Windows module_perfcounter - does anyone have it working?

[Dez]

I have setup a basic Pandora 2.1 server installion & successfully installed the Windows Agent on a few Windows 2003 servers. I have also successfully added extra modules for monitoring extra CPU's & disk space on extra drives. However I have not been able to get the perfcounter module to work.

As a simple test I just copy & pasted in the exact example from the wiki into my conf file:

module_begin
module_name perfcounter
module_type generic_data
module_perfcounter \Memory\Pages/sec
module_end

I then restarted the agent service, but the perfcounter module did not show up on the Pandora server (unlike the extra CPU & disk space modules which showed up straight away).

The wiki obscurely mentions that pdh.dll must be installed. I have checked & it is present in C:\WINDOWS\system32. I even put a copy of it in C:\Program Files\pandora_agent. Still no change.

So my question is, does anyone have this working. If so, then what extra steps do I have to do?

Thanks.

[Dez]

This is my debug log. It doesn't even mention the perfcounter module.

2009-10-20 00:00:03 Run begin
2009-10-20 00:00:03 Pandora_Windows_Service::checkConfig: Remote configuration disabled
2009-10-20 00:00:03 Run ServicioReg
2009-10-20 00:00:03 Run ReceivedPackets
2009-10-20 00:00:03 Executing: cmd.exe /c "netstat -s | grep "Packets Received" | tr -d " " | cut -f 2 -d "=" | tr -d "\n""
2009-10-20 00:00:04 Run Listen_Conn
2009-10-20 00:00:04 Executing: cmd.exe /c "netstat -an | grep LISTEN | wc -l | tr -d " ""
2009-10-20 00:00:04 Run FreeDiskC
2009-10-20 00:00:04 Run FreeDiskD
2009-10-20 00:00:04 Run CPUUse0
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Run FreeMemory
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Run Logevents
2009-10-20 00:00:08 ServicioReg getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 ServicioReg getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 ReceivedPackets getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 ReceivedPackets getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Listen_Conn getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Listen_Conn getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 FreeDiskC getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 FreeDiskC getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 FreeDiskD getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 FreeDiskD getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 CPUUse0 getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 CPUUse0 getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 FreeMemory getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 FreeMemory getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Logevents getXML begin
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Logevents getXML end
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Copying XML on C:\Windows\Temp\IMXJSNS1_Jetset_Production.19311.data
2009-10-20 00:00:08 Next execution on 60 seconds

[Sancho Lerena]

Perfcounter is for Pandora FMS 3.0 windows agent, not for 2.1, the good news is you can use the pandora fms agent 3.0 for windows in a 2.1 server setup. Just install the newest windows agent, is not released officially (the RC1 will be released today or tomorrow, just for you, follow this link:

http://artica.es/downloads/Pandora FMS Windows agent v3.0 RC1-Setup.exe

[Dez]

Thats great. Thank you very much.

Is there a v2.1 specific version of the Windows Agent documentation? I'm concerned that I might make this sort of mistake again.

[Sancho Lerena]

Yep, but you should use the 3.0 version, is a HUGE step forward in Pandora. All documentation for all versions are on our wiki at http://openideas.info/wiki , plus a lot of annexes and other (interesting) stuff.

[Dez]

Ok, I have made some progress now. I have added a counter for available megabytes as follows:

# Memory Available MBytes
module_begin
module_name MemAvailMBytes
module_type generic_data
module_description Memory Available MBytes
module_perfcounter \Memory\Available MBytes
module_end

This appears to be returning valid values.

However I have also added one for processor time:


# Get processor time from Performance Counter
module_begin
module_name Processor_Time
module_type generic_data
module_perfcounter \Processor(_Total)\% Processor Time
module_end

As far I know this should be returning values between 0 to 100. Instead I'm getting values like this:

    <module>
        <name>Processor_Time</name>
        <type>generic_data</type>
        <data>39806287500000</data>
        <description>Processor Total Precent Processor Time</description>
    </module>

Any ideas?

[Sancho Lerena]

Windows surprise you again with black magic?, don't worry :-)

Perfcounters returns values with different scales, windows perfcounter "resize" them, applying a factor over received data, pandora could do the same using the postprocess value in the module definitioin, if you post process them using 0.0001 for example, you will divide it by 1000. Another problem could be that windows are reporting a global counter, so you need to define the module as a generic_data_inc type, not generic_data.

I hope this help to fight against the black magic of Windows !

[Dez]

The data seems wrong no matter how I scale it. In this case I used the following WMI equivalent & it is returning correct data:

module_begin
module_name PercentProcessorTime
module_type generic_data_string
module_wmiquery select PercentProcessorTime from Win32_PerfFormattedData_PerfOS_Processor where name = '_Total'
module_wmicolumn PercentProcessorTime
module_end

[aoton]

Hello,

I'm working with this module getting "differents" behaivours on virtual machines.

With:

module_begin
module_name VM Processor Time (%)
module_type generic_data_inc
module_perfcounter \VM Processor(_Total)\% Processor Time
module_end

I have to add a Post process factor of 0.00001

This return a value near of 0 when the vm is not under load and near to 98 with cpuburn running, by example.

But with:

module_begin
module_name Processor Time (%)
module_type generic_data_inc
module_perfcounter \Processor(_Total)\% Processor Time
module_end

Need a post process factor 0.00001 too but the returned values works from 98 witout load and 0 with load.

I think that both counters must return a similar value, knows somebody why this behaivour?

Regards,
 

[Sancho Lerena]

Perfcounters are a depth mistery. WMI its usually much better, but in some applications you only have perfcounters, we add this feature for compatibility  and to have more options, but for get CPU is much better the internal pandora module, for example.