[Cact 1.x] remote poller guide request

[jhonnyx]

First of all I would like to say thank you to the developers and the supporting community for all the new cacti 1.x versions, IMO performance tuneup guide and remote pollers are key items.

About remote pollers, I am going to redesign operations in my team, we monitor network devices from 5 (!!!) Cacti servers with all the management burden that it comes with it (structure, templates management and reporting out of nectar plugin) and I could really use to redesign with Cacti 1.x in mind.

I feel the dicumentation needs a guide on how to use properly a cacti distributed solution and a description on what works in the background.


Meanwhile I am extending this info request to anyone that may have tried it already or knows better.

Thanks everyone in advance !

[cigamit]

I don't have the time to write current documentation on it, but I can give a few pointers (I'm using it without issue right now).

1. Ensure both servers are nearly identical in OS version / software versions / installed locations. It can work with differences, but its not pretty (path issues etc... since we replicate DB tables over).
2. Install Cacti on system #2. Update the config.php to note that its poller #2 and add the rdatabase entries that point back to your main Cacti install. (We should probably do automated hashes in the future)
3. Run the installer, and when it asks whether its a new install / upgrade, select "Remote Poller". Finish the install.
4. Make sure Boost is running on your main Cacti and the "Enable direct population of poller_output_boost table" is checked.
5. I believe it currently uses system hostnames, so you may have to make some modifications to the hosts files to make sure it connects properly if they aren't in DNS.

From here, it should have connected to your main install, added an entry for the remote poller. Cacti is then going to replicate the entire Cacti install and most of the database tables to the other system. This may take a bit.

You can then go into Console >> Data Collectors and see it. You can modify the name of that poller there. Now to test it, goto a device that you want monitored by that poller, and edit it and tell it to use the Remote Poller. You will do all your modifications on the Main Poller, and it connects back to the Main Poller for most DB Queries.

There are still some issues that are being worked out. Performance can be subpar since it connects back to the main poller for most things (It will go into an offline state and use the local DB if the remote becomes unavailable). I have noticed a significant speed up if I utilize the local DB for all reads and do only writes to the remote, but that code isn't in place currently (and it requires changes to spine). Lots of other little things that I can't think of right now, some plugins work with it, others don't.

[phalek]

This will be a chapter in my updated book, though it's scheduled for mid-year.

[jhonnyx]

Thank you so much.

I would like to let you know my appreciation about your answer and I believe all the community feels the same.

it's understandable that right now you are working hard on the debugging / improvements of the 1.x release.

I will add my input to this thread during my testing.

[Cramin]

2. Install Cacti on system #2. Update the config.php to note that its poller #2 and add the rdatabase entries that point back to your main Cacti install. (We should probably do automated hashes in the future)

From here, it should have connected to your main install, added an entry for the remote poller. Cacti is then going to replicate the entire Cacti install and most of the database tables to the other system. This may take a bit.

If i can ask some questions.
I have Main Cacti server (172.24.208.50) and Remote Poller (172.24.208.51) 30ms from Main Cacti connected directly (172.24.208.0/24 subnet).
In Main Cacti and Remote Poller
Mysql two users cactim and cactir1 both can login from 172.24.208.0/24 subnet
In Main Cacti config.php:

Code: Select all

$database_type     = 'mysql';
$database_default  = 'cacti';
$database_hostname = '172.24.208.50';
$database_username = 'cactim';
$database_password = 'password';
$database_port     = '3306';
$database_ssl      = false;

#$rdatabase_type     = 'mysql';
#$rdatabase_default  = 'cacti';
#$rdatabase_hostname = 'localhost';
#$rdatabase_username = 'cactiuser';
#$rdatabase_password = 'cactiuser';
#$rdatabase_port     = '3306';
#$rdatabase_ssl      = false;

$poller_id = 1;

spine.conf:

Code: Select all

DB_Host 172.24.208.50
DB_Database cacti
DB_User cactim
DB_Pass password
DB_Port 3306

RDB_Host 172.24.208.51
RDB_Database cacti
RDB_User cactir1
RDB_Pass passwordr1
RDB_Port 3306

In Remote Pooler config.php:

Code: Select all

$database_type     = 'mysql';
$database_default  = 'cacti';
$database_hostname = '172.24.208.51';
$database_username = 'cactir1';
$database_password = 'password_r1';
$database_port     = '3306';
$database_ssl      = false;

$rdatabase_type     = 'mysql';
$rdatabase_default  = 'cacti';
$rdatabase_hostname = '172.24.208.50';
$rdatabase_username = 'cactim';
$rdatabase_password = 'password';
$rdatabase_port     = '3306';
$rdatabase_ssl      = false;

$poller_id = 2;

spine.conf:

Code: Select all

DB_Host 172.24.208.51
DB_Database cacti
DB_User cactir1
DB_Pass passwordr1
DB_Port 3306

RDB_Host 172.24.208.50
RDB_Database cacti
RDB_User cactim
RDB_Pass password
RDB_Port 3306

Everything working fine, i have two pollers in Data Collectors, i can switch devices to be polled from remote poller.
But database in remote poller is empty, imported from cacti.sql and nothing is updated.
Cacti is then going to replicate the entire Cacti install and most of the database tables to the other system. This may take a bit.
Nothing happens like this. I searched forum for remote poller, make remote poller in the same location with Main connected directly to speed up the process but replication didn't happens.
Where i did mistake? What if Remote Poller will lose connection to Main Poller?
How can i replicate this manually or from CLI?
And when i changed number of threads in Main Poller, this apply to Remote Poller too. This is normal? I have fast Main Poller 8Core system, but remote pollers are Dell R200 2Core systems.

[phalek]

Did you execute the "full Sync" from the drop-down of Console | Data Collection | Data Collector page ?

[Cramin]

I didn't.

Edit:
I did a Full Sync and database updated from Main to Remote.
Remote Poller will use local database for polled results or Main Poller database?

[netniV]

IF you have set rdatabase_* and your poller id is greater than 1, the system checks that the database is online. If it is, it replaces all the standard database_* variables with the rdatabase_* equivalents. Thus it utilises the local DB.

After that, it is poller 1 that connects to the remote DB's if I remember rightly to pull the data back. There is some major work going on with remote pollers for the 1.2 branch release.