Install Monitorix on Ubuntu 20.04

In this guide, we are going to learn how to install Monitorix on Ubuntu 20.04. Monitorix is an open source, system monitoring tool that is used to monitor variou services and system resources as outlined below;

• System load average and usage
• Disk drive temperatures and health
• Filesystem usage and I/O activity
• Directory usage 
• Netstat statistics
• Users using the system
• Network port traffic

Read more about the features on the Monitorix features page.

Installing Monitorix on Ubuntu 20.04

Install IzzySoft Apt Repositories on Ubuntu

As much as you can install it using the DEB binary, it is easier to install if from the Apt repositories since APT automatically takes care of the dependencies and also offers updates when available. The repos also provides latest versions of Monitorix package.

IzzySoft Apt repositories provides Monitorix package on Ubuntu systems. You can install it as follows;

echo "deb https://apt.izzysoft.de/ubuntu generic universe" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/monitorix.list

Install IzzySoft Apt repositories signing key;

wget -qO- https://apt.izzysoft.de/izzysoft.asc | apt-key add -

Run system update;

apt update

Install Monitorix

Then install Monitorix by executing the command below;

apt install monitorix

If you encounter the error below;

Starting monitorix (via systemctl): monitorix.service.
chown: cannot access '/var/lib/monitorix/www/imgs': No such file or directory
dpkg: error processing package monitorix (--configure):
 installed monitorix package post-installation script subprocess returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
 monitorix
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

Just create the directory and rerun the installation command;

mkdir /var/lib/monitorix/www/imgs

apt install monitorix

Monitorix consists mainly of two programs: a collector, called monitorix, which is a Perl daemon that is started automatically like any other system service, and a CGI script called monitorix.cgi. Monitorix includes its own HTTP server built in, so you aren’t forced to install a third-party web server to use it.

This installs the latest Monitorix on Ubuntu 20.04.

You can verify installed version of Monitorix by running;

monitorix -v

Monitorix version 3.13.1 (27-Jan-2021)
by Jordi Sanfeliu <[email protected]>
https://www.monitorix.org/

Running Monitorix

Once Monitorix is installed, it is started and enabled to run on system boot;

Check the status;

systemctl status monitorix

● monitorix.service - LSB: Start Monitorix daemon
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/init.d/monitorix; generated)
     Active: active (running) since Thu 2021-03-18 19:15:44 UTC; 10min ago
       Docs: man:systemd-sysv-generator(8)
      Tasks: 2 (limit: 2282)
     Memory: 81.2M
     CGroup: /system.slice/monitorix.service
             ├─16634 /usr/bin/monitorix -c /etc/monitorix/monitorix.conf -p /var/run/monitorix.pid
             └─16806 monitorix-httpd listening on 8080

Mar 18 19:15:43 ubuntu20 systemd[1]: Starting LSB: Start Monitorix daemon...
Mar 18 19:15:44 ubuntu20 monitorix[16613]:    ...done.
Mar 18 19:15:44 ubuntu20 systemd[1]: Started LSB: Start Monitorix daemon.

Configure Monitorix on Ubuntu 20.04

To run system monitoring with Monitorix, you need to do some configuration tuning according to your system details.

/etc/monitorix/monitorix.conf is default Monitorix configuration file.

Open the Monitorix configuration file for editing;

vim /etc/monitorix/monitorix.conf

Below are some of the configuration options of Monitorix that we are changing in this demo. Be sure to replace the settings according to your environment.

• Set a description of the server, the location, the Company name, etc.
  
  title = Kifarunix-demo.com
• Set the hostname of the host
  
  hostname = monitorix.kifarunix-demo.com

...
title = Kifarunix-demo.com
hostname = monitorix.kifarunix-demo.com
theme_color = black
refresh_rate = 150
iface_mode = graph
...

Ensure that the hostname of your system is set and resolvable.

Adjust the rest of the options to suit your needs.

You can find out more about Monitorix configuration options on man monitorix.conf.

Configure Monitorix Web Server

Monitorix is bundled with its own HTTP server. Thus, configure web server access permissions under the <httpd_builtin> section of the default configuration file, /etc/monitorix/monitorix.conf.

See the highlighted lines that shows which networks are allowed to access our Monitorix.

...
<httpd_builtin>
        enabled = y
        host = monitorix.kifarunix-demo.com
        port = 8080
        user = nobody
        group = nobody
        log_file = /var/log/monitorix-httpd
        hosts_deny = all
        hosts_allow = 192.168.57.0/24
        autocheck_responsiveness = y
...

You can as well enable htaccess basic authentication.

..
        <auth>
                enabled = y
                msg = Kifarunix-Demo Monitorix: Restricted access
                htpasswd = /var/lib/monitorix/htpasswd
        >/auth>
</httpd_builtin>

Enable or disable the Monitorix graphs to be displayed.

...
# Graphs (de)activation
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
<graph_enable>
        system          = y
        kern            = n
        proc            = y
        hptemp          = n
        lmsens          = n
        gensens         = n
        ipmi            = n
        ambsens         = n
        nvidia          = n
        disk            = n
        fs              = y

...
        int             = y
        verlihub        = n
</graph_enable>

Save and quit the configuration file once done making changes.

If you enabled htaccess basic authentications, you need to create users to be allowed to login. Hence, install Apache Utilities.

apt install apache-utils

Next, create users and store them on the specified file, /var/lib/monitorix/htpasswd. For example to create a user called, monitadmin, run the command below. You will be prompted to set the password for the user.

htpasswd -d -c /var/lib/monitorix/htpasswd monitadmin

You can add more users to the same file above by just omitting option -c. For example, to add a user;

htpasswd -d /var/lib/monitorix/htpasswd monituser

If you want, you can further tweak your Monitorix configurations, consult man pages, man monitorix.conf.

Restart Monitorix

Once you are satisfied by the configurations, restart Monitorix service.

systemctl restart monitorix

By default, Monitorix listens on TCP port 8080. You can verify this by running;

ss -altnp | grep 8080

LISTEN    0         4096          192.168.57.6:8080             0.0.0.0:*        users:(("monitorix-httpd",pid=20482,fd=3))

If firewalld is running, open the port 8080/tcp on it.

ufw allow from 192.168.57.0/24 to any port 8080 proto tcp

Accessing Monitorix Web Interface

Monitorix can be accessed from a web browser using the address http://server-IP-or-hostname:8080/monitorix.

If you enabled basic authentication, authenticate and proceed to the dashboard.

Upon successful authentication, such interface welcomes you.

Select the specific graphs you would like to view from drop down on Graphs options.

You can as well view all Graphs for the specified times, daily, weekly, monthly.

To view all daily graphs, select Daily and click Ok.

System load average ans usage

Network Port Traffic

And many other dashboards for various statistics.

That is it on how to install Monitorix on CentOS 8.

Further Reading

https://www.monitorix.org/documentation.html

Related Tutorials

Install Monitorix on Debian 10

Install Monitorix on CentOS 8

Install and Configure Prometheus on CentOS 8

Installing Perf Performance Analysis Tool on CentOS 8