Book Description

Nagios is a tool for system and network monitoring. It constantly checks other machines and various services on those machines. The main purpose of system monitoring is to detect and report any system not working properly as soon as possible so that you are aware of problems before a user runs into them. It is a modular and flexible solution that uses plug-ins to do its job.

The book is an introduction to Nagios that will teach readers to use Nagios with its advanced features. At the same time, readers who have already used earlier versions of Nagios will also benefit because they will learn about the new and advanced features of Nagios 3.

This book focuses on the new features of Nagios and will teach readers to secure their systems in a much improved manner.

What you will learn from this book

• Understand system monitoring and how Nagios works
• Install and configure Nagios to administer your network and system
• Deploy agents and plug-ins, and monitor assets with advanced features of Nagios
• Notify users of current and future incidents to protect the availability, performance, and security of monitored assets
• Configure and work your way around Nagios’s web interface
• Pass service and host check results over the network using NSCA Download Now »

Book Description

“A very rich book sprinkled with real-life examples as well as battle-tested advice.”
—Pierre Haren, VP ILOG, IBM

“James does a thorough job of explaining Decision Management Systems as enablers
of a formidable business transformation.”
—Deepak Advani, Vice President, Business Analytics Products and SPSS, IBM

Build Systems That Work Actively to Help You Maximize Growth and Profits
Most companies rely on operational systems that are largely passive. But what if you could make your systems active participants in optimizing your business? What if your systems could act intelligently on their own? Learn, not just report? Empower users to take action instead of simply escalating their problems? Evolve without massive IT investments?

Decision Management Systems can do all that and more. In this book, the field’s leading expert demonstrates how to use them to drive unprecedented levels of business value. James Taylor shows how to integrate operational and analytic technologies to create systems that are more agile, more analytic, and more adaptive. Through actual case studies, you’ll learn how to combine technologies such as predictive analytics, optimization, and business rules—improving customer service, reducing fraud, managing risk, increasing agility, and driving growth.

Both a practical how-to guide and a framework for planning, Decision Management Systems focuses on mainstream business challenges. Download Now »

Book Description

Arduino Projects to Save the World shows that it takes little more than a few tools, a few wires and sensors, an Arduino board, and a bit of gumption to build devices that lower energy bills, help you grow our own food, monitor pollution in the air and in the ground, even warn you about earth tremors.

Arduino Projects to Save the World introduces the types of sensors needed to collect environmental data—from temperature sensors to motion sensors. You’ll see projects that deal with energy sources—from building your own power strip to running your Arduino board on solar panels so you can actually proceed to build systems that help, for example, to lower your energy bills. Once you have some data, it’s time to put it to good use by publishing it online as you collect it; this book shows you how.

The core of this book deals with the Arduino projects themselves:

• Account for heat loss using a heat loss temperature sensor array that sends probes into every corner of your house for maximum measurement.
• Monitor local seismic activity with your own seismic monitor.
• Keep your Arduino devices alive in the field with a solar powered device that uses a smart, power-saving design.
• Monitor your data and devices with a wireless radio device; place your sensors where you like without worrying about wires.
• Keep an eye on your power consumption with a sophisticated power monitor Download Now »

Book Description

For system administrators, network engineers, and security analysts, it is essential to keep a track of network traffic.

Zenoss Core is an enterprise-level systems and network monitoring solution that can be as complex as you need it to be. And while just about anyone can install it, turn it on, and monitor “something”, Zenoss Core has a complicated interface packed with features. The interface has been drastically improved over version 2, but it’s still not the type of software you can use intuitively – in other words, a bit of guidance is in order.

The role of this book is to serve as your Zenoss Core tour guide and save you hours, days, maybe weeks of time.

This book will show you how to work with Zenoss and effectively adapt Zenoss for System and Network monitoring. Starting with the Zenoss basics, it requires no existing knowledge of systems management, and whether or not you can recite MIB trees and OIDs from memory is irrelevant. Advanced users will be able to identify ways in which they can customize the system to do more, while less advanced users will appreciate the ease of use Zenoss provides. The book contains step-by-step examples to demonstrate Zenoss Core’s capabilities. The best approach to using this book is to sit down with Zenoss and apply the examples found in these pages to your system.

The book covers the monitoring basics: adding devices, monitoring for availability and performance, processing events, and reviewing reports. Download Now »

Book Description

Cacti is a performance measurement tool that provides easy methods and functions for gathering and graphing system data. You can use Cacti to develop a robust event management system that can alert on just about anything you would like it to. But to do that, you need to gain a solid understanding of the basics of Cacti, its plugin architecture, and automation concepts.

Cacti 0.8 Beginner’s Guide will introduce you to the wide variety of features of Cacti and will guide you on how to use them for maximum effectiveness. Advanced topics like the plugin architecture and Cacti automation using the command-line interface will help you build a professional performance measurement system.

Designed as a beginner’s guide, the book starts off with the basics of installing and using Cacti, and also covers the advanced topics that will show you how to customize and extend the core Cacti functionalities. The book offers essential tutorials for creating advanced graphs and using plugins to create enterprise-class reports to show your customers and colleagues.

From data templates to input methods and plugin installation to creating your own customized plugins, this book provides you with a rich selection of step-by-step instructions to reach your goals. It covers all you need to know to implement professional performance measurement techniques with Cacti and ways to fully customize Cacti to fit your needs.

By the end of the book, you will be able to implement and extend Cacti to monitor, display, and report the performance of your network exactly the way you want. Download Now »

Book Description

Cacti is a network monitoring tool that provides graphic solutions to your everyday monitoring issues. It has a wide variety of features and misusing them can mean that you are not monitoring your network as closely as you think. This book takes you through all of the key features of Cacti and shows how to use them for maximum effectiveness.

This book will teach you how to use Cacti effectively to monitor your network through its web interface leaving aside all the heavy chunks of code. You will be introduced to all the features of Cacti in an easy-to-understand format.

This book introduces Cacti and goes through its complete installation and setup. After a quick look, it will teach you to use Cacti’s amazing graph templating and user management features. You will learn to customize graphs and make them better looking and easier to understand. It will teach you to provide the paths to any external script or command using Cacti. Then it will take you through importing and managing new templates and also customizing them. Creating users and assigning permissions to them is the next step in this book. Towards the end, you will learn to take backups and restore the system.

What you will learn from this book?

• Implement SNMP with Cacti using the Net-SNMP application suite
• Retrieve raw data from the system using Net-SNMP
• Create graphs using the RRDtool for easy understanding Download Now »