Request For Comments: NWPE - Nagios Web Pl ugin Executor

[atonns at mail.ivillage.com]

No reason to run apache - it could be any webserver that supports CGI and
whatever scripting language your service checks are written in.

--
"Computer science is as much about computers as
        astronomy is about telescopes" -- Edsger Dijkstra
---------------------------------------------------------
Anthony Tonns, UNIX Administrator - atonns at mail.ivillage.com


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Tedman Eng [mailto:teng at dataway.com]
> Sent: Thursday, July 10, 2003 1:10 AM
> To: nagios-users at lists.sourceforge.net
> Subject: [Nagios-users] Re: Request For Comments: NWPE - Nagios Web
> Plugin Executor
> 
> 
> Would someone have to run apache on each server they want to 
> use it with?
> 
> <atonns at mail.ivillage.com> wrote in message
> news:F63694D14D538A4CB8DA5DAB5215A11C053D83CA at cookiemonster.iv
> illage.net...
> > Dear Nagios Community,
> >
> > I'm considering making a project that I'm working on for my 
> employer open
> > source. They are o.k. with the concept of open source 
> licensing (otherwise
> I
> > wouldn't be writing this email). However, before putting 
> the extra effort
> in
> > to "clean it up for public consumption", I want to poll the 
> community to
> see
> > if there's any interest.
> >
> > Project:
> > NWPE: Nagios Web Plugin Executor
> > Execute service checks remotely, using HTTP[S] as a 
> transport protocol,
> and
> > a thin wrapper around CGI as a service check API.
> > It functions similar to nrpe with the benefit of possibly 
> improving the
> > performance of perl scripts for service checks (when using
> apache/mod_perl).
> >
> > History:
> > For a home-grown monitoring system, I decided I wanted to 
> go with SNMPv3
> > agents. The main reason were the authentication and 
> encryption aspects.
> So,
> > I created a nice Solaris package of net-snmpd 5.0.7 and was 
> very happy
> with
> > it. I am using Nagios to poll all of my servers w/agents. 
> At the time,
> > SNMPv3 support had not been integrated into check_snmp, so 
> I ventured into
> > coding my own plugins. Using perl with Net::SNMP was the 
> right solution.
> One
> > major advantage my scripts have over check_snmp/snmpget is 
> that I can
> > retrieve an entire MIB table and reference objects by their 
> description
> > field (ie: from the hrStorageTable use htStorageDescr to 
> determine the
> index
> > into hrStorageUsed/hrStorageSize) and have the script be 
> automatically
> > flexible when new items are added (ie: additional 
> partitions are mounted,
> > etc.). So far, I've had miserable success with embedded 
> Perl Nagios (ePN).
> > It leaks memory like mad (I have to restart at LEAST once a 
> day) and the
> > number of service checks (1400+) is totally overwhelming my 
> poor UltraII.
> So
> > I cooked up an alternative...
> >
> > Functionality:
> > A small C program 'nwpe' is called from a Nagios command
> > (checkcommands.cfg). It is small, and strongly leverages libcurl
> > (http://curl.sourceforge.net/libcurl/) to connect (via HTTP 
> or HTTPS) and
> > optionally authenticate to a webserver. An example usage would be:
> >
> > ./nwpe -U https://servicechecker.nagios.org/svc/check_remote_disk -a
> > "args=--hostname=webserver1 --path=/usr --warning=20% 
> --critical=10%" -u
> > nagios -p checkITout
> >
> > "check_remote_disk" is a CGI script written in perl. In my case the
> > webserver is running mod_perl. It uses Net::SNMP and other 
> perl modules to
> > perform it's service check. It also invokes a custom perl 
> module I have
> > written, NWPE (which will hopefully become Nagios::NWPE) 
> that does the
> > following:
> >
> > a) parses the POST/GET "args" field with a CGI object into @ARGV for
> parsing
> > by Getopt::Long
> > b) redirects STDOUT to an IO::String to capture all output 
> from the plugin
> > c) sets the appropriate return value for the state of the 
> service check
> > (OK/WARNING/CRITICAL/UNKNOWN) in the HTTP Header field 
> "Return-state:"
> > d) prints the 'cached' output of the plugin on the real STDOUT with
> > mime-type "text/plain"
> >
> > Essentially, the NWPE module makes it relatively painless to convert
> command
> > line service checks written in perl to CGI/mod_perl service checks.
> >
> > Finally, after the service check has return the data, the 
> 'nwpe' C program
> > prints the output of the request on STDOUT and returns the 
> appropriate
> value
> > (Return-state:) to Nagios.
> >
> > Reasoning:
> > The 'nwpe' system creates:
> > 1) Additional flexibility - any scripting language that can 
> be run from a
> > webserver (perl/mod_perl/asp/jsp) can be used as a service check
> > 2) Additional scalability - allows you to deploy multiple 
> service check
> > webservers just about anywhere on any network and leverage HTTP
> load-balance
> > technology (Cisco LocalDirector, BigIP, etc.) to distribute 
> the load of
> > running service checks.
> > 3) Additional performance - using mod_perl to speed up 
> normally slow perl
> > service check execution
> > 4) Additional security - access to service checks can be 
> authenticated &
> > encrypted, and use any other access control mechanisms your favorite
> > webserver provides.
> >
> > When using nwpe with apache/mod_perl, I see it as combining 
> the best of
> nrpe
> > and ePN.
> >
> > Downsides:
> > 1) I have not integrated performance data into NWPE. 
> However, I suspect it
> > could easily be added as an additional HTTP Header or 
> something similar
> > (I've not done any performance data work with Nagios whatsoever).
> > 2) the NWPE perl module is currently rough around the 
> edges. Very rough.
> > It's the first serious perl module I've written (and bares 
> a striking
> > resemblance to the stuff in perlboot, perltoot and perlobj).
> > 3) While SSL has been integrated into libcurl for sometime, HTTP
> > authentication is only part of the 7.10.6 pre-release and I 
> couldn't get
> > pre3 to work (but pre2 works like a champ). This might make 
> compiling nwpe
> a
> > little hairy.
> > 4) nwpe has not been setup with autoconf yet. It's features 
> are slim.
> >
> > If there's a decent amount of positive response, I will try 
> to see if I
> > carve out some time to setup a site for NWPE development.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > --Tony
> >
> > --
> > "Computer science is as much about computers as
> >         astronomy is about telescopes" -- Edsger Dijkstra
> > ---------------------------------------------------------
> > Anthony Tonns, UNIX Administrator - atonns at mail.ivillage.com
> >
> >
> > -------------------------------------------------------
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> >
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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