Cacti

Jun 15 2009   6:08AM GMT

Opensource Network Graphing Solution - VMware Cacti Built on FreeBSD UNIX,

Posted by: Yasir Irfan
Cacti, VMware, Freebsd, UNIX, RRDTool, PHP, LAN, open source software, Perl, Apache, Net-SNMP, MySQL, OpenSSL, OpenSSH, GD, Ntop, Tripwire, VMware Cacti Appliance, VMware Appliance, Cacti Guide, Cacti Support, Download Cacti, Download Vmware Appliance

Other day I was looking for an upgrade for the Cacti in Google, while searching I came across this wonderful ready to use virtual appliance based on FreeBSD UNIX.

To brief about the Cacti is a complete network graphing solution designed to harness the power of RRDTool’s data storage and graphing functionality. Cacti provide a fast poller, advanced graph templating, multiple data acquisition methods, and user management features out of the box. All of this is wrapped in an intuitive, easy to use interface that makes sense for LAN-sized installations up to complex networks with hundreds of devices.

The creator of this appliance Ernie did a great job by including nice collection of pre- configured open source software’s which includes the following

 

    - FreeBSD UNIX v6.2 RELEASE built to Ernie’s specifications
    - PERL v5.8.8 and many carefully selected modules
    - PHP v5.2.4 that I custom compiled from source
    - Apache v2.2.6 that I custom compiled from source
    - Net-SNMP v5.4 that I custom compiled from source
    - MySQL v5.45 that I custom compiled from source
    - RRDTool v1.23 that I custom compiled from source via FreeBSD’s Ports
    - Cacti and Many Plugins:
    - Various other key ingredients compiled from source with the help of the FreeBSD Ports Collection
        - OpenSSL
        - OpenSSH
        - GD
        - NTop
        - Tripwire
    And even more!

This VMware Cacti Appliance is really helpful, easy to install and manage. More over you will find the installation guide with illustrations as well Wow.  Download the VMware Cacti Appliance here.

Jun 18 2008   1:28PM GMT

Introduction to Free ware Bandwidth Monitoring software’s – Series 1

Posted by: Yasir Irfan
Networking, Cacti, Bandwidth monitoring

Cacti is one of the great free ware bandwidth monitoring software works with SNMP. It’s RRD based tool, which makes use of MySQL server as a database, and completely driven by PHP.

What is Cacti?
Cacti is a resource monitoring software which used RRDtool to store data & the data is used to create graphs. Cacti’s greatest strength is it provides complex graphs easily. Cacti come with fast poller to collect data from different resources simultaneously & do have many user management features. It’s very user-friendly that even a layman can accustomed to figure out how it works with less effort.

Why Cacti?
In a single sentence, “Cacti, because it’s easy”. Installing and using Cacti is a very simple task and does not require indepth knowledge in networking or resource management. You can install and configure it in simple steps, which makes it an ideal software for newbie network administrators. Never-the-less , its so powerful and scalable that you can use it even in large networks with hundreds of devices

Installation
Cacti can be installed on many platforms like unix, linux and windows. I am concentrating on Windows XP . In order install a Cacti download a full integrated package from following links http://www.disorder.com/~bsod/cacti-0.8….
 http://files.davehope.co.uk/cacti/ thanks to Rony and Dave Hope for hosting .
It’s pretty easy to install, make sure IIS is enabled and just follow the steps until you reached the final step where you are suppose to do some modifications which are attached with this post. Cacti Post Installation Instructions

Once you are done with installation then log on to the cacti local web port by following
http://IP Address of the PC/cacti/index.php with default username admin & password cactipw.

For Adding Devices and graphs access this link http://www.cacti.net/downloads/docs/html…

For further details do log in to cacti forums and cacti web site
http://forums.cacti.net
http://www.cacti.net/