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ESX Hosts

17 messages in this thread

list Vernon Everett · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 12:38:27 +0900 ·
Hi all

Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.

I know there was some mutterings about SNMP monitoring on the list. Has this progressed any further yet?

Regards
     V


NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential. They may contain legally privileged information or copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an intended recipient, please contact us at once by return email and then delete both messages and all attachments.
list Iain M Conochie · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 09:01:42 +0000 ·
Everett, Vernon wrote:
Hi all
 Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
You can compile the hobbit client like normal on ESX. Just install gcc etc and this will work. Alternatively you can install it on a RHEL or CentOS 3 server. This is (sort of) what ESX is based on

Cheers

Iain
quoted from Vernon Everett
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.
 I know there was some mutterings about SNMP monitoring on the list. Has this progressed any further yet?
 Regards
     V
 NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential. They may contain legally privileged information or copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an intended recipient, please contact us at once by return email and then delete both messages and all attachments.
list Iain M Conochie · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 09:39:37 +0000 ·
quoted from Iain M Conochie
<snip>
 Alternatively you can install it on a RHEL or CentOS 3 server. This 
is (sort of) what ESX is based on
^^^^^^

This should of course be you can compile on on a RHEL or CentOS 3 server 
and create an RPM package and install it on the ESX server

Cheers

Iain
list Renard Samuel · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 10:47:12 +0100 ·
Hi!

ESX servers are secured. I've just install an agent on one. Your remember me I had to install on my esx servers :) Thanks! The ESX can't connect the hobbit server the 1984 port. You should connect via ssh-tunnel. It's work very well!
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/System_Monitoring_with_Xymon/Other_Docs/HOWTO#Monitor_Hobbit_clients_in_a_DMZ_using_reverse_SSH_tunnels

Samuel
quoted from Iain M Conochie


-----Message d'origine-----
De : Iain M Conochie [mailto:user-c784e16a5170@xymon.invalid] Envoyé : mardi 13 janvier 2009 10:02
À : user-ae9b8668bcde@xymon.invalid
Objet : Re: [hobbit] ESX Hosts

Everett, Vernon wrote:
Hi all
 Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
You can compile the hobbit client like normal on ESX. Just install gcc etc and this will work. Alternatively you can install it on a RHEL or CentOS 3 server. This is (sort of) what ESX is based on

Cheers

Iain
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.
 I know there was some mutterings about SNMP monitoring on the list. Has this progressed any further yet?
 Regards
     V
 NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential. They may contain legally privileged information or copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an intended recipient, please contact us at once by return email and then delete both messages and all attachments.
  
Ce message a ete scanne par l'anti-virus du Conseil General du Finistere.

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list Olivier Audry · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 10:56:54 +0100 ·
hello

it's not necessary to install the standart xymon client on the esx
servers. The information reported won't be usefull because you are going
to monitore service console not the "real" state of esx server. 
Perhaps for the fs but you have to change the xymon df command into vdf
to see the vmware fs.

I use the xymon client on esx service console to graph the number of vm
on an esx server. I cant follow the drs and see if he do his job like I
want.

I you have a way to monitore cpu la io memory of a esx cluster give us
your code :)

About snmp : it seems that the snmp mib change all time ... I have give
up this way.

Olivier

On Tue, 13 Jan 2009 10:47:12 +0100, "RENARD Samuel" <user-c4043dfd2480@xymon.invalid>
quoted from Renard Samuel
wrote:
Hi!

ESX servers are secured. I've just install an agent on one. Your remember
me I had to install on my esx servers :) Thanks! The ESX can't connect
the
hobbit server the 1984 port. You should connect via ssh-tunnel. It's work
very well!
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/System_Monitoring_with_Xymon/Other_Docs/HOWTO#Monitor_Hobbit_clients_in_a_DMZ_using_reverse_SSH_tunnels
Samuel


-----Message d'origine-----
De : Iain M Conochie [mailto:user-c784e16a5170@xymon.invalid] Envoyé : mardi 13 janvier 2009 10:02
À : user-ae9b8668bcde@xymon.invalid
Objet : Re: [hobbit] ESX Hosts

Everett, Vernon wrote:
Hi all
 Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
You can compile the hobbit client like normal on ESX. Just install gcc
etc
and this will work. Alternatively you can install it on a RHEL or CentOS
3
server. This is (sort of) what ESX is based on

Cheers

Iain
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.
 I know there was some mutterings about SNMP monitoring on the list. Has this progressed any further yet?
 Regards
     V
 NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential. They may contain legally privileged information or copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an intended recipient, please contact us at once by return email and then delete both messages and all attachments.
  
Ce message a ete scanne par l'anti-virus du Conseil General du Finistere.

Ce message a ete scanne par l'anti-virus du Conseil General du Finistere.

list Iain M Conochie · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 09:59:37 +0000 ·
quoted from Renard Samuel
RENARD Samuel wrote:
Hi!

ESX servers are secured. I've just install an agent on one. Your remember me I had to install on my esx servers :) Thanks! The ESX can't connect the hobbit server the 1984 port. You should connect via ssh-tunnel. It's work very well!
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/System_Monitoring_with_Xymon/Other_Docs/HOWTO#Monitor_Hobbit_clients_in_a_DMZ_using_reverse_SSH_tunnels
  
Or just open up the firewall!

esxcfg-firewall -o 1984,tcp,out,Hobbit

Cheers

Iain
quoted from Olivier Audry
Samuel


-----Message d'origine-----
De : Iain M Conochie [mailto:user-c784e16a5170@xymon.invalid] Envoyé : mardi 13 janvier 2009 10:02
À : user-ae9b8668bcde@xymon.invalid
Objet : Re: [hobbit] ESX Hosts

Everett, Vernon wrote:
  
Hi all
 Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
    
You can compile the hobbit client like normal on ESX. Just install gcc etc and this will work. Alternatively you can install it on a RHEL or CentOS 3 server. This is (sort of) what ESX is based on

Cheers

Iain

  
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.
 I know there was some mutterings about SNMP monitoring on the list. Has this progressed any further yet?
 Regards
     V
 NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential. They may contain legally privileged information or copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an intended recipient, please contact us at once by return email and then delete both messages and all attachments.
      
Ce message a ete scanne par l'anti-virus du Conseil General du Finistere.

Ce message a ete scanne par l'anti-virus du Conseil General du Finistere.

list Pkc_mls · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 11:09:42 +0100 ·
quoted from Renard Samuel
RENARD Samuel a écrit :
Hi!

ESX servers are secured. I've just install an agent on one. Your remember me I had to install on my esx servers :) Thanks! The ESX can't connect the hobbit server the 1984 port. You should connect via ssh-tunnel. It's work very well!
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/System_Monitoring_with_Xymon/Other_Docs/HOWTO#Monitor_Hobbit_clients_in_a_DMZ_using_reverse_SSH_tunnels

Samuel

  
there is an iptables like config on the esx server.
you need to manually allow the outgoing packets on port 1984 with 
/usr/sbin/esxcfg-firewall.
quoted from Iain M Conochie
-----Message d'origine-----
De : Iain M Conochie [mailto:user-c784e16a5170@xymon.invalid] 
Envoyé : mardi 13 janvier 2009 10:02
À : user-ae9b8668bcde@xymon.invalid
Objet : Re: [hobbit] ESX Hosts

Everett, Vernon wrote:
  
Hi all
 
Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
    
You can compile the hobbit client like normal on ESX. Just install gcc etc and this will work. Alternatively you can install it on a RHEL or CentOS 3 server. This is (sort of) what ESX is based on

Cheers

Iain
list Iain M Conochie · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 12:05:32 +0000 ·
quoted from Olivier Audry
Olivier AUDRY wrote:
hello

it's not necessary to install the standart xymon client on the esx
servers. The information reported won't be usefull because you are going
to monitore service console not the "real" state of esx server.
True. However you should be able to query the status using esx commands. You can then run scripts using the hobbit client
quoted from Olivier Audry
 
Perhaps for the fs but you have to change the xymon df command into vdf
to see the vmware fs.

I use the xymon client on esx service console to graph the number of vm
on an esx server. I cant follow the drs and see if he do his job like I
want.

I you have a way to monitore cpu la io memory of a esx cluster give us
your code :)
  
If i had it i would gladly donate it :) I will need to look into ESX some more

Iain
quoted from Iain M Conochie
About snmp : it seems that the snmp mib change all time ... I have give
up this way.

Olivier

On Tue, 13 Jan 2009 10:47:12 +0100, "RENARD Samuel" <user-c4043dfd2480@xymon.invalid>
wrote:
  
Hi!

ESX servers are secured. I've just install an agent on one. Your remember
me I had to install on my esx servers :) Thanks! The ESX can't connect
    
the
  
hobbit server the 1984 port. You should connect via ssh-tunnel. It's work
very well!

    
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/System_Monitoring_with_Xymon/Other_Docs/HOWTO#Monitor_Hobbit_clients_in_a_DMZ_using_reverse_SSH_tunnels
  
Samuel


-----Message d'origine-----
De : Iain M Conochie [mailto:user-c784e16a5170@xymon.invalid] Envoyé : mardi 13 janvier 2009 10:02
À : user-ae9b8668bcde@xymon.invalid
Objet : Re: [hobbit] ESX Hosts

Everett, Vernon wrote:
    
Hi all
 Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
      
You can compile the hobbit client like normal on ESX. Just install gcc
    
etc
  
and this will work. Alternatively you can install it on a RHEL or CentOS
    
3
  
server. This is (sort of) what ESX is based on

Cheers

Iain

    
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.
 I know there was some mutterings about SNMP monitoring on the list. Has this progressed any further yet?
 Regards
     V
 NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential. They may contain legally privileged information or copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an intended recipient, please contact us at once by return email and then delete both messages and all attachments.
        
Ce message a ete scanne par l'anti-virus du Conseil General du Finistere.

Ce message a ete scanne par l'anti-virus du Conseil General du Finistere.

list Jon Dustin · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 11:36:46 -0500 ·
On 1/12/2009 at 10:38 PM, in message <496C491C.0B6 : 45 : 32950>, "Everett,
quoted from Iain M Conochie
Vernon" <user-9da1a1882f49@xymon.invalid> wrote:
Hi all

Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.
I decided to use a "standard" Hobbit client running on the service console, then add my own customizations:

- use vdf for disk space monitoring instead of df (picks up VMDK volumes)

- use esxtop to get CPU usage for entire ESX box

Here is a snippet I wrote for parsing ESXTOP output:

my $esxtop = "sudo /usr/bin/esxtop -b -d $interval";
open(CMD,"$esxtop |") || die "error - could not open $esxtop   $!\n";
my $count = 0;
while( <CMD> ) {
        chomp;
        s/\"//g;
        my (@row) = split/\,/;
        $count++;
        if ( $count <= 2 ) { next; }    # skip 1st few results, just titles and 100% values
        my $util = int($row[9]);        # round to INT, because RRD does not like floating-point
        &SendHobbit($util);
        if ( $verbose ) { print "util = $util\n"; }
}

I hope this helps, please don't flame my crappy code...  Enjoy!

-- 

 
Jon Dustin - Network Specialist
University of Southern Maine
Portland, ME  XXX-XXX-XXXX
list Josh Luthman · Tue, 13 Jan 2009 11:55:11 -0500 ·
This may or may not help...

Re: VMWare ESX: msg#00464
http://osdir.com/ml/monitoring.hobbit/2007/msg00464.html

Josh Luthman
Office: XXX-XXX-XXXX
Direct: XXX-XXX-XXXX
XXXX Wayne St
Suite XXXX
Troy, OH XXXXX

Those who don't understand UNIX are condemned to reinvent it, poorly.
--- Henry Spencer
quoted from Jon Dustin


On Tue, Jan 13, 2009 at 11:36 AM, Jon Dustin <user-d8c63a8259c1@xymon.invalid> wrote:
On 1/12/2009 at 10:38 PM, in message <496C491C.0B6 : 45 : 32950>,
"Everett,
Vernon" <user-9da1a1882f49@xymon.invalid> wrote:
Hi all

Has anybody had any success monitoring ESX hosts yet?
In particular, I am looking for HBA and disk stats, CPU, memory, etc.
The usual suspects.
I decided to use a "standard" Hobbit client running on the service console,
then add my own customizations:

- use vdf for disk space monitoring instead of df (picks up VMDK volumes)

- use esxtop to get CPU usage for entire ESX box

Here is a snippet I wrote for parsing ESXTOP output:

my $esxtop = "sudo /usr/bin/esxtop -b -d $interval";
open(CMD,"$esxtop |") || die "error - could not open $esxtop   $!\n";
my $count = 0;
while( <CMD> ) {
       chomp;
       s/\"//g;
       my (@row) = split/\,/;
       $count++;
       if ( $count <= 2 ) { next; }    # skip 1st few results, just titles
and 100% values
       my $util = int($row[9]);        # round to INT, because RRD does not
like floating-point
       &SendHobbit($util);
       if ( $verbose ) { print "util = $util\n"; }
}

I hope this helps, please don't flame my crappy code...  Enjoy!

--


Jon Dustin - Network Specialist
University of Southern Maine
Portland, ME  XXX-XXX-XXXX

list Vernon Everett · Thu, 15 Jan 2009 10:47:53 +0900 ·
Hi all

Thanks for the multiple responses.
Some of you understand the problem. Olivier, Iain, I am looking at you  :-)
And thanks for the firewall tip.

Thanks for the link Josh - Not quite as easy as it looks though. :-(
Will keep plugging at it when I get time.

One of the problems with ESX, is that the console is also a VM.
Installing hobbit in the console is all well and good, and probably will be cause for complaints from VMWare support, but still gives us no information about the ESX host itself.
The utility esxtop is great, and gives lots of info, but is very limited and completely ugly when running in non-interactive mode.
Try getting the disk controller stats in batch mode. (If you get it right, please let me know how.)

SNMP appears to be a good approach. It shows enormous promise.
# snmpwalk -v2c -c $Community_String $Host vmtable
gives lots of info about the VMs, but still no info about the actual host.

snmpwalk -v2c -c $Community_String $Host  1.3.6.1.4.1.6876
gives heaps of information, but still doesn't seem to contain what I want.

We could probably get devmon to do some funky monitoring of the VMs based on the output.

What I need though, is the CPU, network, disk IO and memory utilisation of the entire ESX host, not just the VMs.
Haven't given up just yet, though. :-)

Cheers
     Vernon
quoted from Iain M Conochie

NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential. 
They may contain legally privileged information or 
copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or 
disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an 
intended recipient, please contact us at once by return 
email and then delete both messages and all attachments.
list Raymond Storer · Thu, 15 Jan 2009 14:18:26 -0500 ·
Vernon, does your hardware vendor have anything you can install on the console that would give you the information?  If you are using Dell, OpenManage can do the trick with SNMP.

Ray
quoted from Vernon Everett
From: Everett, Vernon [user-9da1a1882f49@xymon.invalid]
Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 8:47 PM
To: user-ae9b8668bcde@xymon.invalid
Subject: RE: [hobbit] ESX Hosts

Hi all

Thanks for the multiple responses.
Some of you understand the problem. Olivier, Iain, I am looking at you  :-)
And thanks for the firewall tip.

Thanks for the link Josh - Not quite as easy as it looks though. :-(
Will keep plugging at it when I get time.

One of the problems with ESX, is that the console is also a VM.
Installing hobbit in the console is all well and good, and probably will be cause for complaints from VMWare support, but still gives us no information about the ESX host itself.
The utility esxtop is great, and gives lots of info, but is very limited and completely ugly when running in non-interactive mode.
Try getting the disk controller stats in batch mode. (If you get it right, please let me know how.)

SNMP appears to be a good approach. It shows enormous promise.
# snmpwalk -v2c -c $Community_String $Host vmtable
gives lots of info about the VMs, but still no info about the actual host.

snmpwalk -v2c -c $Community_String $Host  1.3.6.1.4.1.6876
gives heaps of information, but still doesn't seem to contain what I want.

We could probably get devmon to do some funky monitoring of the VMs based on the output.

What I need though, is the CPU, network, disk IO and memory utilisation of the entire ESX host, not just the VMs.
Haven't given up just yet, though. :-)

Cheers
     Vernon

NOTICE: This email and any attachments are confidential.
They may contain legally privileged information or
copyright material. You must not read, copy, use or
disclose them without authorisation. If you are not an
intended recipient, please contact us at once by return
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list Buchan Milne · Fri, 16 Jan 2009 09:10:25 +0200 ·
quoted from Raymond Storer
On Thursday 15 January 2009 03:47:53 Everett, Vernon wrote:
SNMP appears to be a good approach. It shows enormous promise.
# snmpwalk -v2c -c $Community_String $Host vmtable
gives lots of info about the VMs, but still no info about the actual host.

snmpwalk -v2c -c $Community_String $Host  1.3.6.1.4.1.6876
gives heaps of information, but still doesn't seem to contain what I want.
Walk the entire host, not just under the VMWare arc. It may provide data under 
some of the (RFC) standard OIDs that may be of interest (e.g. IFMIB etc.).
quoted from Raymond Storer
We could probably get devmon to do some funky monitoring of the VMs based
on the output.
If the data is there, definitely.
quoted from Raymond Storer
What I need though, is the CPU, network, disk IO and memory utilisation of
the entire ESX host, not just the VMs. Haven't given up just yet, though.

:-)
Regards,
Buchan
list Nikesh Maharaj · Tue, 5 Jul 2011 08:37:56 +0000 ·
Hi guys,

Please advise if xymon can monitor esx hosts and if there is a readme to this.

Thanks

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list Malcolm Hunter · Tue, 05 Jul 2011 13:04:44 +0000 ·
Hi Nikesh,
Please advise if xymon can monitor esx hosts and if there is a readme to this.
This question has been asked numerous times (try googling Xymon ESX).

This thread might be useful: http://lists.xymon.com/oldarchive/2010/11/msg00146.html

Regards,

Malcolm
list Alessandro Tinivelli · Tue, 5 Jul 2011 16:40:16 +0000 ·
Thank you for asking and reposting the discussion, I've decided to give it a try

I've got the following instructions
Super-short outline how to get your ESX-monitoring up and running with VMX:
1. fetch the vMA from VMware from above url and install it.
2. install a xymon-client on the vMA, rpm available from
	http://staff.telkomsa.net/packages/rhel5/xymon/x86_64/
3. install VMX on vMA (client-extension script) and on the xymon-server (for data-processing and graphing)

1. easy and done
2. how to install xymon-client on the vMA which has root disabled?
3. ... I'm not actually able to understand what VMX is: googling " Vmware Monitor for Xmyon" or " Vmware-Monitor for Xmyon (VMX)" only finds a few pages on this mailing list archive and nothing to be downloaded and installed :(
list Alessandro Tinivelli · Tue, 5 Jul 2011 17:03:06 +0000 ·
Solved 2.: just type sudo rpm -i.....
And answer with the same vi-admin password as root password.

Still missing 3...
quoted from Alessandro Tinivelli

-----Messaggio originale-----

Thank you for asking and reposting the discussion, I've decided to give it a try

I've got the following instructions
Super-short outline how to get your ESX-monitoring up and running with VMX:
1. fetch the vMA from VMware from above url and install it.
2. install a xymon-client on the vMA, rpm available from
	http://staff.telkomsa.net/packages/rhel5/xymon/x86_64/
3. install VMX on vMA (client-extension script) and on the xymon-server (for data-processing and graphing)

1. easy and done
2. how to install xymon-client on the vMA which has root disabled?
3. ... I'm not actually able to understand what VMX is: googling " Vmware Monitor for Xmyon" or " Vmware-Monitor for Xmyon (VMX)" only finds a few pages on this mailing list archive and nothing to be downloaded and installed :(