— 1 min read

Preparation

First we need to make sure we have all the stuff we need to compile mk livestatus and run it

sudo apt-get install make build-essential xinetd ucspi-unix

MK Livestatus

Grab the mk livestatus source from here, currently it’s version 1.1.10p3 but update the commands below to match your version.

wget https://mathias-kettner.de/download/mk-livestatus-1.1.10p3.tar.gz
tar xvzf mk-livestatus-1.1.10p3.tar.gz
cd mk-livestatus-1.1.10p3
./configure
make
sudo make install

Xinetd

Now that it’s compiled we need to write a xinetd config for it, create a new file called /etc/xinetd.d/livestatus and put the following in it

service livestatus {
    type = UNLISTED
    port = 6557
    socket_type = stream
    protocol = tcp
    wait = no
    cps = 100 3
    instances = 500
    per_source = 250
    flags = NODELAY
    user = nagios
    server = /usr/bin/unixcat
    server_args = /var/lib/nagios3/rw/live
    only_from = 127.0.0.1 # modify this to …
 — 1 min read

I’ll assume you already have Nagios installed and configured and have an understanding of actually configuring and using Nagios.

Remote server — the server to be monitored

First we’ll install the needed plugins and daemon on the remote server.

sudo apt-get install nagios-plugins nagios-nrpe-server

Once installed, open up /etc/nagios/nrpe_local.cfg

And place the following in it

allowed_hosts=NAGIOS.SERVER.IP,127.0.0.1

command[check_users]=/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_users -w 5 -c 10
command[check_load]=/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_load -w 15,10,5 -c 30,25,20
command[check_all_disks]=/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_disk -w 20 -c 10
command[check_zombie_procs]=/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_procs -w 5 -c 10 -s Z
command[check_total_procs]=/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_procs -w 150 -c 200
command[check_swap]=/usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_swap -w 20 -c 10

Save and exit.

Commands need to explicitly be enabled on the …