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

[Steve Holmes]

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 hostname Applications Infrastructure Other 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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