[mrtg] Re: Newbie OS X User

[Drew Hawn]

It's easy to make something that is easy really difficult.

If you have mrtg, perl and a web server installed, the only thing left to do is tell mrtg what device and what information you want to monitor.  mrtg then creates simple html pages that you can then view through a web browser.  (You know all of this already, I know).

So, you first run a script which creates a configuration file vaguely similar to the following:

cfgmaker --global "WorkDir: \http\html\mrtg" --global "Options[_]: growright,bits" public at 192.168.1.25 > whatever_name_I want.cfg

Broken down into plain English:
 - Run the cfgmaker script
 - With these options
 - On this device
 - And create this output file

It's easy to get lost in the forest because of the trees, so forget about the options for the sake of understanding.  You could run:

cfgmaker public at 192.168.1.254 --output filename.cfg 

This is the same command with no options and will run just fine.  The only problem here is that you want your html files to end up in a certain directory.  That is the function of the --global "WorkDir: \blah\blah" option listed above.  Simply put in the directory where you want your html files to go.

Also, you might want your graphs to go from right to left and be in bits instead of bytes (or maybe not, it's up to you).  That's why they call them options, they're all optional.

You now have a configuration file (which you can later change manually, or change through running the cfgmaker script again.

Now all you need to do is run mrtg using this freshly minted configuration.

mrtg your_config_file_name.cfg

Simply; "run mrtg and use the config_file_name.cfg" file.  This will run mrtg, collect info from the device listed in the config, and output html files to the directory you specified to cfgmaker.  All you need to do now is point a web browser to the files that were created and see the magic.  (Remember that you'll have to run mrtg a couple of times over the period of a few minutes before you see any data.)

Don't worry about indexmaker yet.  Get mrtg to run with a config that you've created.  Once you can view the graphs, then move on to indexmaker.  indexmaker does not create any new data, it simply organizes what you already have created.  So, don't worry about organizing what you don't have.

Drew Hawn
Santa Barbara



-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Tappin [mailto:dan at wavefront.ca]
Sent: Monday, April 29, 2002 8:07 PM
To: mrtg at list.ee.ethz.ch
Subject: [mrtg] Newbie OS X User



I have MRTG up and running on my OS X box and I am looking for some help 
on setting up the fancy GUI for monitoring my servers.

I have only one system right now but I plan to have 6+ when I am done my 
OS 9 -> OS X transition.  I am on a steep UNIX learning curve so please 
bear with me if you try to help the poor newbie.

My specific problems are with running the cfgmaker and indexmaker.  I 
have a virtual host setup to view the MRTG directory but thats it.  I 
have deduced so far that I need to run cfgmaker first to make my 
mrtg.cfg file and then it's on to indexmaker.  Where I get stuck is the 
options and associated paths.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Dan


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