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Monit, not to be confused to M/Monit, is an AGPL3.0 licensed system and process monitoring tool. Monit can automatically restart crashed services, display temperatures from standard hardware (through lm_sensors and hard drives from smartmontools for example). Service alerts can be sent based on a wide criteria including a single occurrence or occurrences over a period of time. It can be accessed directly through the command line or ran as a web app using its integrated HTTP(S) server. This allows quick and streamlined snapshot of a given systems status.

## Installation

Install the monit package and any software for optional testing such as lm_sensors or smartmontools. Once you have completed the configuration, be sure to enable and start `monit.service`.

## Configuration

Monit keeps a main configuration file as `/etc/monitrc`. You can choose to edit this file but if you wish to run scripts (such as to get hard drive temperatures or health status) you should uncomment the last directive of `include /etc/monit.d/*`, save `/etc/monitrc` and create `/etc/monit.d/`.

Note: Monit requires the `/etc/monitrc` file (and potentially files stored in `/etc/monit.d`) to have `0700` permissions. Failure to comply will result in Monit failing to start.

### Configuration syntax

Monit utilizes a configuration syntax that makes it very easy to read; essentially `check WHAT` followed by `if THING condition THEN action` format. Any occurrence of `if`, `and`, `with(in)`, `has`, `us(ing|e)`, `on(ly)`, `then`, `for`, `of` in the configuration file is for human readability only and are completely ignored by Monit.

Checks are usually performed in `cycles`. This is defined at the beginning of the configuration file, for example a 30second poll is defined with:

    set daemon 30

Checks with `4 cycles` would therefore happen every 2 minutes

## Configuration examples

### Mailserver declaration

    set mailserver smtp.myserver.com port 587
            username "MyUser" password "MyPassW0rd"
    using tlsv12

### Email notification format

    set mail-format {
          from: Monit@MyServer
       subject: $SERVICE $EVENT at $DATE
       message: Monit $ACTION $SERVICE at $DATE on $HOST: $DESCRIPTION.
    }

Note: The above variables such as `$SERVICE` are not generic examples but are specific variable names which Monit replaces with what the alert is, on what system, etc.

### CPU, memory and swap utilization

    check system $HOST
        if loadavg (15min) > 15 for 5 times within 15 cycles then alert
        if memory usage > 80% for 4 cycles then alert
        if swap usage > 20% for 4 cycles then alert

### Filesystem(s) usage

    check filesystem rootfs with path /
        if space usage > 90% then alert

    check filesystem NFS with path /mnt/nfs_share
        if space usage > 90% then alert

### Process monitoring

    check process sshd with pidfile /var/run/sshd.pid
       start program  "systemctl start sshd"
       stop program  "systemctl stop sshd"
       if failed port 22 protocol ssh then restart

    check process smbd with pidfile /run/samba/smbd.pid
       group samba
       start program = "/etc/init.d/samba start"
       stop  program = "/etc/init.d/samba stop"
       if failed host 192.168.1.250 port 139 type TCP  then restart
       depends on smbd_bin

    check file smbd_bin with path /usr/bin/smbd
       group samba
       if failed permission 755 then unmonitor
       if failed uid root then unmonitor
       if failed gid root then unmonitor

Note: For the above samba example, the first block has `depends on smbd_bin`, this makes the testing of Samba require the actual `smbd` process

### Hard drive health and temperature using scripts

#### Temperature

Create the file `/etc/monit.d/scripts/hdtemp.sh` as well as the `/etc/monit.d/scripts` folder if necessary.

    /etc/monit.d/scripts/hdtemp.sh

     #!/usr/bin/sh
     HDDTP=`/usr/bin/smartctl -A /dev/sd${1} | grep Temp.*Cels | awk -F " " '{printf "%d",$10}'`
     #echo $HDDTP # for debug only
     exit $HDDTP

    monitrc or /etc/monit.d/*.monit file

    check program SSD-A-Temp with path "/etc/monit.d/scripts/hdtemp.sh a"
        every 5 cycles
        if status > 40 then alert
        group health

    check program HDD-B-Temp with path "/etc/monit.d/scripts/hdtemp.sh b"
        every 5 cycles
        if status > 40 then alert
        group health

In this example, the `/etc/monit.d/scripts/hdtemp.sh` script assumes your drive path is `/dev/sdX` where `X` is filled in by the letter at the end of the `check` declaration. A similar method is used for the SMART health status in the next example.

#### SMART health status

    /etc/monit.d/scripts/hdhealth.sh

     #!/usr/bin/sh
     STATUS=`/usr/bin/smartctl -H /dev/sd${1} | grep overall-health | awk 'match($0,"result:"){print substr($0,RSTART+8,6)}'`
     if [ "$STATUS" = "PASSED" ]
     then
         # 1 implies PASSED
         TP=1
     else
         # 2 implies FAILED
         TP=2
     fi
     #echo $TP # for debug only
     exit $TP

    monitrc or /etc/monit.d/*.monit file

    check program SSD-A-Health with path "/etc/monit.d/scripts/hdhealth.sh a"
        every 120 cycles
        if status != 1 then alert
        group health

    check program HDD-B-Health with path "/etc/monit.d/scripts/hdhealth.sh b"
        every 120 cycles
        if status != 1 then alert
        group health

Tip: The `group` declaration will cause Monit to display all assigned checks with the same group name (in this case health) together.

## Alert recipients: global or subsystem based

Alerts can be set globally, where a given user / email address is alerted for any `alert` condition; or you can set an alert recipient for each type of check (eg network alerts go to recipient A; process alerts go to recipient B). You can set as many global or subsystem recipients as you like, just make multiple declarations.

### Global alerts

Global alerts are set outside of any subsystem checks; for ease of reading they should be set in the same location as the mailserver declaration.

    SET ALERT email@domain

### Subsystem alerts

Subsystem alerts are set very similarly to global alerts except they lack the `SET` flag.

    ALERT email@domain

## See also

- Official Documentation
- Monit Wiki configuration examples

Categories:

- Init
- System monitors