[Xymon] Formatting errors on log files

Japheth Cleaver cleaver at terabithia.org
Tue Oct 18 00:10:02 CEST 2016


Hmm. Does the data after the corrupted lines appear to match the 
remaining data for the server in question? From the sample below it 
seems not (as I believe this is reported in alphabetical order), which 
might indicate indicate a broader memory corruption issue going on 
within xymond_client, where it's somehow losing track of the end or 
garbling the data in the buffer being used for holding status output. If 
it's causing a false positive, then it's not merely the final output 
that's the problem, but something occurring earlier in processing.

What OS+distro is the server running on?
Any chance you might be able to run xymond_client in debug mode for a 
bit while this is occurring?

-jc


On 10/17/2016 7:56 AM, Greg Krpan wrote:
> Hi JC-
>
> Thanks for the response.
>
> I am using Xymon 4.3.27 currently.  The raw client data looks fine- 
> there are no corrupted lines and no added brackets or special 
> characters that I can see.  This only occurs on the status pages.
>
> The server has been running since May, and this particular problem 
> started at the end of Sept., after running Windows Update on my 
> servers, but as both Windows and Linux clients are showing the 
> behavior, I have ruled out the updates as the issue.
>
> I have tried restarting the service with no effect on behavior and 
> there is nothing in the log files that show a problem that I can see.  
> The level of false positives due to formatting errors has remained 
> relatively consistent, and tends to be limited to the PROCS (Win, 
> Linux) and SVCS (Win only) tests, but occasionally will see the same 
> error occurring on the DISK and CPU tests, although that is 
> significantly less frequent, and is not across all configured 
> machines.  The PROCS/SVCS tests are showing random errors on one 
> machine or another approximately every 5 minutes.
>
> Thanks
> Greg.
>
> On Fri, Oct 14, 2016 at 6:52 PM, J.C. Cleaver <cleaver at terabithia.org 
> <mailto:cleaver at terabithia.org>> wrote:
>
>
>
>     On Fri, October 14, 2016 3:52 pm, Greg Krpan wrote:
>     > Recently, my monitoring has been generating frequent errors that are
>     > false,
>     > due to improper formatting,  It is happening on both Windows and
>     Linux
>     > clients.  I've included an example of how the tests are sending
>     data back
>     > to the xymon server.  I have not made any changes to my client
>     or server
>     > configurations.  Has anyone else been experiencing this
>     behavior, or know
>     > of a fix?
>     >
>     > Greg.
>     >
>     > Name                                StartupType Status
>     > DisplayName
>     > AeLookupSvc                         manual  stopped
>     > Application Experience
>     > ALG                                 manual  stopped
>     > Application Layer Gateway Service
>     > AppIDSvc                            manual  stopped
>     > Application Identity
>     > Appinfo                             manual  stopped
>     > Application Information
>     > AppMgmt                             manual  stopped
>     > Application Management
>     > AppReadiness                        manual  stopped        App
>     > Readiness
>     > AppXSvc                             manual  stopped        AppX
>     > Deployment Service (AppXSVC)
>     > AudioEndpointBuilder                manual
>     > toppe]        Windows Audio Endpoint Builder
>     > Audiosrv                            manual  stopped        Windows
>     > Audio
>     > BBWin                               automatic started        Big
>     > Brother Xymon Client
>     > BFE                                 automatic started        Base
>     > Filtering Engine
>     > BITS                                automatic started
>     > Background Intelligent Transfer Serv
>     > ce
>     > BrokerInfrastructure   ]            automatic started
>     > Background Tasks Infrastructure Service
>     > Browser                             disabled  stopped       
>     Computer
>     > Browser
>     > CcmExec                             automatic started        SMS
>     Agent
>     > Host
>     > CertPropSvc                         manual  started
>     > Certificate Propagation
>     > CmRcService                         disabled  stopped
>     > Configuration Manager Remote Control
>     > COMSysApp                           manual
>     > started        COM+ Sys]
>     > m Application
>     > CryptSvc]
>     >                          ]
>     > utomatic    started        Cr]
>     > tographic Services
>     > DcomLaunch   ]
>     >                      automatic    sta]
>     > ed        DCOM Serv]
>     >  Process Launcher
>     > defra]svc                           manual  stopped        Optimize
>     > drives
>     > DeviceAssociationService            manual  stopped        Device
>     > Association Service
>
>
>     Hi Greg,
>
>     Is there anything unusual about the process names on the lines
>     immediately
>     before the corruption? There's a known issue in that lines
>     starting with a
>     bracket will cause missing data, and this can happen more
>     frequently on
>     Windows servers just by virtue of some of the data that's coming
>     across,
>     but that doesn't appear to be causing this specific issue.
>
>
>     Can you confirm which version of Xymon server you're using? Do you
>     see the
>     same corruption in the "raw" Client Data for the affected servers,
>     or is
>     it only occurring on the status pages?
>
>     Also -- anything unusual in the log files? Has this problem been
>     constant
>     since it started, or is it getting worse? Does restarting the xymon
>     service fix it (temporarily)?
>
>
>     Regards,
>     -jc
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>
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> White II, Roger Bruce Chaffee
> Space Shuttle Challenger, Mission STS-51-L; January 28, 1986 Francis 
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> M. Brown, Laurel Blair Salton Clark, Ilan Ramon


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