System Monitoring with Nagios – Part 2 of 4

I have decided to write a three part article on the benefits of using Nagios. The first article focused on why I chose Nagios/what it offers. This second article will focus on installing Nagios on Mac OS X. The third article will focus on configuring Nagios. The fourth article will focus on improving the Nagios interface and further customizing it.

Downloading Nagios 1.2 (and other files)

At the time of this article, the stable release of Nagios is 1.2. There is a beta out for version 2 (2.0b4), but I decided to use the stable release. There are two few files you will need to download to properly install Nagios: the core distributionand the plugins. I also would recommend looking at the Nagios Exchange for extras, and of course xicons for some good looking replacement icons.

Installing Nagios 1.2

I used a few good web site tutorials on how to install Nagios, so no need to rewrite it. I will pass on the resources I used and, of course, make some random comments.

• Nagios.org documentation
• Mac OS X install specific information
• O’Reilly’s Nagio install article

My random comments

• After the install, you are left with several conf files that need to be renamed. Make sure you save yourself some time by using sed to rename the muliple files all at once:
  for i in *cfg-sample; do mv $i `echo $i | sed -e s/cfg-sample/cfg/`; done;
• Do not forget about installing the plugins, make sure you install them after you build and install the core distribution.
• Consider using SSL on the server you are running Nagios so your password is not sent in the clear
• Be prepared to spend a good amount of time on configuring the many conf files

In part 3 of 3 of my Nagios articles, I will go over my conf files and try and explain as much as possible so your Nagios configuration will go a little more smootly than mine did my first time around.