How To Monitor Network Switch and Ports Using Nagios

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• Prune November 26, 2008, 4:44 am

  You should maybe consider graphing tools like cacti or big brother for your network usage. Nagios is mainly targeted as a status monitoring application.

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• Bryan December 10, 2008, 8:26 pm

  Nagios is a really good status monitoring system, but is better to install Cacti in order to graph our devices, the main advantage of Cacti, is the simple but powerful usage.

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• G S Kharel February 24, 2009, 1:03 am

  hello every one

  I want to find the health of all the router and switches connected in my organization LAN using java. So, could you help me in the concern topic.

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• Jeremy April 3, 2009, 1:30 pm

  What if there are 2 switches in a stack? How do I monitor the ports on the 2nd switch on the stack?

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• Ramesh April 11, 2009, 12:55 am

  @Prune, @Bryan,

  Thanks for the information about Cacti – The complete RRDtool based graphing solution. I’ll check it out.
   

  @Jeremy,

  If you are using cisco switches, Check-out check_cisco.pl Nagios Pluginfound in the Nagios Exchange that seems to monitor the ports that are part of the multiple stacked switches.

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• salaz July 9, 2009, 2:56 am

  Hello,

  How about if i want to monitor network bandwidth usage within a building, where do i should place the nagios server? after the firewall?

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• Cameron September 14, 2009, 10:12 pm

  Hi Guys,

  I’m interested in monitoring a switch stack (echoing Jeremy’s question above). The cisco plugin that Ramesh linked to looks good, but I’m using Enterasys equipment.

  Is anyone aware of any ways to monitor switch stacks via snmp?

  Cheers,
  Cameron

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• Bronislav Kaminsky October 29, 2009, 4:32 am

  Hy guys!
  Does anyone have an idea on making smth like subservices in Nagios. A.e. I need to monitor the throughput on each port of the switch and each port status. I wrote a small script using snmpwalk command, that gives a list of ports and their status(or anything that snmpwalk shows) as a result. And I dont’t even imagine how to make Nagios understand it in this way: host -> service(my script) -> port(as a result of the previous) -> smth I choose from snmpwalk
  Thanx

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• Norman Paterson November 30, 2009, 9:38 am

  Where is the mapping between snmp port numbers and switch port numbers defined? It’s simple enough for the first 24 ports, but my 2950 then has two more ports labelled 1 and 2 (ie duplicating the first 2 port numbers). If I use snmpwalk to see what ports are being monitored, I get 28 in all:

  # snmpwalk -v1 -c public my_switch -m ALL .1 | grep ifOperStatus
  RFC1213-MIB::ifOperStatus.1 = INTEGER: down(2)
  RFC1213-MIB::ifOperStatus.2 = INTEGER: down(2)
  RFC1213-MIB::ifOperStatus.3 = INTEGER: down(2)
  …
  RFC1213-MIB::ifOperStatus.26 = INTEGER: down(2)
  RFC1213-MIB::ifOperStatus.27 = INTEGER: up(1)
  RFC1213-MIB::ifOperStatus.28 = INTEGER: up(1)

  I’ve not been able to find this information from the usual sources (ie Google, Cisco).

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• sawsen December 1, 2009, 5:37 am

  Hi,
  Always i have: check_mrtgtraf: Impossible d’ouvrir le fichier de log de MRTG
  In the configuration of switch I have:
  check_command check_local_mrtgtraf!/var/lib/mrtg/192.168.1.253_1.log!AVG!1000000,1000000!5000000,5000000!10
  but in var/lib/mrtg i don’t have a file 192.168.1.253_1.log
  Can someone help me?
  thank you in advance

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• baggage April 23, 2010, 3:55 am

  Can you take a look at this, please?
  Or Can somebody tell me how to add a switch monitoring on nagios3 without centreon interface?
  Actually, I mean about the services since i’ve added the switch. =)
  But I would like to monitor it’s Bandwidth Usage and CPU load/stats.
  I did sth like the following :

  – Bandwidth/traffic :
  Error message is : Port 1 Bandwidth Usage CRITICAL(Return code of 139 is out of bounds)

  define service{
  use generic-service
  host_name switch1
  service_description Port 1 Bandwidth Usage
  check_command check_mrtg!10.4.126.234_1.log!1!1000000!1500000!In!Bytes/Sec
  # check_command traffic_average!10.4.126.234 10 !AVG 1000000 2000000 5000000 5000000
  }

  along with the following given command in /etc/nagios-plugins/config/mrtg.cfg :

  # ‘check_mrtg’ command definition
  define command{
  command_name check_mrtg
  command_line /usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_mrtg ‘$ARG1$’ 10 AVG ‘$ARG2$’ ‘$ARG3$’ ‘$ARG4$’ ‘$ARG5$’ ‘$ARG6$’
  }

  # ‘traffic_average’ command definition
  define command{
  command_name traffic_average
  command_line /usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_mrtgtraf ‘$ARG1$’ 10 AVG ‘$ARG2$’ ‘$ARG3$’ ‘$ARG4$’ ‘$ARG5$’
  }

  – CPU stats :
  Erro message : Port2CPUstats snmp_cpustat -> UNKNOWN : External command error: Cannot find module (”): At line 1 in (none)

  define service{
  hostgroup_name Switches
  use generic-service
  service_description Port2CPUstats snmp_cpustats
  check_command snmp_cpustats!public!50
  }

  along with the following given command definition in /etc/nagios-plugins/config/snmp.cfg:

  # ‘snmp_cpustats’ command definition
  define command{
  command_name snmp_cpustats
  command_line /usr/lib/nagios/plugins/check_snmp -H ‘$HOSTADDRESS$’ -C ‘$ARG1$’ -o .1.3.6.1.4.1.2021.11.9.0,.1.3.6.1.4.1.2021.11.10.0,.1.3.6.1.4.1.2021.11.11.0 -l ‘CPU usage (user system idle)’ -u ‘%’
  }

  For instance, I really abandon centreon matter because it’s a kinda “urgent” project for me. :s
  for mrtg, do we need to install it? That’s kinda what i got from googling. :/

  Thanks,

  kpwstarina@yahoo.com

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• David Merrick June 28, 2010, 5:50 pm

  @baggage and @sawsen–
  I’m no expert, and am still trying to get mrtg working myself, but most tutorials on how to install mrtg have you put the log files in /var/www/mrtg.

  Instead of:
  check_local_mrtgtraf!/var/lib/mrtg/192.168.1.11_1.log!AVG!1000000,2000000!5000000,5000000!10

  You might try:
  check_local_mrtgtraf!/var/www/mrtg/192.168.1.11_1.log!AVG!1000000,2000000!5000000,5000000!10

  (Notice the /var/www instead of /var/lib)
  ~David

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• Vaibhav Mishra September 23, 2010, 2:05 am

  Hi Experts,

  Can I request for some suggestion for my query as below? I have NAGIOS 3.2 installed on Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 4. When I try to monitor traffic on a particular port of my router (router support SNMP), I get Return code of 255 is out of bounds.

  I learnt that my OS should have NET:SNMP agent installed. When I checked, I found that NET::SNMP agent installed as you can see below the output.

  rpm -qa | grep net-snmp
  net-snmp-devel-5.1.2-11.EL4.6
  net-snmp-5.1.2-11.EL4.6
  net-snmp-utils-5.1.2-11.EL4.6
  net-snmp-perl-5.1.2-11.EL4.6
  net-snmp-libs-5.1.2-11.EL4.6

  Can some one tell me where I am making a mistake or if the NET::SNAMP agent need some customization?

  Your kind help must be appreciated.

  Regards,

  Vaibhav

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• Jay September 27, 2010, 12:34 pm

  Hoping someone can help me here. I am currently running Nagios Core Version 3.2.1 and am having an issue monitoring ports on my Cisco 3750 switches. Currently I have all of my switches setup within a host group and can see all other data with the exception of port status. I followed the directions from this site on how to set it up, but to no avail. For instance, I keep getting the error “External command error: Error in packet” and it shows a status of UNKNOWN. What’s strange is that I also have a monitor setup on port 1 (Port 1 Link Status) and it shows as green, but yet the port is in down/down status within the switch. Here is my syntax:

  check_snmp! -C -o ifOperstatus.4 -r 1 -m RFC1213-MIB

  Any help would be greatly appreciated.

  -Jay

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• ramesh December 24, 2010, 1:35 am

  hi experts,

  hi iam configuring nagiios monitoring for but i’m confusing about web access..
  so can you please suggest me how would it be please,

  regards,
  ramesh.

  ∞
• PT May 11, 2011, 4:13 pm

  Is it possible to use check_mrtgtraf if the server running mrtg is a windows server? In my environment I have mrtg running on a windows 2000 box.

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• Chitti Prasad December 24, 2011, 2:01 am

  In Steps #6 and #7 – to monitor switch ports, the Port Number given in the service command i.e., “ifOperStatus.1” <== the 1 is not always the switch port number. The port number for different switches will be different – for example for Cisco2960 Gigabit switch, it will start at 10101 for the first port. It is better to run a snmpwalk command on the switch with "ifDescr" as OID as below for a switch with ip address 172.16.16.1:
  #snmpwalk -v 1 -c public 172.16.16.1 ifDescr
  IF-MIB::ifDescr.1 = STRING: Vlan1
  IF-MIB::ifDescr.10101 = STRING: GigabitEthernet0/1
  IF-MIB::ifDescr.10102 = STRING: GigabitEthernet0/2
  IF-MIB::ifDescr.10103 = STRING: GigabitEthernet0/3
  IF-MIB::ifDescr.10104 = STRING: GigabitEthernet0/4
  IF-MIB::ifDescr.10105 = STRING: GigabitEthernet0/5
  .
  .
  .
  The number foloowing "ifDescr" in the output above is the actual switch port number. As displayed in the first line, the "ifDescr.1" denotes "Vlan1" – which can be taken as the total switch itself – thus it can be used to get the status of the sitch as a whole!

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• Francesco Pucci March 9, 2012, 5:50 am

  I did not find plugin check_snmp into my Nagios installation (Ubuntu 10.04 – Nagios Core 3.2.3).
  Searching Internet I read that I have to install the service snmp and then recompile the Nagios plugin; but when I launched the make command I received the following errors:

  nagios-plugins-1.4.15/plugins/check_http.c:785: undefined reference to `np_net_ssl_write’
  check_http.o(.text+0x120b):/home/machielr/nagios-plugins-1.4.11/plugins/check_http.c:789: undefined reference to `np_net_ssl_read’
  check_http.o(.text+0x12bd):/home/machielr/nagios-plugins-1.4.15/plugins/check_http.c:828: undefined reference to `np_net_ssl_cleanup’
  check_http.o(.text+0x14f4):/home/machielr/nagios-plugins-1.4.15/plugins/check_http.c:734: undefined reference to `np_net_ssl_init’
  check_http.o(.text+0x1513):/home/machielr/nagios-plugins-1.4.15/plugins/check_http.c:736: undefined reference to `np_net_ssl_check_cert’
  check_http.o(.text+0x151a):/home/machielr/nagios-plugins-1.4.15/plugins/check_http.c:737: undefined reference to `np_net_ssl_cleanup’

  I resolved cleaning the make info before recompiling the plugins:

  make distclean
  ./configure –with-nagios-user=nagios –with-nagios-group=nagios –with-openssl
  make all
  make install

  Now, I find the check_snmp plugin under the folder /usr/local/nagios/libexec and all works well !

  ∞
• Cooltechie March 22, 2012, 3:11 pm

  Although the information on this page is very useful I still have trouble understanding why the Author will call it Monitoring “Ports” when in reality the only thing this setting is doing is monitoring “Interfaces” (NICs)
  If I have an HP Switch with 24 “ports” these ports will never be monitored by this writings, only the Interface with an IP address will, the 24 ports will not.
  I wish to find something that will monitor bandwidth at each port level, in order for me to know how much bandwidth a particular port in the switch is pulling at any time.

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• Gaurav September 15, 2012, 8:38 pm

  Hi ,
  I have to implement cpu utilization for pktr device so I download the plugin check_cpu and did following :

  1) Put check_cpu into your Nagios libexec directory
  (e.g. /usr/local/Nagios/libexec, or wherever Nagios is installed on your server)

  2) Create the symbolic links, being careful not to overwrite any files by the same name already there:
  ln –s check_cpu check_load
  ln –s check_cpu check_ram
  ln –s check_cpu check_swap
  (these symlinks dictate how the script is run, as it can check CPU, RAM, load and swap, depending on how it is invoked)

  3) Edit your Nagios commands.cfg file and add some entries like this:

  # ‘check_cpu’ command definition
  # w = Warning level (if CPU % idle falls below this level – must be a percentage)
  # c = Critical level
  define command{
  command_name check_cpu
  command_line $USER1$/check_cpu -H $HOSTADDRESS$ -w $ARG1$ -c $ARG2$ -p $USER3$
  }

  # ‘check_swap’ command definition
  # w = Warning level (if % or MB swap free drops below this level)
  # c = Critical level
  define command{
  command_name check_swap
  command_line $USER1$/check_swap -H $HOSTADDRESS$ -w $ARG1$ -c $ARG2$ -p $USER3$
  }

  # ‘check_ram’ command definition
  # w = Warning level defined as percentage (with % sign) or in megabytes (without % sign)
  # c = Critical level (can be defined as percentage or MB independently of warning)
  # o = below|above –> if mem [free drops BELOW] or [used rises ABOVE] thresholds
  define command{
  command_name check_ram
  command_line $USER1$/check_ram -H $HOSTADDRESS$ -w $ARG1$ -c $ARG2$ -p $USER3$ -o $ARG3$
  }

  # ‘check_load’ command definition
  # w = Warning levels (alert if n,n,n (1,5,15 minute load averages) go above these levels)
  # c = Critical levels
  define command{
  command_name check_load
  command_line $USER1$/check_load -H $HOSTADDRESS$ -w $ARG1$ -c $ARG2$ -p $USER3$
  }
  and then in switch.cf file i entered following :
  define host{
  use generic-switch
  host_name atx-pktr
  alias atx-pktr
  address xx.xx.xx.xxx
  hostgroups dti
  }

  define service{
  use generic-service
  host_name atx-pktr
  service_description PING
  check_command check_ping!700.0,40%!1200.0,70%
  normal_check_interval 5
  retry_check_interval 1
  }

  define service{
  use generic-service ; Inherit values from a template
  host_name atx-pktr
  service_description Uptime
  check_command check_snmp!-C encrypted -o sysUpTime.0
  }

  define service{
  use generic-service ; Inherit values from a template
  host_name atx-pktr
  service_description cpu
  check_command check_cpu!10%!20%
  }

  But when I go to Nagios and serch for this device it is not giving me anything for CPU utilization…. Can anyone please help this is really urgent for my Project.

  Output on Nagios page:

  Service Status Details For Host ‘atx-pktr’

  Host Sort by host name (ascending)Sort by host name (descending) Service Sort by service name (ascending)Sort by service name (descending) Status Sort by service status (ascending)Sort by service status (descending) Last Check Sort by last check time (ascending)Sort by last check time (descending) Duration Sort by state duration (ascending)Sort by state duration time (descending) Attempt Sort by current attempt (ascending)Sort by current attempt (descending) Status Information
  atx-pktr

  PING

  OK 09-15-2012 19:33:09 16d 20h 47m 26s 1/3 PING OK – Packet loss = 0%, RTA = 63.53 ms

  Uptime

  OK 09-15-2012 19:33:06 17d 7h 59m 36s 1/3 SNMP OK – Timeticks: (1417832615) 164 days, 2:25:26.15

  cpu

  UNKNOWN 09-15-2012 19:28:49 0d 1h 41m 0s 3/3 CPU ERROR: SNMP Connection Problem

  Regards
  Gaurav

  ∞
• Rajendra December 23, 2012, 11:03 am

  Hi All,

  Information is worth and usefull, I have installed Nagios 3.2 in my project.

  I am able to monitor the cisco switches ports status and traffic utilzation of the ports..

  Now i would like to know how to monitor/configure Cisco switches CPU utilization??

  It will be great if you can provide the configuration example…

  Thank you in advance

  Best Regards,
  Rajendra

  ∞
• Roth January 12, 2013, 2:13 pm

  Hi there,
  I am not sure how could I know the OID from my switch port. I would like to monitor my switch port from nagios.
  Anyone could help me?

  Thanks in advance,
  Roth

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• Ben Mobabbe February 17, 2013, 12:44 pm

  Hi,
  you should give this plugin a try.

  check_nwc_health not only can be used in a multi-vendor environment (Cisco, HP, F5, Juniper,…), it brings together many features in one single plugin.
  –mode uptime
  –mode interface-usage // monitor _all_ interfaces
  –mode interface-usage –name // monitor _one_ specific interface
  –mode interface-usage –name –regexp // monitor interfaces which match
  –mode cpu-usage
  –mode hardware-health
  –mode memory-usage
  …and many more

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• tonmoy May 20, 2013, 11:12 pm

  not getting my switchport snmp reply…status unknown.any help

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• vijayscsa July 31, 2013, 1:04 am

  Hi ..!

  Right now, i’m monitoring a device through device for all services it is giving the following error.
  “Return code of 127 is out of bounds – plugin may be missing”, request your suggestions on how to fix the same.

  Thanks.

  ∞
• Manish Jagtap August 12, 2013, 12:26 am

  Hi,

  How do I monitor SNMP table in Nagios? Here, the row count would be dynamic. here.

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• Muharrem Aydin June 24, 2014, 4:10 am

  Hi,

  I want to do with SNMPv3, examples of this transaxle? Only your user name and password you want to use.

  ∞
• Massoud November 7, 2014, 11:18 am

  Hi,

  Is it useful for monitoring ports on Juniper? I need to check status of some ports on my juniper switches.

  If yes, the scripts are same or not?

  Thanks in advance

  ∞
• Chiraniv May 23, 2016, 10:26 am

  Hello Sir,

  Tutorial is very nice..

  can you please upload how to configure brocade SAN switch (Commands)..

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