cmdln.org (a sysadmin blog)

Sysstat Sar Performance Metrics Via Nagios Plugin

Nick Anderson — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:42:06 +0000

I know I’ve mentioned how much I love the sysstat package before. I use sar regularly to help with performance diagnostics (Analyzing Linux System Performance And Finding Bottle Necks, CPU Performance Analysis In Linux, Baseline Analysis Is Important, CPU Performance Analysis In Linux Revisited). I wrote this little Nagios plugin to collect the performance metrics that sar [...]

XenServer License Check – Nagios NRPE Plugin

Nick Anderson — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:51:23 +0000

If you hadn’t already guessed I am a big fan of the Xen hypervisor. Lately I have been using the Citrix XenServer release because it makes it quite palatable for my co-workers. One annoyance that I do have about XenServer is the requirement that you license it (with a free license) every year. If you [...]

Flashback: Remote kernel logging with netconsole for fun and profit

Nick Anderson — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 15:17:23 +0000

Have you ever had a machine that was a bit flaky? You know those ones that occasionally crash and don’t write anything useful into the log file. Sometimes you can capture those messages with netconsole. Just revisiting a small walk-through I wrote a while back. Remote kernel logging with netconsole for fun and profit ©2010 cmdln.org [...]

Installing NRPE on XenServer

Nick Anderson — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:05:58 +0000

I like to have as little run in dom0 as possible. However some things you really need checked from dom0, like the status of your raid perhaps. Just some quick instructions on getting Nagios NRPE running in XenServer. Install EPEL repository and disable it by default (remember we don’t want to accidentally install unnecessary packages) wget http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/epel/5/$(uname [...]

Flashback: Vim customization for python

Nick Anderson — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 15:05:10 +0000

Python has become my language of choice for automation and general scripting. Its nice to have an editor that makes things easier when your doing things. Its also nice to use an editor that you can find just about anywhere. I have customized my vim to make doing things in python much quicker and this [...]

Flashback: Backdoor Corporate Sabotage With DNS

Nick Anderson — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 14:31:37 +0000

This is just an old entry that I thought was interesting, and it appears its still relevant. Like a broken record, “economic times are rough”, what better way to boost your revenue than to exploit your customers. What better way to suppress a competitor than to increase a competitors infrastructure costs (with little visibility to [...]

Flashback: Automatic session logging and monitoring with GNU screen for the paranoid

Nick Anderson — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 14:31:02 +0000

Another day, another flashback. I don’t know about you but at times I have had some very odd and uncomfortable requests from vendors. It’s not wholly uncommon for them to want to log into your system to diagnose an issue for themselves. Or perhaps for whatever reason your manager says hey give this random outside [...]

Flashback: Trust not DNS or How to properly move a website

Nick Anderson — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 05:01:58 +0000

Matt Simmons is trying to dust off some old articles he think some people may have missed. So I figure why not. A while back I talked about how to move a website (read DNS sucks , you need a reverse proxy). In fact I have talked about reverse proxies a few times since I [...]

Home Grown / Open Source vs Appliances

Nick Anderson — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 17:52:12 +0000

The last few days I have been having a pretty good debate with a friend about the virtues of open source vs Appliances. At times its gotten pretty heated but its all in good fun. The current debate centers around email infrastructure. There are options on the table to use an appliance, or a 3rd [...]

Microsoft Mediaroom Personal Server Odyssey

Nick Anderson — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 15:09:15 +0000

Ewwww, scary isn’t it. No Its not Halloween, but you may have entered the twilight zone. Right, I never touch Microsoft products. Well in actuality sometimes I do (I just don’t brag about it). Some of the development at $work uses Microsofts Mediaroom, and I have a “Personal Server” (great name right?) that the developers use. [...]