[hobbit] Hobbit client executing a script to be proactive if a problem occurs?

[Josh Luthman]

David,

Sorry for your loss =(  I know of many people that are being forced into
Outlook.

I use puTTY and Gmail exclusively.  I'm using rich text (Gmail will not send
out HTML) which VI seems to like.

Anyways, just thought I'd help you eliminate issues - I think we can all
agree Outlook is the cause of the copy/paste malfunction.

Josh

On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 1:17 PM, Chris Wopat <chrisw at supranet.net> wrote:

> Phil Wild wrote:
>
> > Hi Chris,
> >
> > I think it really depends on what you are testing? If you are using the
> > standard hobbit client and the standard tests, most of the client side is
> > pretty basic, I guess you could call it a dumb client in a way as it does a
> > simple job of pulling the data out and sends it on without any intelligent
> > decisions being made about thresholds etc.
> >
> > To do what you want, you either have to do as you say (set up keys from
> > the server etc and have the server perform an action after a threshold
> > breach from a script initiated/configured in the hobbit-alerts file.
> >
>
> Bummer, I was hoping there was perhaps a barely documented feature that
> would let you exec a script on the client to make my life easier.
>
>
>  Or, which would be much simpler, put some code in your monitoring script
> > to take action, but then you are starting to move away from the simplicity
> > of hobbit. It decomes even harder if you want to take action based on
> > something picked up in the standard tests (like CPU that you mentioned in
> > your post).
> >
>
> Indeed, my intent is for standard tests.
>
>
>  You may need to write your own test/new column that monitors the same
> > metric but in a different light. In my view, an automated action based on a
> > detected event probably does not belong in the monitoring system. If a
> > failure can be expected and an automated action is known to fix the issue,
> > perhaps that should be built into the startup process of the application (a
> > watchdog process etc).
> >
>
> Indeed, a daemon shouldn't fail and it should run properly or be fixed
> natively. However, in the case of what I'm trying to monitor is an item that
> has a series of dependencies - Postfix, depending on Amavis, depending on
> p0f, depending on ClamAV, depending on greylist software, depending on
> database, etc. Under certain circumstances if one of these were to go down,
> it ends up snowballing to have high CPU, in my case.
>
> The better way for me to handle this is to likely search logs for items,
> instead of relying on high CPU.
>
>
>  Hobbit can then be used to monitor the log for a restart event, or a
> > failed restart event etc. Actually, thinking about it more, building the
> > intelligent action into the agent is an ok idea and you also have the
> > opportunity of capturing and transmitting additional information about why
> > something dies if you run an action to fix and it failed etc.
> >
>
> For the scenario I laid out above, I intend to write a script that will
> restart the daemons properly in the correct order, but this is the "oh shit"
> script, and wouldn't be a system startup script, for example.
>
>
>  I am waffling... You still need extra security based configuration steps
> > on the client with sudo or ssh anyway to get around access permission to
> > restart something anyway as your client is running as the hobbit userid so
> > this brings the client configuration closer to an ssh setup on the server. I
> > don't think either way is perfect but both would do what you want...
> >
>
> Indeed. It sounds like generally the two scenarios I'd mentioned in my
> email are the way to get it to work, and whichever is most reliable/less
> hack-ish would be the best way to do it.
>
>
>  Perhaps this is something that belongs on a request for feature list of a
> > future release of hobbit.
> >
> > The hobbit client installation to configure sudo to allow it to run
> > commands as other users (on admins acceptance during the installation of
> > course).
> > The ability of the hobbit server to send a series of actions to the
> > hobbit client for execution via the hobbit communication channel. Sounds
> > like something that could have lots of uses if done well...
> >
>
> I think this would be the perfect scenario. Something added to the hobbit
> client, that would go in 'localclient.cfg'. A simple 'SCRIPT' line that
> could be nested under a test, that would pass along whatever meaningful
> variables that could be useful, such as PID.
>
> The hobbit server *already uses* 'setuid root' for some binaries, such as
> 'hobbitping'. The client would simply need to call some binary who's sole
> purpose is to launch scripts as root so essentially anything would be
> possible.
>
> I can't think of any reason that some hook would have to exist for the
> script to tell the hobbit client anything back, I think it can just wait for
> the next poll period to see if it went back to green.
>
>
> --Chris
>
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>
>
>


-- 
Josh Luthman
Office: 937-552-2340
Direct: 937-552-2343
1100 Wayne St
Suite 1337
Troy, OH 45373

Those who don't understand UNIX are condemned to reinvent it, poorly.
--- Henry Spencer
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