
    Websmon -- Web-based system performance monitor, version 1.02.
    Copyright (C) 2003-2006 Dmitry Lapenkov. All rights reserved.


    Websmon Monitor. Readme.
    ========================

   The installation notes can be found in the file Install.

   For technical information, please refer to the file Websmon.

   Also, feel free to visit the Web site at http://www.websmon.com.
   You will find there the numerous samples of the statistics Web pages
   created by the monitor.

    1. Websmon - what is it? And what is it for?
    2. What are the systems the monitor consist of?
    3. On what operating systems can Websmon be running?
    4. What additional software does Websmon need to be installed?
    5. What operating systems and databases can Websmon monitor?
    6. What system resources can be monitored?
    7. How to obtain a license?
    8. What next? What features will appear in the next versions?

  1. Websmon - what is it? And what is it for?

   Websmon, or Web-based system performance monitor is a perfomance
   monitoring and management system for local and remote UNIX servers and
   PROGRESS databases.

   Websmon collects and processes the statistics of the system resources
   consumption (e.g., usage of the server CPU(s), memory, or disk storage,
   server load averages, number of the UNIX users logged, size and growth
   rate of a PROGRESS database, transactional activity in the database,
   number of the database clients connected and many other important
   parameters; for the detailed description, please read Chapter 6) storing
   the gathered statistic information in the data files and then shows the
   collected statistics in the form of Web pages containing graphical
   representation of the utilization of system resources for a certain period
   of time (that is, for a day, a week, a month or a year).

   The Web pages created can be viewed from any modern browser (for instance,
   Microsoft Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox).

   The collected statistic information is stored in the data files in the CSV
   format and can easily be viewed and analyzed later (i.e. off-line); also,
   this statistics can be imported to a database or used for making various
   reports in the office productivity suites (e.g., Microsoft Excel).

   Beside this, Websmon demonstrates the current status of the remote servers
   (hosts) as well as TCP services (e.g., HTTP, FTP, telnet, DNS servers,
   etc.) and database servers running on these hosts.

   Generally, Websmon shows:

     o Whether or not the specified hosts are active. Note that these hosts
       can run not only UNIX but any modern operating system with support for
       TCP protocol enabled;
     o Whether or not the specified TCP services are active;
     o Whether or not the specified PROGRESS database servers are active
       (support for client-server mode required);
     o Statistics of usage of the system resources for the specified UNIX
       servers (see the list of the operating systems supported in the
       Chapter 5);
     o On-line UNIX server reports: the detailed host report, the list of the
       logged user, the list of the system and user processes running;
     o Statistics of usage of the system resources for the specified PROGRESS
       databases (see Chapter 5);
     o On-line PROGRESS database reports: current status of a database, and
       list of the database clients connected.

   Finally, Websmon can alert a system administrator (via e-mail or SMS) when
   a host, a TCP service, and/or a PROGRESS database server become inactive
   (which may mean a server shutdown, a network failure, a power blackout,
   etc).

   So, here are a few main reasons to use the Websmon Monitor:

     o With Websmon, system administrator can clearly see what exactly is
       happening with his/her computer systems.
     o At any time, administrator knows the real usage of system resources.
       Also this makes the process of system capacity planning easier.
     o Administrator gets immediately notified when a UNIX server, a PROGRESS
       database, or a TCP service fails.
     o Websmon facilitates the process of monitoring of the large distributed
       computer systems: system administrator can get the current statistics
       of use of the remote servers on-line or off-line.

                              Websmon - main page

                     Figure 1. Websmon - main (start) page

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  2. What are the systems the monitor consist of?

   The Websmon monitor consists of three independent systems which are as
   follows:

     o wmgather - a system collecting the performance statistics from the
       UNIX servers and PROGRESS databases specified in the configuration
       file. The gathered information is then being stored as CSV data files
       and in RRD databases.
     o wmshow - a system creating the graphical representation of the
       statistics collected by wmgather. It also shows current status of the
       specified hosts, TCP services and PROGRESS databases. Currently, this
       is a Web application running under Apache Web server.
     o wmwatch - a system monitoring availability of the specified hosts, TCP
       services and PROGRESS databases and sending alerts to system
       administrators when a server or a service fails.

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  3. On what operating systems can Websmon be running?

   The Websmon monitor version 1.02 can be running on the following operating
   systems:

     o Red Hat Linux 9 (Intel)
     o Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 3 (Intel)
     o Fedora Core release 1 (Intel)
     o Fedora Core release 2 (Intel)
     o Fedora Core release 3 (Intel)
     o Fedora Core release 4 (Intel)
     o Sun Solaris 8 (SPARC)
     o Sun Solaris 9 (SPARC)
     o Sun Solaris 10 (SPARC)
     o SuSE Linux Professional 9 (Intel)
     o SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 (Intel)
     o SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 (Intel)
     o SCO UnixWare 7.1 (Intel)

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  4. What additional software does Websmon need to be installed?

     o Perl version 5.8 or better
     o Apache HTTP server version 1.3.27 or better

   You can find these software packages along with their source codes on the
   installation CD-ROM.
   All these programs are the Open Source Software distributing under terms
   and conditions of the GNU Public License.

   For gathering PROGRESS database system statistics, PROGRESS V9 client
   software should be installed on the Websmon statistics server, and
   PROGRESS V9 or PROGRESS V8.3 database servers to be monitored have to be
   started with support for the client-server mode enabled.

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  5. What operating systems and databases can Websmon monitor?

     o Operating systems:

          o Red Hat Linux 7, 8, 9
          o Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 3
          o Fedora Core release 1, 2, 3, 4
          o Sun Solaris 8, 9, 10
          o SCO UnixWare 7

     o Databases:

          o PROGRESS V8.3, V9 and V10 databases running in the client-server
            mode under any operating system with the support for TCP
            connections enabled

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  6. What system resources can be monitored?

   6.1. System resources of a UNIX server

     o UNIX server uptime
     o Number of users logged to the UNIX server
     o Number of processes running on the server
     o Server load average
     o CPU usage statistics (%total CPU utilization, %user, %system, %wait
       I/O utilizations)
     o Server memory usage
     o File systems usage: disk space utilization, inodes utilization
     o System I/O activity
     o Network interfaces activity (summary of network activity, statistics
       of traffic, statistics of errors)
     o Disk swap space utilization
     o System paging activity
     o System swapping activity
     o OS kernel semaphores operations activity
     o OS kernel message queues activity
     o System context switching activity
     o Host status report
     o List of UNIX users logged to the server
     o List of the processes running on the server

                           Websmon - UNIX server page

               Figure 2. UNIX system resources usage: Summary ^*

   ^* only top half of the page shown

                      Websmon - Server load averages page

                     Figure 3. UNIX server load averages ^*

   ^* only top half of the page shown (statistics for the last day and last
   week)

   6.2. System resources of a PROGRESS database

     o PROGRESS database server uptime
     o Number of user, batch, SELF, REMC, SERV connections
     o Database files size and free space
     o Database BI files size
     o Database AI file size
     o Database buffer pool hit ratio and buffer pool utilization
     o Database I/O activity: total database I/O rate, data blocks I/O rate,
       index blocks I/O rate, database read rate, database write rate
     o PROGRESS Asynchronous Page Writers utilization
     o PROGRESS Before Image Writer utilization
     o PROGRESS After Image Writer utilization
     o Database transactional activities: commit and undo rates
     o Database record access activity: record reading, creation, updating,
       deletion rates
     o Database index access activity: index creation, deletion, and finding
       rates
     o Database record locking activity
     o Statistics of database checkpoints
     o Statistics of waits for BI buffers and waits for AI buffers
     o Statistics of waits for locked database records
     o Detailed report on PROGRESS database status
     o List of PROGRESS database users

                       Websmon - PROGRESS db server page

            Figure 4. PROGRESS database resources usage: Summary ^*

   ^* only top half of the page shown

                     Websmon - PROGRESS db connections page

 Figure 5. Number of PROGRESS database clients of any type (SELF, REMC, BATCH)
                                  connected ^*

   ^* only top half of the page shown (statistics for the last day and last
   week)

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  7. How to obtain a license?

   You can obtain a trial 30-day license free of charge - for this, just send
   an e-mail to the following address:

         Websmon demo license <websmon@websmon.com>

   To obtain a new permanent license or to renew the existing license for the
   monitor, please email to

         Sales Dept <websmon@websmon.com>

   Please specify your system ID and the existing Websmon license
   information, if applicable.

   You can get the unique ID of your system by running the following command:

         /home/websmon/bin/wmsysid

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  8. What next? What features will appear in the next versions of the monitor?

   The next versions of Websmon will include among others, the following
   features:

     o Ports for HP/UX and IBM AIX operating systems
     o Ports for Web servers other than Apache
     o Support for Oracle databases
     o Support for MySQL databases

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   PROGRESS ^(c) is a trademark of the Progress Software Corporation
