Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway <dave at dgaraway.com> wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
Thanks for the reply. Is there any tricks to getting the client install and running on the ESX hosts?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Everett" <everett.vernon at gmail.com> To: xymon at xymon.com Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 6:34:32 PM Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway < dave at dgaraway.com > wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
From memory, no. Like I said, ensure you install the appropriate client for the guest OS. It should be pretty much the same as installing the client in a physical host.
Regards Vernon
On Mon, Oct 25, 2010 at 4:06 AM, Dave Garaway <dave at dgaraway.com> wrote:
Thanks for the reply. Is there any tricks to getting the client install and running on the ESX hosts?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Everett" <everett.vernon at gmail.com> To: xymon at xymon.com Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 6:34:32 PM Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway < dave at dgaraway.com > wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
To unsubscribe from the xymon list, send an e-mail to xymon-unsubscribe at xymon.com
Vmwares has some perl/Python packades for managin esx, you could probably use those and à ext script for xymon to check the esx status..
/Daniel
Skickat från min iPhone
25 okt 2010 kl. 07:21 skrev Dave Garaway <dave at dgaraway.com>:
Thanks for the reply. Is there any tricks to getting the client install and running on the ESX hosts?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Everett" <everett.vernon at gmail.com> To: xymon at xymon.com Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 6:34:32 PM Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway < dave at dgaraway.com > wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
To unsubscribe from the xymon list, send an e-mail to xymon-unsubscribe at xymon.com
I use also the hobbit client this nagios plugin check_esx3 (for monitoring VC, Host, VM) + xynagios
http://www.monitoringexchange.org/inventory/Check-Plugins/Virtualization/VMW...
It will be great have xynagios or something like in the new release
Marco
Il 25/10/2010 7.49, Daniel Rapp ha scritto:
Vmwares has some perl/Python packades for managin esx, you could probably use those and à ext script for xymon to check the esx status..
/Daniel
Skickat från min iPhone
25 okt 2010 kl. 07:21 skrev Dave Garaway<dave at dgaraway.com>:
Thanks for the reply. Is there any tricks to getting the client install and running on the ESX hosts?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Everett"<everett.vernon at gmail.com> To: xymon at xymon.com Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 6:34:32 PM Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway< dave at dgaraway.com> wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
To unsubscribe from the xymon list, send an e-mail to xymon-unsubscribe at xymon.com
As Vernon wrote to the list in reply to your post installing a xymon-/hobbit-client on the ESX-host is not sufficient for monitoring the ESX. The reason for this is a) the service-console is just a VM by itself, so there is no way to monitor the cpu- and memory-consumption of the "bare-metal" b) the service-console will not be available in post v4.1 ESX-versions (at least that's announced by VMware)
Personally I havn't looked into SNMP because I had several reports by people running small to mid-sized ESX installations that it's both unreliable and reporting incorrect values.
"Vmware-Monitor for Xmyon (VMX)" takes the offical approach recommended by VMware (and is thus _fully_ supported and not in conflict with support-contracts, ...): the virtual management assistant vMA (a pre-built virtual machine with management-tools available from VMware): http://www.vmware.com/go/vma4 collects the data. Data-processing is done by a small daemon that generates the status-messages for Xymon. Super-short outline how to get your ESX-monitoring up and running with VMX:
- fetch the vMA from VMware from above url and install it.
- install a xymon-client on the vMA, rpm available from http://staff.telkomsa.net/packages/rhel5/xymon/x86_64/
- install VMX on vMA (client-extension script) and on the xymon-server (for data-processing and graphing)
In particular you do not have to install anything on the ESX-hosts.
For more details I've attached the VMX-documentation for your convenience.
All the best,
ThomasOn 10/24/2010 10:06 PM, Dave Garaway wrote:
Thanks for the reply. Is there any tricks to getting the client install and running on the ESX hosts?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Everett" <everett.vernon at gmail.com> To: xymon at xymon.com Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 6:34:32 PM Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway < dave at dgaraway.com > wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
To unsubscribe from the xymon list, send an e-mail to xymon-unsubscribe at xymon.com
--
| IT-Beratung Eckert | Hartkirchweg 54 | fon: +49 (0)761/ 594 9898 | Thomas Eckert | 79111 Freiburg i.Br. | fax: +49 (0)761/ 594 9899 | | Germany | http://www.it-eckert.de/
Is it safe to assume that if I do not want to monitor the usage of each VM against the ESX server, all I need would be the VMA and the Xymon client from the link below and I can get at least an idea of the resources being used on the ESX server itself, or do I really need to have VMX?
I really don't like the idea of purchasing a license from an unknown guy for VMX. Seems really sketchy to me.
Jason Chambers IT Help Desk Associate
GEOSOFT INC. freedom to explore T +1 416.369.0111 #344 F +1 416.369.9599
Visit our site at www.geosoft.com
-----Original Message----- From: Thomas Eckert [mailto:thomas.eckert at IT-Eckert.de] Sent: October-25-10 1:50 AM To: xymon at xymon.com Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
As Vernon wrote to the list in reply to your post installing a xymon-/hobbit-client on the ESX-host is not sufficient for monitoring the ESX. The reason for this is a) the service-console is just a VM by itself, so there is no way to monitor the cpu- and memory-consumption of the "bare-metal" b) the service-console will not be available in post v4.1 ESX-versions (at least that's announced by VMware)
Personally I havn't looked into SNMP because I had several reports by people running small to mid-sized ESX installations that it's both unreliable and reporting incorrect values.
"Vmware-Monitor for Xmyon (VMX)" takes the offical approach recommended by VMware (and is thus _fully_ supported and not in conflict with support-contracts, ...): the virtual management assistant vMA (a pre-built virtual machine with management-tools available from VMware): http://www.vmware.com/go/vma4 collects the data. Data-processing is done by a small daemon that generates the status-messages for Xymon. Super-short outline how to get your ESX-monitoring up and running with VMX:
- fetch the vMA from VMware from above url and install it.
- install a xymon-client on the vMA, rpm available from http://staff.telkomsa.net/packages/rhel5/xymon/x86_64/
- install VMX on vMA (client-extension script) and on the xymon-server (for data-processing and graphing)
In particular you do not have to install anything on the ESX-hosts.
For more details I've attached the VMX-documentation for your convenience.
All the best,
ThomasOn 10/24/2010 10:06 PM, Dave Garaway wrote:
Thanks for the reply. Is there any tricks to getting the client install and running on the ESX hosts?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Everett" <everett.vernon at gmail.com> To: xymon at xymon.com Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 6:34:32 PM Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway < dave at dgaraway.com > wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
To unsubscribe from the xymon list, send an e-mail to xymon-unsubscribe at xymon.com
--
| IT-Beratung Eckert | Hartkirchweg 54 | fon: +49 (0)761/ 594 9898 | Thomas Eckert | 79111 Freiburg i.Br. | fax: +49 (0)761/ 594 9899 | | Germany | http://www.it-eckert.de/
Jason, I would say yes; you can just use VMA and Xymon. In fact, after looking at the VMX screen shots I do not believe it provides enough information about the ESX performance. I did not see a CPUReady% counter for each VM, e.g. I'm sure with a couple hours of coding you could put something together using VMA and the Xymon client. If you didn't know, PowerShell and the VMware PowerCli work well to get statistical information from your VMware environment too.
Good luck!
Ray
-----Original Message----- From: Jason Chambers [mailto:Jason.Chambers at geosoft.com] Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2010 12:10 PM To: 'xymon at xymon.com' Subject: RE: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Is it safe to assume that if I do not want to monitor the usage of each VM against the ESX server, all I need would be the VMA and the Xymon client from the link below and I can get at least an idea of the resources being used on the ESX server itself, or do I really need to have VMX?
I really don't like the idea of purchasing a license from an unknown guy for VMX. Seems really sketchy to me.
Jason Chambers IT Help Desk Associate
GEOSOFT INC. freedom to explore T +1 416.369.0111 #344 F +1 416.369.9599
Visit our site at www.geosoft.com
-----Original Message----- From: Thomas Eckert [mailto:thomas.eckert at IT-Eckert.de] Sent: October-25-10 1:50 AM To: xymon at xymon.com Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
As Vernon wrote to the list in reply to your post installing a xymon-/hobbit-client on the ESX-host is not sufficient for monitoring the ESX. The reason for this is a) the service-console is just a VM by itself, so there is no way to monitor the cpu- and memory-consumption of the "bare-metal" b) the service-console will not be available in post v4.1 ESX-versions (at least that's announced by VMware)
Personally I havn't looked into SNMP because I had several reports by people running small to mid-sized ESX installations that it's both unreliable and reporting incorrect values.
"Vmware-Monitor for Xmyon (VMX)" takes the offical approach recommended by VMware (and is thus _fully_ supported and not in conflict with support-contracts, ...): the virtual management assistant vMA (a pre-built virtual machine with management-tools available from VMware): http://www.vmware.com/go/vma4 collects the data. Data-processing is done by a small daemon that generates the status-messages for Xymon. Super-short outline how to get your ESX-monitoring up and running with VMX:
- fetch the vMA from VMware from above url and install it.
- install a xymon-client on the vMA, rpm available from http://staff.telkomsa.net/packages/rhel5/xymon/x86_64/
- install VMX on vMA (client-extension script) and on the xymon-server (for data-processing and graphing)
In particular you do not have to install anything on the ESX-hosts.
For more details I've attached the VMX-documentation for your convenience.
All the best,
ThomasOn 10/24/2010 10:06 PM, Dave Garaway wrote:
Thanks for the reply. Is there any tricks to getting the client install and running on the ESX hosts?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Everett" <everett.vernon at gmail.com> To: xymon at xymon.com Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 6:34:32 PM Subject: Re: [xymon] ESX 4.1
Hi Dave
This question pops up every few months or so. I even asked it myself once upon a time. The short, but unfortunately incorrect answer is that you can install the Red Hat client in the service console. It is after all, a Linux variant. However, this monitors only the service console, which is itself, only a VM, so it gives you almost nothing about the general health of the system as a whole.
You can install the Xymon client into each VM, in which case, you simply use the appropriate client for the installed OS. But again, this will only give an indication of the health of the VM, not the entire host server.
At one point, when called upon to monitor ESX, I started trying to do some interesting stuff with SNMP using Devmon, but I moved on to a different project, so I never completed it. I did however post to the list what I had managed to do, and hoped somebody else would have picked up where I left off. As far as I am aware, nobody did. :-( NOTE : I am more than happy to be proven wrong on this point. :-) Scan the list for postings from me from about 12 to 18 months ago. It might come up with something which may prove useful.
Unless somebody takes the time to come up with an ESX specific client, or does some magic with SNMP, your only hope is to install clients into every VM.
Regards Vernon
On Sun, Oct 24, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Dave Garaway < dave at dgaraway.com > wrote:
Does anyone have a good way to monitor ESX hosts and the VMs that are running on them?
To unsubscribe from the xymon list, send an e-mail to xymon-unsubscribe at xymon.com
--
| IT-Beratung Eckert | Hartkirchweg 54 | fon: +49 (0)761/ 594 9898 | Thomas Eckert | 79111 Freiburg i.Br. | fax: +49 (0)761/ 594 9899 | | Germany | http://www.it-eckert.de/
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participants (7)
-
daniel.rapp＠incabus.com
-
dave＠dgaraway.com
-
everett.vernon＠gmail.com
-
Jason.Chambers＠geosoft.com
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marco.avvisano＠regione.toscana.it
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storerr＠nibco.com
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thomas.eckert＠IT-Eckert.de