Hobbit 4.1.2 released

[Henrik Stoerner]

I'm pleased to finally announce the availability of Hobbit version 4.1.2.

Sources and binaries (in .rpm and .deb format) are available from 
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=128058&package_id=140220&release_id=362670

This release fixes a number of bugs in the client- and server-
code, but also includes some minor improvements.

If you are upgrading, please note:
- If you are upgrading from 4.1.1, you MUST change the
  ~hobbit/server/etc/hobbit-clients.cfg file and add a
  line with the text "DEFAULT" before the default settings
  in the file.
- The 4.1.x pre-built Debian packages for the Hobbit client
  were built without flagging the local client configuration
  files as such. So upgrading a client with the .deb packages
  may overwrite any modifications you have made to the local
  client configuration (e.g. if you have added extensions
  to the client).


Regards,
Henrik


Changes from 4.1.1 -> 4.1.2 (11 Oct 2005)
-----------------------------------------

Post-RC1 fixes:
* Linux client now runs ps with "-w" to get more of the
  commandline.
* Disk status reports from clients are now processed with
  sed to make sure each mounted filesystem appears on a
  single line.
* A missing "req." text in the "procs" status report was
  fixed.
* Web checks now recognize status "100" as OK.
* All of the build scripts using "head -1" now use the
  POSIX'ly correct "head -n 1" instead.
* Documentation update: We do have a client now; the
  hobbit-clients.cfg man-page was added.

Bugfixes:
* The hobbit module handling client reports had several bugs
  in the way it interpreted the hobbit-clients.cfg file. These
  were fixed, but this necessitated that the default settings
  are explicitly flagged with a "DEFAULT" line.
* When multiple recipients of an alert had different minimum
  duration and/or repeat-settings, they would mostly use only
  the settings for the first recipient.
* The alert module could continue sending alerts even though
  the rules in hobbit-alerts.cfg that triggered the alert had
  been modified.
* The hobbitd daemon would leak memory when responding to a
  "query" request. In extreme circumstances, it could also
  crash.
* The hobbitd_alert module could leak tiny amounts of memory.
* The default timeouts on the server- and client-side have 
  been increased to allow some more time to send in status
  messages. Because of Hobbit's more agressive use of "combo"
  messages and larger amounts of data, it could timeout
  prematurely on busy servers.
* Hosts flagged with "nobb2" no longer appear in the acknowledge
  log on the BB2 page.
* The size of the shared-memory buffers used to pass data between
  the core hobbit daemon and the hobbitd_* modules has been 
  increased, allowing for larger messages. These are now also
  configurable, so you can change them without having to
  recompile Hobbit (see the MAXMSG_* settings in hobbitserver.cfg(5)).
* bbproxy: When sending to multiple servers and the connection to
  one server fails, continue feeding a message to the other servers
  instead of dropping it completely.
* bbproxy: Rotating the logs will now also rotate the logfile for
  any debugging output.
* The RSS files now escape special characters, to make sure
  the file has a valid RSS XML syntax.
* The "cpu" status from a Hobbit client with a critical load
  would include texts showing both that the load was "high"
  and "critical". Changed to include only the most severe
  condition.
* The "ncv" (name-colon-value) data handler could easily 
  read past end of input, and mis-interpret the input data.
  Fixed by Matti Klock.

Build fixes:
* An "autoconf" type of script is now used to check for some
  of the more common build problems. This should make the client
  build without problems on more platforms.
* The "configure" script will now recognize the "hobbit" user
  on systems using NIS or NIS+.
* "make install" would fail to set the proper permissions for the
  Hobbit client directories.
* The pre-built Debian- and RPM-packages failed to flag the
  client configuration files as such, so they would be overwritten
  by an upgrade. Note that this fix only takes effect AFTER you
  have installed the new .deb or .rpm files.
* The pre-built Debian- and RPM-packages failed to set permissions
  on the client logs/ and tmp/ directories.
* A separate "hobbit-client" package is now generated in both
  .rpm and .deb format.
* A bug in the "merge-sects" installation utility has been fixed. This
  could cause the installation to abort prematurely.

Server improvements:
* The acknowledge log on the BB 2 page now has a configurable
  max number and max time of the entries listed, via the
  --max-ackcount and --max-acktime options for bbgen.
* The eventlog script now lets you filter out events based on
  the hostname, testname, color, and start/stop times. Thanks
  to Eric Schwimmer for contributing this.
* The "netstat" statistics module has been upgraded to collect
  byte-counter statistics for HP-UX, AIX, OSF/1 and *BSD.
  This might only work with the Hobbit client, not the BB/LARRD
  bf-netstat module.
* A "group-except" definition is now supported in the bb-hosts
  file, to show all tests EXCEPT certain ones for a group of
  hosts.
* A "noclear" tag has been added. This is the equivalent of
  defining all network test with the '~' - "always report true 
  status" - flag.
* RPC tests now only run if the ping check of the server did 
  not fail.
* The default size of the RRD graphs can be defined via the
  RRDHEIGHT and RRDWIDTH settings in hobbitserver.cfg.
* The hobbitgraph CGI can now generate comparison graphs 
  with e.g. the load graphs from multiple hosts. However, a
  front-end tool for requsting these has not yet been created.
* Stale RRD files (.rrd files that haven't been updated for 
  more than 1 day) are no longer included when generating the
  graphs on the status pages. They still show up if you view
  the graphs on the "trends" status column.
* The hobbit-confreport CGI is now installed correctly,
  including an item in the "Reports" menu.
* The "info" column now include the "uname" data from the
  Hobbit client, allowing you to see what operating system
  is running on the host.

Client improvements:
* The "runclient.sh" script now accepts two commandline options:
  "--hostname=CLIENT.HOST.NAME" lets you override the default
  hostname that the client uses when it reports data to Hobbit;
  "--os=OSNAME" lets you override the operating system name for
  certain Linux systems. See the README.CLIENT file.
* The client is now re-locatable. I.e. you can pack up the
  "client" directory and move it to another box or another
  location for easier deployment of the client on multiple
  boxes running the same operating system.
* Client installations on NIS-based systems should now work.
* AIX is now supported - has been tested with 4.3.3 and 5.x.
* OSF/1 is now supported (4.x and 5.x)
* HP-UX support should work
* Darwin / Mac OS X is now supported.
* {Free,Net,Open}BSD-based systems failed to build the meminfo 
  tool, so memory reporting was broken.
* Solaris clients now reports all types of filesystems 
  (notably "vxfs" filesystems were omitted before).
* The client configuration now lets you check for filesystems
  that MUST be mounted.
* The clients now switch locale to use the POSIX locale - 
  previously the system locale was used, which could result
  in status messages in languages that the backend did
  not expect.

Other:
* A new utility "demotool" can be used to simulate a number of
  servers to Hobbit. This may be useful when demonstrating
  Hobbit to new users. Note: This is not included in the 
  default build - to build it, run "make demo-build".