, while test $service.state_id$ -gt 0
makes sure that the daemon
is only restarted when the service is an a not OK
state.
object EventCommand "event_by_ssh_restart_service" {
import "event_by_ssh"
//only restart the daemon if state > 0 (not-ok)
//requires sudo permissions for the icinga user
vars.event_by_ssh_command = "test $service.state_id$ -gt 0 && sudo /etc/init.d/$event_by_ssh_service$ restart"
}
Now set the event_command
attribute to event_by_ssh_restart_service
and tell it
which service should be restarted using the event_by_ssh_service
attribute.
object Service "http" {
import "generic-service"
host_name = "remote-http-host"
check_command = "http"
event_command = "event_by_ssh_restart_service"
vars.event_by_ssh_service = "$host.vars.httpd_name$"
//vars.event_by_ssh_logname = "icinga"
//vars.event_by_ssh_identity = "/home/icinga/.ssh/id_rsa.pub"
}
Each host with this service then must define the httpd_name
custom attribute
(for example generated from your cmdb):
object Host "remote-http-host" {
import "generic-host"
address = "192.168.1.100"
vars.httpd_name = "apache2"
}
You can testdrive this example by manually stopping the httpd
daemon
on your remote-http-host
. Enable the debuglog
feature and tail the
/var/log/icinga2/debug.log
file.
Remote Host Terminal:
# date; service apache2 status
Mon Sep 15 18:57:39 CEST 2014
Apache2 is running (pid 23651).
# date; service apache2 stop
Mon Sep 15 18:57:47 CEST 2014
[ ok ] Stopping web server: apache2 ... waiting .
Icinga 2 Host Terminal:
[2014-09-15 18:58:32 +0200] notice/Process: Running command '/usr/lib64/nagios/plugins/check_http' '-I' '192.168.1.100': PID 32622
[2014-09-15 18:58:32 +0200] notice/Process: PID 32622 ('/usr/lib64/nagios/plugins/check_http' '-I' '192.168.1.100') terminated with exit code 2
[2014-09-15 18:58:32 +0200] notice/Checkable: State Change: Checkable remote-http-host!http soft state change from OK to CRITICAL detected.
[2014-09-15 18:58:32 +0200] notice/Checkable: Executing event handler 'event_by_ssh_restart_service' for service 'remote-http-host!http'
[2014-09-15 18:58:32 +0200] notice/Process: Running command '/usr/lib64/nagios/plugins/check_by_ssh' '-C' 'test 2 -gt 0 && sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart' '-H' '192.168.1.100': PID 32623
[2014-09-15 18:58:33 +0200] notice/Process: PID 32623 ('/usr/lib64/nagios/plugins/check_by_ssh' '-C' 'test 2 -gt 0 && sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart' '-H' '192.168.1.100') terminated with exit code 0
Remote Host Terminal:
# date; service apache2 status
Mon Sep 15 18:58:44 CEST 2014
Apache2 is running (pid 24908).
Dependencies
Icinga 2 uses host and service Dependency objects for determing their network reachability.
A service can depend on a host, and vice versa. A service has an implicit dependency (parent) to its host. A host to host dependency acts implicitly as host parent relation. When dependencies are calculated, not only the immediate parent is taken into account but all parents are inherited.
The parent_host_name
and parent_service_name
attributes are mandatory for
service dependencies, parent_host_name
is required for host dependencies.
Apply rules will allow you to
determine these attributes in a more
dynamic fashion if required.
parent_host_name = "core-router"
parent_service_name = "uplink-port"
Notifications are suppressed by default if a host or service becomes unreachable.
You can control that option by defining the disable_notifications
attribute.
disable_notifications = false
The dependency state filter must be defined based on the parent object being
either a host (Up
, Down
) or a service (OK
, Warning
, Critical
, Unknown
).
The following example will make the dependency fail and trigger it if the parent object is not in one of these states:
states = [ OK, Critical, Unknown ]
Rephrased: If the parent service object changes into the Warning
state, this
dependency will fail and render all child objects (hosts or services) unreachable.
You can determine the child's reachability by querying the is_reachable
attribute
in for example DB IDO.
Implicit Dependencies for Services on Host
Icinga 2 automatically adds an implicit dependency for services on their host. That way
service notifications are suppressed when a host is DOWN
or UNREACHABLE
. This dependency
does not overwrite other dependencies and implicitely sets disable_notifications = true
and
states = [ Up ]
for all service objects.
Service checks are still executed. If you want to prevent them from happening, you can
apply the following dependency to all services setting their host as parent_host_name
and disabling the checks. assign where true
matches on all Service
objects.
apply Dependency "disable-host-service-checks" to Service {
disable_checks = true
assign where true
}
Dependencies for Network Reachability
A common scenario is the Icinga 2 server behind a router. Checking internet
access by pinging the Google DNS server google-dns
is a common method, but
will fail in case the dsl-router
host is down. Therefore the example below
defines a host dependency which acts implicitly as parent relation too.
Furthermore the host may be reachable but ping probes are dropped by the
router's firewall. In case the dsl-router``ping4
service check fails, all
further checks for the ping4
service on host google-dns
service should
be suppressed. This is achieved by setting the disable_checks
attribute to true
.
object Host "dsl-router" {
import "generic-host"
address = "192.168.1.1"
}
object Host "google-dns" {
import "generic-host"
address = "8.8.8.8"
}
apply Service "ping4" {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "ping4"
assign where host.address
}
apply Dependency "internet" to Host {
parent_host_name = "dsl-router"
disable_checks = true
disable_notifications = true
assign where host.name != "dsl-router"
}
apply Dependency "internet" to Service {
parent_host_name = "dsl-router"
parent_service_name = "ping4"
disable_checks = true
assign where host.name != "dsl-router"
}
Apply Dependencies based on Custom Attributes
You can use apply rules to set parent or
child attributes e.g. parent_host_name
to other object's
attributes.
A common example are virtual machines hosted on a master. The object name of that master is auto-generated from your CMDB or VMWare inventory into the host's custom attributes (or a generic template for your cloud).
Define your master host object:
/* your master */
object Host "master.example.com" {
import "generic-host"
}
Add a generic template defining all common host attributes:
/* generic template for your virtual machines */
template Host "generic-vm" {
import "generic-host"
}
Add a template for all hosts on your example.com cloud setting
custom attribute vm_parent
to master.example.com
:
template Host "generic-vm-example.com" {
import "generic-vm"
vars.vm_parent = "master.example.com"
}
Define your guest hosts:
object Host "www.example1.com" {
import "generic-vm-master.example.com"
}
object Host "www.example2.com" {
import "generic-vm-master.example.com"
}
Apply the host dependency to all child hosts importing the
generic-vm
template and set the parent_host_name
to the previously defined custom attribute host.vars.vm_parent
.
apply Dependency "vm-host-to-parent-master" to Host {
parent_host_name = host.vars.vm_parent
assign where "generic-vm" in host.templates
}
You can extend this example, and make your services depend on the
master.example.com
host too. Their local scope allows you to use
host.vars.vm_parent
similar to the example above.
apply Dependency "vm-service-to-parent-master" to Service {
parent_host_name = host.vars.vm_parent
assign where "generic-vm" in host.templates
}
That way you don't need to wait for your guest hosts becoming unreachable when the master host goes down. Instead the services will detect their reachability immediately when executing checks.
Note
This method with setting locally scoped variables only works in apply rules, but not in object definitions.
Dependencies for Agent Checks
Another classic example are agent based checks. You would define a health check for the agent daemon responding to your requests, and make all other services querying that daemon depend on that health check.
The following configuration defines two nrpe based service checks nrpe-load
and nrpe-disk
applied to the nrpe-server
. The health check is defined as
nrpe-health
service.
apply Service "nrpe-health" {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "nrpe"
assign where match("nrpe-*", host.name)
}
apply Service "nrpe-load" {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "nrpe"
vars.nrpe_command = "check_load"
assign where match("nrpe-*", host.name)
}
apply Service "nrpe-disk" {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "nrpe"
vars.nrpe_command = "check_disk"
assign where match("nrpe-*", host.name)
}
object Host "nrpe-server" {
import "generic-host"
address = "192.168.1.5"
}
apply Dependency "disable-nrpe-checks" to Service {
parent_service_name = "nrpe-health"
states = [ OK ]
disable_checks = true
disable_notifications = true
assign where service.check_command == "nrpe"
ignore where service.name == "nrpe-health"
}
The disable-nrpe-checks
dependency is applied to all services
on the nrpe-service
host using the nrpe
check_command attribute
but not the nrpe-health
service itself.
Downtimes
Downtimes can be scheduled for planned server maintenance or any other targetted service outage you are aware of in advance.
Downtimes will suppress any notifications, and may trigger other downtimes too. If the downtime was set by accident, or the duration exceeds the maintenance, you can manually cancel the downtime. Planned downtimes will also be taken into account for SLA reporting tools calculating the SLAs based on the state and downtime history.
Multiple downtimes for a single object may overlap. This is useful
when you want to extend your maintenance window taking longer than expected.
If there are multiple downtimes triggered for one object, the overall downtime depth
will be greater than 1
.
If the downtime was scheduled after the problem changed to a critical hard state triggering a problem notification, and the service recovers during the downtime window, the recovery notification won't be suppressed.
Fixed and Flexible Downtimes
A fixed
downtime will be activated at the defined start time, and
removed at the end time. During this time window the service state
will change to NOT-OK
and then actually trigger the downtime.
Notifications are suppressed and the downtime depth is incremented.
Common scenarios are a planned distribution upgrade on your linux
servers, or database updates in your warehouse. The customer knows
about a fixed downtime window between 23:00 and 24:00. After 24:00
all problems should be alerted again. Solution is simple -
schedule a fixed
downtime starting at 23:00 and ending at 24:00.
Unlike a fixed
downtime, a flexible
downtime will be triggered
by the state change in the time span defined by start and end time,
and then last for the specified duration in minutes.
Imagine the following scenario: Your service is frequently polled by users trying to grab free deleted domains for immediate registration. Between 07:30 and 08:00 the impact will hit for 15 minutes and generate a network outage visible to the monitoring. The service is still alive, but answering too slow to Icinga 2 service checks. For that reason, you may want to schedule a downtime between 07:30 and 08:00 with a duration of 15 minutes. The downtime will then last from its trigger time until the duration is over. After that, the downtime is removed (may happen before or after the actual end time!).
Scheduling a downtime
This can either happen through a web interface or by sending an external command
to the external command pipe provided by the ExternalCommandListener
configuration.
Fixed downtimes require a start and end time (a duration will be ignored). Flexible downtimes need a start and end time for the time span, and a duration independent from that time span.
Triggered Downtimes
This is optional when scheduling a downtime. If there is already a downtime scheduled for a future maintenance, the current downtime can be triggered by that downtime. This renders useful if you have scheduled a host downtime and are now scheduling a child host's downtime getting triggered by the parent downtime on NOT-OK state change.
Recurring Downtimes
ScheduledDowntime objects can be used to set up recurring downtimes for services.
Example:
apply ScheduledDowntime "backup-downtime" to Service {
author = "icingaadmin"
comment = "Scheduled downtime for backup"
ranges = {
monday = "02:00-03:00"
tuesday = "02:00-03:00"
wednesday = "02:00-03:00"
thursday = "02:00-03:00"
friday = "02:00-03:00"
saturday = "02:00-03:00"
sunday = "02:00-03:00"
}
assign where "backup" in service.groups
}
Comments
Comments can be added at runtime and are persistent over restarts. You can add useful information for others on repeating incidents (for example "last time syslog at 100% cpu on 17.10.2013 due to stale nfs mount") which is primarly accessible using web interfaces.
Adding and deleting comment actions are possible through the external command pipe
provided with the ExternalCommandListener
configuration. The caller must
pass the comment id in case of manipulating an existing comment.
Acknowledgements
If a problem is alerted and notified you may signal the other notification recipients that you are aware of the problem and will handle it.
By sending an acknowledgement to Icinga 2 (using the external command pipe
provided with ExternalCommandListener
configuration) all future notifications
are suppressed, a new comment is added with the provided description and
a notification with the type NotificationFilterAcknowledgement
is sent
to all notified users.
Expiring Acknowledgements
Once a problem is acknowledged it may disappear from your handled problems
dashboard and no-one ever looks at it again since it will suppress
notifications too.
This fire-and-forget
action is quite common. If you're sure that a
current problem should be resolved in the future at a defined time,
you can define an expiration time when acknowledging the problem.
Icinga 2 will clear the acknowledgement when expired and start to re-notify if the problem persists.
Custom Attributes
Using Custom Attributes for Apply Rules
Custom attributes are not only used at runtime in command definitions to pass command arguments, but are also a smart way to define patterns and groups for applying objects for dynamic config generation.
There are several ways of using custom attributes with apply rules:
- As simple attribute literal (number, string,
boolean) for expression conditions (
assign where
,ignore where
) - As array or dictionary attribute with nested values (e.g. dictionaries in dictionaries) in apply for rules.
Features like DB IDO, Livestatus(#setting-up-livestatus) or StatusData(#status-data)
dump this column as encoded JSON string, and set is_json
resp. cv_is_json
to 1
.
If arrays are used in runtime macros (for example $host.groups$
) all entries
are separated using the ;
character. If an entry contains a semi-colon itself,
it is escaped like this: entry1;ent\;ry2;entry3
.
Using Custom Attributes at Runtime
Custom attributes may be used in command definitions to dynamically change how the command is executed.
Additionally there are Icinga 2 features such as the PerfDataWriter feature which use custom runtime attributes to format their output.
Tip
Custom attributes are identified by the
vars
dictionary attribute as short name. Accessing the different attribute keys is possible using the index accessor.
.
Custom attributes in command definitions or performance data templates are evaluated at runtime when executing a command. These custom attributes cannot be used somewhere else for example in other configuration attributes.
Custom attribute values must be either a string, a number, a boolean value or an array. Dictionaries cannot be used at the time of writing.
Arrays can be used to pass multiple arguments with or without repeating the key string. This helps passing multiple parameters to check plugins requiring them. Prominent plugin examples are:
More details on how to use repeat_key
and other command argument options can be
found in this section.
Note
If a macro value cannot be resolved, be it a single macro, or a recursive macro containing an array of macros, the entire command argument is skipped.
This is an example of a command definition which uses user-defined custom attributes:
object CheckCommand "my-icmp" {
import "plugin-check-command"
command = [ "/bin/sudo", PluginDir + "/check_icmp" ]
arguments = {
"-H" = {
value = "$icmp_targets$"
repeat_key = false
order = 1
}
"-w" = "$icmp_wrta$,$icmp_wpl$%"
"-c" = "$icmp_crta$,$icmp_cpl$%"
"-s" = "$icmp_source$"
"-n" = "$icmp_packets$"
"-i" = "$icmp_packet_interval$"
"-I" = "$icmp_target_interval$"
"-m" = "$icmp_hosts_alive$"
"-b" = "$icmp_data_bytes$"
"-t" = "$icmp_timeout$"
}
vars.icmp_wrta = 200.00
vars.icmp_wpl = 40
vars.icmp_crta = 500.00
vars.icmp_cpl = 80
vars.notes = "Requires setuid root or sudo."
}
Custom attribute names used at runtime must be enclosed in two $
signs,
for example $address$
.
Note
When using the
$
sign as single character, you need to escape it with an additional dollar sign ($$
).
This example also makes use of the command arguments passed to the command line.
You can integrate the above example CheckCommand
definition
passing command argument parameters like this:
object Host "my-icmp-host" {
import "generic-host"
address = "192.168.1.10"
vars.address_mgmt = "192.168.2.10"
vars.address_web = "192.168.10.10"
vars.icmp_targets = [ "$address$", "$host.vars.address_mgmt$", "$host.vars.address_web$" ]
}
apply Service "my-icmp" {
check_command = "my-icmp"
check_interval = 1m
retry_interval = 30s
vars.icmp_targets = host.vars.icmp_targets
assign where host.vars.icmp_targets
}
Runtime Custom Attributes Evaluation Order
When executing commands Icinga 2 checks the following objects in this order to look up custom attributes and their respective values:
- User object (only for notifications)
- Service object
- Host object
- Command object
- Global custom attributes in the
vars
constant
This execution order allows you to define default values for custom attributes
in your command objects. The my-ping
command shown above uses this to set
default values for some of the latency thresholds and timeouts.
When using the my-ping
command you can override some or all of the custom
attributes in the service definition like this:
object Service "ping" {
host_name = "localhost"
check_command = "my-ping"
vars.ping_packets = 10 // Overrides the default value of 5 given in the command
}
If a custom attribute isn't defined anywhere an empty value is used and a warning is emitted to the Icinga 2 log.
Best Practice
By convention every host should have an
address
attribute. Hosts which have an IPv6 address should also have anaddress6
attribute.
Runtime Custom Attributes as Environment Variables
The env
command object attribute specifies a list of environment variables with values calculated
from either runtime macros or custom attributes which should be exported as environment variables
prior to executing the command.
This is useful for example for hiding sensitive information on the command line output when passing credentials to database checks:
object CheckCommand "mysql-health" {
import "plugin-check-command"
command = [
PluginDir + "/check_mysql"
]
arguments = {
"-H" = "$mysql_address$"
"-d" = "$mysql_database$"
}
vars.mysql_address = "$address$"
vars.mysql_database = "icinga"
vars.mysql_user = "icinga_check"
vars.mysql_pass = "password"
env.MYSQLUSER = "$mysql_user$"
env.MYSQLPASS = "$mysql_pass$"
}
Multiple Host Addresses using Custom Attributes
The following example defines a Host
with three different interface addresses defined as
custom attributes in the vars
dictionary. The if-eth0
and if-eth1
services will import
these values into the address
custom attribute. This attribute is available through the
generic $address$
runtime macro.
object Host "multi-ip" {
check_command = "dummy"
vars.address_lo = "127.0.0.1"
vars.address_eth0 = "10.0.0.10"
vars.address_eth1 = "192.168.1.10"
}
apply Service "if-eth0" {
import "generic-service"
vars.address = "$host.vars.address_eth0$"
check_command = "my-generic-interface-check"
assign where host.vars.address_eth0 != ""
}
apply Service "if-eth1" {
import "generic-service"
vars.address = "$host.vars.address_eth1$"
check_command = "my-generic-interface-check"
assign where host.vars.address_eth1 != ""
}
object CheckCommand "my-generic-interface-check" {
import "plugin-check-command"
command = "echo \"This would be the service $service.description$ using the address value: $address$\""
}
The CheckCommand
object is just an example to help you with testing and
understanding the different custom attributes and runtime macros.
Modified Attributes
Icinga 2 allows you to modify defined object attributes at runtime different to the local configuration object attributes. These modified attributes are stored as bit-shifted-value and made available in backends. Icinga 2 stores modified attributes in its state file and restores them on restart.
Modified Attributes can be reset using external commands.
Runtime Macros
Next to custom attributes there are additional runtime macros made available by Icinga 2. These runtime macros reflect the current object state and may change over time while custom attributes are configured statically (but can be modified at runtime using external commands).
Runtime Macro Evaluation Order
Custom attributes can be accessed at runtime using their
identifier omitting the vars.
prefix.
There are special cases when those custom attributes are not set and Icinga 2 provides
a fallback to existing object attributes for example host.address
.
In the following example the $address$
macro will be resolved with the value of vars.address
.
object Host "localhost" {
import "generic-host"
check_command = "my-host-macro-test"
address = "127.0.0.1"
vars.address = "127.2.2.2"
}
object CheckCommand "my-host-macro-test" {
command = "echo \"address: $address$ host.address: $host.address$ host.vars.address: $host.vars.address$\""
}
The check command output will look like
"address: 127.2.2.2 host.address: 127.0.0.1 host.vars.address: 127.2.2.2"
If you alter the host object and remove the vars.address
line, Icinga 2 will fail to look up $address$
in the
custom attributes dictionary and then look for the host object's attribute.
The check command output will change to
"address: 127.0.0.1 host.address: 127.0.0.1 host.vars.address: "
The same example can be defined for services overriding the address
field based on a specific host custom attribute.
object Host "localhost" {
import "generic-host"
address = "127.0.0.1"
vars.macro_address = "127.3.3.3"
}
apply Service "my-macro-test" to Host {
import "generic-service"
check_command = "my-service-macro-test"
vars.address = "$host.vars.macro_address$"
assign where host.address
}
object CheckCommand "my-service-macro-test" {
command = "echo \"address: $address$ host.address: $host.address$ host.vars.macro_address: $host.vars.macro_address$ service.vars.address: $service.vars.address$\""
}
When the service check is executed the output looks like
"address: 127.3.3.3 host.address: 127.0.0.1 host.vars.macro_address: 127.3.3.3 service.vars.address: 127.3.3.3"
That way you can easily override existing macros being accessed by their short name like $address$
and refrain
from defining multiple check commands (one for $address$
and one for $host.vars.macro_address$
).
Host Runtime Macros
The following host custom attributes are available in all commands that are executed for hosts or services:
Name | Description |
---|---|
host.name | The name of the host object. |
host.display_name | The value of the display_name attribute. |
host.state | The host's current state. Can be one of UNREACHABLE , UP and DOWN . |
host.state_id | The host's current state. Can be one of 0 (up), 1 (down) and 2 (unreachable). |
host.state_type | The host's current state type. Can be one of SOFT and HARD . |
host.check_attempt | The current check attempt number. |
host.max_check_attempts | The maximum number of checks which are executed before changing to a hard state. |
host.last_state | The host's previous state. Can be one of UNREACHABLE , UP and DOWN . |
host.last_state_id | The host's previous state. Can be one of 0 (up), 1 (down) and 2 (unreachable). |
host.last_state_type | The host's previous state type. Can be one of SOFT and HARD . |
host.last_state_change | The last state change's timestamp. |
host.duration_sec | The time since the last state change. |
host.latency | The host's check latency. |
host.execution_time | The host's check execution time. |
host.output | The last check's output. |
host.perfdata | The last check's performance data. |
host.last_check | The timestamp when the last check was executed. |
host.num_services | Number of services associated with the host. |
host.num_services_ok | Number of services associated with the host which are in an OK state. |
host.num_services_warning | Number of services associated with the host which are in a WARNING state. |
host.num_services_unknown | Number of services associated with the host which are in an UNKNOWN state. |
host.num_services_critical | Number of services associated with the host which are in a CRITICAL state. |
Service Runtime Macros
The following service macros are available in all commands that are executed for services:
Name | Description |
---|---|
service.name | The short name of the service object. |
service.display_name | The value of the display_name attribute. |
service.check_command | The short name of the command along with any arguments to be used for the check. |
service.state | The service's current state. Can be one of OK , WARNING , CRITICAL and UNKNOWN . |
service.state_id | The service's current state. Can be one of 0 (ok), 1 (warning), 2 (critical) and 3 (unknown). |
service.state_type | The service's current state type. Can be one of SOFT and HARD . |
service.check_attempt | The current check attempt number. |
service.max_check_attempts | The maximum number of checks which are executed before changing to a hard state. |
service.last_state | The service's previous state. Can be one of OK , WARNING , CRITICAL and UNKNOWN . |
service.last_state_id | The service's previous state. Can be one of 0 (ok), 1 (warning), 2 (critical) and 3 (unknown). |
service.last_state_type | The service's previous state type. Can be one of SOFT and HARD . |
service.last_state_change | The last state change's timestamp. |
service.duration_sec | The time since the last state change. |
service.latency | The service's check latency. |
service.execution_time | The service's check execution time. |
service.output | The last check's output. |
service.perfdata | The last check's performance data. |
service.last_check | The timestamp when the last check was executed. |
Command Runtime Macros
The following custom attributes are available in all commands:
Name | Description |
---|---|
command.name | The name of the command object. |
User Runtime Macros
The following custom attributes are available in all commands that are executed for users:
Name | Description |
---|---|
user.name | The name of the user object. |
user.display_name | The value of the display_name attribute. |
Notification Runtime Macros
Name | Description |
---|---|
notification.type | The type of the notification. |
notification.author | The author of the notification comment, if existing. |
notification.comment | The comment of the notification, if existing. |
Global Runtime Macros
The following macros are available in all executed commands:
Name | Description |
---|---|
icinga.timet | Current UNIX timestamp. |
icinga.long_date_time | Current date and time including timezone information. Example: 2014-01-03 11:23:08 +0000 |
icinga.short_date_time | Current date and time. Example: 2014-01-03 11:23:08 |
icinga.date | Current date. Example: 2014-01-03 |
icinga.time | Current time including timezone information. Example: 11:23:08 +0000 |
icinga.uptime | Current uptime of the Icinga 2 process. |
The following macros provide global statistics:
Name | Description |
---|---|
icinga.num_services_ok | Current number of services in state 'OK'. |
icinga.num_services_warning | Current number of services in state 'Warning'. |
icinga.num_services_critical | Current number of services in state 'Critical'. |
icinga.num_services_unknown | Current number of services in state 'Unknown'. |
icinga.num_services_pending | Current number of pending services. |
icinga.num_services_unreachable | Current number of unreachable services. |
icinga.num_services_flapping | Current number of flapping services. |
icinga.num_services_in_downtime | Current number of services in downtime. |
icinga.num_services_acknowledged | Current number of acknowledged service problems. |
icinga.num_hosts_up | Current number of hosts in state 'Up'. |
icinga.num_hosts_down | Current number of hosts in state 'Down'. |
icinga.num_hosts_unreachable | Current number of unreachable hosts. |
icinga.num_hosts_flapping | Current number of flapping hosts. |
icinga.num_hosts_in_downtime | Current number of hosts in downtime. |
icinga.num_hosts_acknowledged | Current number of acknowledged host problems. |
Check Result Freshness
In Icinga 2 active check freshness is enabled by default. It is determined by the
check_interval
attribute and no incoming check results in that period of time.
threshold = last check execution time + check interval
Passive check freshness is calculated from the check_interval
attribute if set.
threshold = last check result time + check interval
If the freshness checks are invalid, a new check is executed defined by the
check_command
attribute.
Check Flapping
The flapping algorithm used in Icinga 2 does not store the past states but
calculcates the flapping threshold from a single value based on counters and
half-life values. Icinga 2 compares the value with a single flapping threshold
configuration attribute named flapping_threshold
.
Flapping detection can be enabled or disabled using the enable_flapping
attribute.
Volatile Services
By default all services remain in a non-volatile state. When a problem
occurs, the SOFT
state applies and once max_check_attempts
attribute
is reached with the check counter, a HARD
state transition happens.
Notifications are only triggered by HARD
state changes and are then
re-sent defined by the interval
attribute.
It may be reasonable to have a volatile service which stays in a HARD
state type if the service stays in a NOT-OK
state. That way each
service recheck will automatically trigger a notification unless the
service is acknowledged or in a scheduled downtime.
External Commands
Icinga 2 provides an external command pipe for processing commands triggering specific actions (for example rescheduling a service check through the web interface).
In order to enable the ExternalCommandListener
configuration use the
following command and restart Icinga 2 afterwards:
# icinga2 feature enable command
Icinga 2 creates the command pipe file as /var/run/icinga2/cmd/icinga2.cmd
using the default configuration.
Web interfaces and other Icinga addons are able to send commands to Icinga 2 through the external command pipe, for example for rescheduling a forced service check:
# /bin/echo "[`date +%s`] SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;ping4;`date +%s`" >> /var/run/icinga2/cmd/icinga2.cmd
# tail -f /var/log/messages
Oct 17 15:01:25 icinga-server icinga2: Executing external command: [1382014885] SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;ping4;1382014885
Oct 17 15:01:25 icinga-server icinga2: Rescheduling next check for service 'ping4'
External Command List
A list of currently supported external commands can be found here.
Detailed information on the commands and their required parameters can be found on the Icinga 1.x documentation.
Logging
Icinga 2 supports three different types of logging:
- File logging
- Syslog (on *NIX-based operating systems)
- Console logging (
STDOUT
on tty)
You can enable additional loggers using the icinga2 feature enable
and icinga2 feature disable
commands to configure loggers:
Feature | Description |
---|---|
debuglog | Debug log (path: /var/log/icinga2/debug.log , severity: debug or higher) |
mainlog | Main log (path: /var/log/icinga2/icinga2.log , severity: information or higher) |
syslog | Syslog (severity: warning or higher) |
By default file the mainlog
feature is enabled. When running Icinga 2
on a terminal log messages with severity information
or higher are
written to the console.
Performance Data
When a host or service check is executed plugins should provide so-called
performance data
. Next to that additional check performance data
can be fetched using Icinga 2 runtime macros such as the check latency
or the current service state (or additional custom attributes).
The performance data can be passed to external applications which aggregate and store them in their backends. These tools usually generate graphs for historical reporting and trending.
Well-known addons processing Icinga performance data are PNP4Nagios, inGraph and Graphite.
Writing Performance Data Files
PNP4Nagios, inGraph and Graphios use performance data collector daemons to fetch the current performance files for their backend updates.
Therefore the Icinga 2 PerfdataWriter
object allows you to define
the output template format for host and services backed with Icinga 2
runtime vars.
host_format_template = "DATATYPE::HOSTPERFDATA\tTIMET::$icinga.timet$\tHOSTNAME::$host.name$\tHOSTPERFDATA::$host.perfdata$\tHOSTCHECKCOMMAND::$host.checkcommand$\tHOSTSTATE::$host.state$\tHOSTSTATETYPE::$host.statetype$"
service_format_template = "DATATYPE::SERVICEPERFDATA\tTIMET::$icinga.timet$\tHOSTNAME::$host.name$\tSERVICEDESC::$service.name$\tSERVICEPERFDATA::$service.perfdata$\tSERVICECHECKCOMMAND::$service.checkcommand$\tHOSTSTATE::$host.state$\tHOSTSTATETYPE::$host.statetype$\tSERVICESTATE::$service.state$\tSERVICESTATETYPE::$service.statetype$"
The default templates are already provided with the Icinga 2 feature configuration which can be enabled using
# icinga2 feature enable perfdata
By default all performance data files are rotated in a 15 seconds interval into
the /var/spool/icinga2/perfdata/
directory as host-perfdata.<timestamp>
and
service-perfdata.<timestamp>
.
External collectors need to parse the rotated performance data files and then
remove the processed files.
Graphite Carbon Cache Writer
While there are some Graphite collector scripts and daemons like Graphios available for Icinga 1.x it's more reasonable to directly process the check and plugin performance in memory in Icinga 2. Once there are new metrics available, Icinga 2 will directly write them to the defined Graphite Carbon daemon tcp socket.
You can enable the feature using
# icinga2 feature enable graphite
By default the GraphiteWriter
object expects the Graphite Carbon Cache to listen at
127.0.0.1
on TCP port 2003
.
The current naming schema is
icinga.<hostname>.<metricname>
icinga.<hostname>.<servicename>.<metricname>
You can customize the metric prefix name by using the host_name_template
and
service_name_template
configuration attributes.
The example below uses runtime macros and a
global constant named GraphiteEnv
. The constant name
is freely definable and should be put in the constants.conf file.
const GraphiteEnv = "icinga.env1"
object GraphiteWriter "graphite" {
host_name_template = GraphiteEnv + ".$host.name$"
service_name_template = GraphiteEnv + ".$host.name$.$service.name$"
}
To make sure Icinga 2 writes a valid label into Graphite some characters are replaced
with _
in the target name:
\/.- (and space)
The resulting name in Graphite might look like:
www-01 / http-cert / response time
icinga.www_01.http_cert.response_time
In addition to the performance data retrieved from the check plugin, Icinga 2 sends internal check statistic data to Graphite:
metric | description |
---|---|
current_attempt | current check attempt |
max_check_attempts | maximum check attempts until the hard state is reached |
reachable | checked object is reachable |
downtime_depth | number of downtimes this object is in |
execution_time | check execution time |
latency | check latency |
state | current state of the checked object |
state_type | 0=SOFT, 1=HARD state |
The following example illustrates how to configure the storage-schemas for Graphite Carbon Cache. Please make sure that the order is correct because the first match wins.
[icinga_internals]
pattern = ^icinga\..*\.(max_check_attempts|reachable|current_attempt|execution_time|latency|state|state_type)
retentions = 5m:7d
[icinga_default]
# intervals like PNP4Nagios uses them per default
pattern = ^icinga\.
retentions = 1m:2d,5m:10d,30m:90d,360m:4y
GELF Writer
The Graylog Extended Log Format
(short: GELF)
can be used to send application logs directly to a TCP socket.
While it has been specified by the graylog2 project as their
input resource standard, other tools such as
Logstash also support GELF
as
input type.
You can enable the feature using
# icinga2 feature enable gelf
By default the GelfWriter
object expects the GELF receiver to listen at 127.0.0.1
on TCP port 12201
.
The default source
attribute is set to icinga2
. You can customize that for your needs if required.
Currently these events are processed:
- Check results
- State changes
- Notifications
Status Data
Icinga 1.x writes object configuration data and status data in a cyclic
interval to its objects.cache
and status.dat
files. Icinga 2 provides
the StatusDataWriter
object which dumps all configuration objects and
status updates in a regular interval.
# icinga2 feature enable statusdata
Icinga 1.x Classic UI requires this data set as part of its backend.
Note
If you are not using any web interface or addon which uses these files you can safely disable this feature.
Compat Logging
The Icinga 1.x log format is considered being the Compat Log
in Icinga 2 provided with the CompatLogger
object.
These logs are not only used for informational representation in external web interfaces parsing the logs, but also to generate SLA reports and trends in Icinga 1.x Classic UI. Furthermore the Livestatus feature uses these logs for answering queries to historical tables.
The CompatLogger
object can be enabled with
# icinga2 feature enable compatlog
By default, the Icinga 1.x log file called icinga.log
is located
in /var/log/icinga2/compat
. Rotated log files are moved into
var/log/icinga2/compat/archives
.
The format cannot be changed without breaking compatibility to existing log parsers.
# tail -f /var/log/icinga2/compat/icinga.log
[1382115688] LOG ROTATION: HOURLY
[1382115688] LOG VERSION: 2.0
[1382115688] HOST STATE: CURRENT;localhost;UP;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;disk;WARNING;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;http;OK;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;load;OK;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;ping4;OK;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;ping6;OK;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;processes;WARNING;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;ssh;OK;HARD;1;
[1382115688] SERVICE STATE: CURRENT;localhost;users;OK;HARD;1;
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;disk;1382115705
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;http;1382115705
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;load;1382115705
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;ping4;1382115705
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;ping6;1382115705
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;processes;1382115705
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;ssh;1382115705
[1382115706] EXTERNAL COMMAND: SCHEDULE_FORCED_SVC_CHECK;localhost;users;1382115705
[1382115731] EXTERNAL COMMAND: PROCESS_SERVICE_CHECK_RESULT;localhost;ping6;2;critical test|
[1382115731] SERVICE ALERT: localhost;ping6;CRITICAL;SOFT;2;critical test
DB IDO
The IDO (Icinga Data Output) modules for Icinga 2 take care of exporting all configuration and status information into a database. The IDO database is used by a number of projects including Icinga Web 1.x and 2.
Details on the installation can be found in the Configuring DB IDO chapter. Details on the configuration can be found in the IdoMysqlConnection and IdoPgsqlConnection object configuration documentation. The DB IDO feature supports High Availability in the Icinga 2 cluster.
The following example query checks the health of the current Icinga 2 instance
writing its current status to the DB IDO backend table icinga_programstatus
every 10 seconds. By default it checks 60 seconds into the past which is a reasonable
amount of time - adjust it for your requirements. If the condition is not met,
the query returns an empty result.
Tip
Use check plugins to monitor the backend.
Replace the default
string with your instance name, if different.
Example for MySQL:
# mysql -u root -p icinga -e "SELECT status_update_time FROM icinga_programstatus ps
JOIN icinga_instances i ON ps.instance_id=i.instance_id
WHERE (UNIX_TIMESTAMP(ps.status_update_time) > UNIX_TIMESTAMP(NOW())-60)
AND i.instance_name='default';"
+---------------------+
| status_update_time |
+---------------------+
| 2014-05-29 14:29:56 |
+---------------------+
Example for PostgreSQL:
# export PGPASSWORD=icinga; psql -U icinga -d icinga -c "SELECT ps.status_update_time FROM icinga_programstatus AS ps
JOIN icinga_instances AS i ON ps.instance_id=i.instance_id
WHERE ((SELECT extract(epoch from status_update_time) FROM icinga_programstatus) > (SELECT extract(epoch from now())-60))
AND i.instance_name='default'";
status_update_time
------------------------
2014-05-29 15:11:38+02
(1 Zeile)
A detailed list on the available table attributes can be found in the DB IDO Schema documentation.
Check Result Files
Icinga 1.x writes its check result files to a temporary spool directory where they are processed in a regular interval. While this is extremely inefficient in performance regards it has been rendered useful for passing passive check results directly into Icinga 1.x skipping the external command pipe.
Several clustered/distributed environments and check-aggregation addons
use that method. In order to support step-by-step migration of these
environments, Icinga 2 ships the CheckResultReader
object.
There is no feature configuration available, but it must be defined on-demand in your Icinga 2 objects configuration.
object CheckResultReader "reader" {
spool_dir = "/data/check-results"
}