Monitoring Cacti

This article will help you get the Cacti plugin for sd-agent configured and returning metrics

Installing the cacti plugin package

Install the cacti plugin on Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install sd-agent-cacti

Install the cacti plugin on RHEL/CentOS:

sudo yum install sd-agent-cacti

Read more about agent plugins.

Configuring the agent to monitor cacti

1. Create a read-only serverdensity for the Cacti database:

sudo mysql -e "create user 'serverdensity'@'localhost' identified by '$PASSWORD';"
sudo mysql -e "grant select on cacti.* to 'serverdensity'@'localhost';"

Before proceeding we reccomend that you check that the newly created has the correct permissions.

2. Configure the agent in /etc/sd-agent/conf.d/cacti.yaml

init_config:

instances:
    -   mysql_host: localhost
        mysql_user: serverdensity
        mysql_password: $PASSWORD
        rrd_path: /path/to/cacti/rra
        #field_names:
        #    - ifName
        #    - dskDevice
        #    - ifIndex
        #rrd_whitelist: /path/to/rrd_whitelist.txt

3. Grant the sd-agent user access to the RRD files:

sudo gpasswd -a sd-agent www-data
sudo chmod -R g+rx /var/lib/cacti/rra/

4. Restart the agent

sudo /etc/init.d/sd-agent restart

or

sudo systemctl restart sd-agent

Verifying the configuration
Execute info to verify the configuration with the following:

sudo /etc/init.d/sd-agent info 

or

/usr/share/python/sd-agent/agent.py info

If the agent has been configured correctly you'll see an output such as:

cacti
-----
  - instance #0 [OK]
  - Collected * metrics

You can also view the metrics returned with the following command:

sudo -u sd-agent /usr/share/python/sd-agent/agent.py check cacti

Configuring graphs

Click the name of your server from the Devices list in your Server Density account then go to the Metrics tab. Click the + Graph button on the right then choose the cacti metrics to display the graphs. The metrics will also be available to select when building dashboard graphs.

Monitored metrics

Metric	Values
cacti.hosts.count The number of hosts monitored by Cacti	host / None Type: float
cacti.metrics.count The number of metrics collected from Cacti	None / None Type: float
cacti.rrd.count The number of Cacti RRD files	file / None Type: float
system.disk.free.last The amount of disk space that is free - last polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.disk.free.max The amount of disk space that is free - max polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.disk.free.min The amount of disk space that is free - min polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.disk.used.last The amount of disk space that is used - last polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.disk.used.max The amount of disk space that is used - max polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.disk.used.min The amount of disk space that is used - min polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.load.1.last The average system load over one minute - last polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.1.max The average system load over one minute - max polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.1.min The average system load over one minute - min polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.15.last The average system load over 15 minute - last polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.15.max The average system load over 15 minute - max polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.15.min The average system load over 15 minute - min polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.5.last The average system load over five minute - last polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.5.max The average system load over five minute - max polling value	None / None Type: float
system.load.5.min The average system load over five minute - min polling value	None / None Type: float
system.mem.buffered.last The amount of physical RAM used for file buffers - last polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.mem.buffered.max The amount of physical RAM used for file buffers - max polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.mem.buffered.min The amount of physical RAM used for file buffers - min polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.ping.latency The system ping latency - avg polling value	millisecond / None Type: float
system.ping.latency.max The system ping latency - max polling value	millisecond / None Type: float
system.proc.running.last The number of processes running - last polling value	process / None Type: float
system.proc.running.max The number of processes running - max polling value	process / None Type: float
system.proc.running.min The number of processes running - min polling value	process / None Type: float
system.swap.free.max The amount of free swap space - max polling value	byte / None Type: float
system.users.current.last The number of logged in users - last polling value	None / None Type: float
system.users.current.max The number of logged in users - max polling value	None / None Type: float
system.users.current.min The number of logged in users - min polling value	None / None Type: float