[Xymon] Thought Process for Xymon Page Layout - Sanity Check

[Steve Holmes]

I use group-compress rather than group-only, that way I don't have to
predict which columns to show.
I've never been able to get the CLASS thing to work. I tried, but either I
don't understand it or it just doesn't work :-).
I rely heavily on the page directives for controlling alerts. It works for
us.
Seve

On Wed, Apr 4, 2012 at 12:33 PM, Don Kuhlman <Don.Kuhlman at schawk.com> wrote:

>  Thanks Steve!  I appreciate your thoughtful response.  More questions…
>
>  Do you use the "group-only" directives to add or remove columns on your
> pages or do you use the "Class" directives to help arrange and organize
> things, or do you strictly use the page categories to help with alerts and
> notifications?
>
>  Or maybe I am misunderstanding the use of the Class: directives from the
> man page.  Is it only for log file monitoring?
>
>  Regards,
>
>  Don K
>
>
>   From: Steve Holmes <sholmes42 at mac.com>
> Date: Wed, 4 Apr 2012 11:59:05 -0400
> To: Don Kuhlman <don.kuhlman at schawk.com>
> Cc: Xymon Email List <xymon at xymon.com>
> Subject: Re: [Xymon] Thought Process for Xymon Page Layout - Sanity Check
>
>  Don,
> We have wrestled with the same issues. We started with systems organized
> by OS (Unix/Windows) and then as more apps became multi-platform have moved
> away from the platform centric organization, with some exceptions. The
> reason for the change is so we can see at a glance when there is a problem
> in a service we support so when there is a problem the customers for that
> service can be notified, unless the problem is fixed before the customers
> have to be notified (which is the big payoff with using Xymon).
>
> Our main page contains 3 groups:
>
>    Services
>    Platform Support
>    Infrastructure
>
> Under Services there are sub pages:
> Production
> Non-Production
> Pre-production
> Decommissioned
>
> Under Platform Support there is currently only:
> Platform Windows Servers
>
> Under Infrastructure:
>
> Authentication
> Network
> Server Provisioning
>
>
> Prod and non-prod each have a list of application/service areas as sub
> pages, each of which is a list of hosts in logical groups with no respect
> for OS platform. Within the groups the hosts are listed in alpha order.
>
> Pre-production contains hosts which are not in production yet, but will be
> heading there (with some arm twisting at times). The reason for this is the
> OPS center only calls support for alerts that show up on a production page.
> Hosts in pre-prod (as well as non-prod) can fail without causing a call.
>
> Decommissioned is where we put host entries for hosts that are just that.
> We keep them there for a year after they've gone off line in case someone
> wants to see the history. They all have noconn and all the NOPROPS so they
> don't show up anywhere else.
>
> The Infrastructure group is also production, but not application specific.
> This is an area currently under development so it is incomplete. There we
> have network devices, DNS servers, and the like.
>
> Platform Support was a special request from the Windows admins to group
> all of the windows servers in one place (with duplicate entries) so they
> don't have to look through all of the application pages to find their
> servers. The Platform Windows Servers sub page contains sub pages for Prod
> and Non-Prod, each of which is grouped by application area. Yes, this
> duplicates the work I have to do when Windows systems are added, but they
> know that if they don't tell me exactly where to put the duplicate entry it
> won't go in. We could also put a page in there for Linux/Solaris admins,
> but that hasn't been requested, yet.
>
> Many times when a new server shows up in the ghost report I have to ask
> the admins for information about where it should go. Our naming convention
> helps, but not totally.
>
> Side note: OPS likes to watch the all-non-green page. But that contains
> non-green tests for non-prod as well as prod. I would really like to be
> able to provide them with an all-non-green-prod-only (for lack of better
> terminology) so they could easily see what they need to. Putting NOPROPS on
> all non-prod would prevent the admins from being able to use the same page
> to watch everything. Something I'm not willing to do.
>
> HTH
> Steve
>
> On Wed, Apr 4, 2012 at 10:57 AM, Don Kuhlman <Don.Kuhlman at schawk.com>wrote:
>
>>  Hi folks. I have been modifying our xymon server host cfg file setups.
>>  I have been moving page layouts around.  I thought I would send a note to
>> the list to see what others are doing in their web page layouts just to
>> have a sanity check…
>>
>>  Do you set up your main page to list things by OS, then by environment
>> – like this:
>> Unix -  then Prod, Dev, Test, Uat, etc.
>> Windows – then Prod, Dev, Test, Uat, etc.
>>
>>  Do you also use Application groups and then arrange them by OS and
>> environment ?
>> App1, Unix, Prod
>> App1, Unix, Dev
>>
>>  Or
>>
>>  App1, Prod
>> App1, Dev
>>
>>  Here's what I've been doing and I'm having second thoughts about the
>> logic of doing it this way:
>>
>>  Main xymon page lists the following Pages
>>
>>  Server lists by hostnameApplications InfrastructureOther Systems
>>
>>  Under Server lists by hostname – I have now made up UNIX-MAC and WINDOWS
>> Under each of these I have PROD and DEV
>>
>>  Under the Applications I have several business Applications -
>> App1
>> App2
>> App3
>>
>>  In each of the App1, App2, App3, I have Prod and Dev subpages
>>
>>  I'm creating include files for each category – like HostsApp1Prod.cfg,
>> HostsApp1Dev.cfg, HostsApp2Prod.cfg, HostsApp2Dev.cfg, etc.
>> Now that I've changed it, I will probably need to create new
>> HostsApp1ProdUnixMac.cfg, HostsApp1ProdWindows.cfg
>>
>>  I would like to be able to setup base rules for monitoring the Prod &
>> Dev systems – Prod disk, mem, cpu is different than Dev disk, mem, cpu,
>> etc.  That's why I thought breaking out by OS and then environment would
>> make sense.
>>
>>  Then I want to create very specific service, process, or other
>> monitoring for the application servers.
>>
>>  Does this seem like a good way to go, or am I making it too complicated
>> by breaking everything down this way?
>>
>>
>>  Thanks
>>
>>  Don K
>>
>>
>>
> --
> If they give you ruled paper, write the other way. -Juan Ramon Jimenez,
> poet, Nobel Prize in literature (1881-1958)
>
> I prayed for freedom for twenty years, but received no answer until I
> prayed with my legs. -Frederick Douglass, Former slave, abolitionist,
> editor, and orator (1817-1895)
>
>
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-- 
If they give you ruled paper, write the other way. -Juan Ramon Jimenez,
poet, Nobel Prize in literature (1881-1958)

I prayed for freedom for twenty years, but received no answer until I
prayed with my legs. -Frederick Douglass, Former slave, abolitionist,
editor, and orator (1817-1895)
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