CMon :: CMDB-2-Nagios interface

  

What is CMon?

CMon ("C" like "CMDB" and "Mon" like "Monitoring") is a bridge between your CMDB[1] and your monitoring system[2]. The basic idea is: CMDB holds information about all the items of your IT infrastructure so the monitoring system could be populated using that pieces of information. CMon makes it possible to auto-magically create the configuration of your monitoring system based on the information stored in your CMDB.

Altaught the idea could be applied to all CMDBs and monitoring systems, CMon is tightly coupled with IBM Tivoli CCMDB[3] and Nagios Core[4].

Some quick stats: 16128 lines of Java, 3752 lines of Javascript, 280 lines of CSS and 1465 lines of bash/perl scripts for a total of 21625 lines of code, CMon is made of the following components:

  • A Java core to inteface CCMDB APIs
  • A JDBC-compliant database for internal purposes (currently Derby/JavaDB and Oracle have been tested)
  • A Web-based GUI made of an ExtJS[6]-based front-end and a Tomcat-based backend with an XML-based glue
  • A set of scripts to integrate CMon with SystemImager[7]

How does CMon work?

The process is this simple:

  1. You spread CCMDB agents all over your infrastructure and populate CMDB.
  2. You tag the objects you want to monitor (e.g. computer systems, apache servers, ssh daemons, ...).
  3. You click CMon's magic wand and wait for the wizard to complete.

What features does CMon offer?

Currently CMon supports these features:

  • Automatic configuration of Nagios hosts and services
  • Automatic configuration of contacts and contact_groups, including escalations
  • Automatic charting via NagiosGrapher
  • Link from Nagios to documentation of host and service checks (useful for service desk)
  • Automatic configuration of multiple Nagios instances (points of view) with a central dashboard
  • Every service check reports the command used to perform the check directly on the Web interface
  • Creation of hostgroups and servicegroups based on CCMDB information (Business Application and Business Services)
  • Automatic configuration of monitored hosts (crontab for passive checks, NsClient.ini for Windows hosts)
  • Integration of CMDB topology information as Nagios "parents"
  • "Vanilla" Nagios compliant, no patching is required!
  • Pluggable: everyone can write their Java plugin to monitor a component not yet supported by CMon

...and probably more that I can't remember now ;)

What kind of objects are supported by CMon?

Currently CMon supports these objects:

  • Network devices: routers, bridges, switches
  • Computer systems: Linux, AIX, Windows
  • File systems: UNIX, NFS, GPFS, FAT, NTFS
  • HTTP servers: Apache, OHS
  • J2EE servers: Tomcat, WebLogic, Oracle OAS/OC4J
  • LDAP servers: slapd
  • Database servers: Oracle, MySQL
  • Nagios Core, NSCA, NagiosGrapher
  • Identity providers: Shibboleth
  • SSH servers: openssh

Who should use CMon?

All enterprise-grade companies that own a CMDB-like source.

Is CMon ready for production?

CMon is currently under development and I consider it to be in BETA stage and I'm using it to monitor about 1'000 hosts and 10'000 services in CINECA[5], the company I work for.

Notes:

[1] A configuration management database (CMDB) is a repository of information related to all the components of an information system. [CMDB on Wikipedia]

[2] A System Monitor (SM) in systems engineering is a process within a distributed system for collecting and storing state data. [System Monitoring on Wikipedia]

[3] Tivoli Change and Configuration Management Database is IBM's strategic tool that is said to automatically discover the physical and application infrastructure in an enterprise, given the appropriate credentials. The low level component of CCMDB is called Tivoli Application Dependency Discovery Manager (TADDM in short). TADDM creates comprehensive application maps that include complete run-time dependencies, deep information about the Configuration Items (CIs) and tracks changes to the CIs. [IBM Tivoli Configuration and Change Management Database on Wikipedia]

[4] Nagios is a popular open source computer system and network monitoring software application. It watches hosts and services, alerting users when things go wrong and again when they get better. [Nagios on Wikipedia]

[5] Cineca is a non profit Consortium, made up of 40 Italian universities*, The National Institute of Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics - OGS, the CNR (National Research Council), and the Ministry of Education, University and Research (MIUR). Today it is the largest Italian computing centre, one of the most important worldwide. [CINECA Web site]

[6] Ext is a JavaScript library for building interactive web applications[2] using techniques such as Ajax, DHTML and DOM scripting. [ExtJS on Wikipedia]

[7] SystemImager is software which automates Linux installs, software distribution, and production deployment. SystemImager makes it easy to do automated installs (clones), software distribution, content or data distribution, configuration changes, and operating system updates to your network of Linux machines. [SystemImager Web site]

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