What Is Pandora FMS 01-10-2021 What Is Pandora FMS Pandora FMS| pg. 2 What Is Pandora FMS What Is Pandora FMS Go back to Quick Guides index Introduction Pandora FMS is a monitoring software that collects data from any system, generates alerts based on that data and shows graphs, reports and maps of our environment. There are two versions of Pandora FMS; a free or OpenSource version and a paid or Enterprise version, available starting from 100 devices. We will have the possibility to monitor systems, servers, applications, networks, events and a long list of devices. Pandora FMS collects the information that we want to monitor, compiles it and saves it to represent it visually, with the objective of carrying out actions that our systems require. This tool can run on different operating systems, including Windows and Linux, the latter being the recommended operating system. Pandora FMS consists of different elements for its correct operation. Servers: in charge of collecting and processing data. Database: the place where the servers store the information collected by the different monitors, as well as the tool configuration. Console: is the web interface in charge of displaying the collected data and the main method of user interaction with the tool. In Pandora FMS there are more than ten different servers specialized in different monitoring tasks; from network servers to perform remote checks, to web servers used to monitor the navigation made by a user. There are the following servers: Data server: in charge of processing local monitoring information. Network server: in charge of executing remote monitoring tasks through network checks. SNMP Server: in charge of collecting and processing SNMP traps. WMI Server: in charge of monitoring Windows environments. Recognition server: in charge of exploring the network and detecting new systems in operation. Plugin server: in charge of carrying out more complex remote monitoring by means of personalized scripts. Prediction server: in charge of knowing if a data, in the current moment, is anomalous. Web server: in charge of carrying out complete web checks. Export server: in charge of exporting data to obtain data replication. Inventory server: in charge of obtaining and visualizing information from the Pandora FMS| pg. 3 What Is Pandora FMS monitored systems. Event server: in charge of collecting events caused in the system. Enterprise network server: in charge of the use of advanced strategies for network checks. Satellite server: server installed separately to explore and remotely monitor new systems that cannot be reached by the server. WUX server: in charge of carrying out complex web transactions in a distributed way. Pandora FMS console allows different users with different profiles to manage and operate the tool. With this web tool we can control the state of the current monitoring, see statistical information through graphs or reports and control the incidences generated by the monitoring. Pandora FMS is managed by the use of ACL profiles, by which a user can access only information related to the profile they belong to. For example, an administrator will be able to access to all the information that Pandora FMS contains, while a user will be able to have access only to the data that belong to a certain group. All the elements described above that make up Pandora FMS (console, server and database) are collected in a single software package -except the satellite server-, which makes the installation of the tool very easy. This package is updated every month with the generation of new versions that can include new functionalities, error correction and security improvements. Next we are going to describe in a general way some elements that compose Pandora FMS, as well as some functionalities to be able to know the tool a little more. Pandora FMS| pg. 4 What Is Pandora FMS Agents What is an agent? Agents are organizational elements that are created remotely or locally to contain a series of monitoring elements. They usually represent a device or server. An agent may have one or more IPs associated with it and its name cannot be repeated with any other, although its alias can. Each agent belongs to a main group, and to as many secondary groups as wanted. The agents have different states, which are determined by the state of their monitoring elements or modules. The work of the agent is based on being the container of data extraction tools of a certain machine. Which kinds og agents are there? There are two types of agent: the software agent and the remote agent. Software agent: it is a small piece of software that is installed in a machine and remains running in it, extracting information through local or remote extraction tools and sending it to Pandora FMS server regularly. This installation is done individually in each machine, through an installer. Remote Agent: this agent is installed through Pandora FMS console remotely, pointing to an IP address that can reach the machine where the Pandora FMS server is installed. In this agent, we can only use remote extraction tools. It is important to see the difference between the agents, being the software agent a local agent that has the machine with which local and remote monitoring can be done, and the remote agent a fictitious agent with which only remote monitoring can be done. Modules What is a module? Modules are units of information stored within an agent. They are the monitoring elements with which the information is extracted from the device or server to which the agent points. Each module can store only one metric. Inside the same agent there cannot be two modules with the same name. All modules have an associated status, which can be: Not started: where no data has been received yet. Pandora FMS| pg. 5 What Is Pandora FMS Normal: data are being received with values outside the warning or critical thresholds. Warning: Data is being received with values within the warning threshold. Critical: Data is being received with values within the critical threshold. Unknown: the module has been running and has stopped receiving information for a certain time. The modules have different types of data, such as Boolean, numeric or alphanumeric. Depending on the information collected by the module, it will be of one type or another. Which kinds of modules are there? There are several types of modules inside Pandora FMS. Data module: it is a type of local monitoring module with which checks are made on the system in which the agent is, such as for example the use of CPU of the device or its free memory. Network module: it is a type of remote monitoring module with which checks are made to verify the connection with the device or server to which the agent points, as for example if it is working or if it has a particular port open. Plugin module: this is a type of local or remote monitoring module with which custom checks can be made through the creation of scripts. With them more advanced and extensive checks than the ones proposed directly through Pandora FMS console can be done. WMI module: this is a type of local monitoring module with which the Windows system can be checked through the WMI protocol, such as obtaining the list of installed services or the current CPU load. Prediction module: this is a type of predictive monitoring module with which different arithmetic operations are performed through the consultation of data from other “base” modules, such as the average CPU usage of the monitored servers or the sum of connection latency. Webserver module: this is a type of web monitoring with which checks are made of the status of a website and obtain data from it, such as for example to see if a website is down or if it contains a specific word. Web analysis module: this is a type of web monitoring with which simulations of a user's web browsing are carried out, such as browsing a website, introducing credentials or complying with forms. Each of these types of module can be used or not depending on the type of agent desired to create. As we mentioned before, a data type module, being a local monitoring module, can only be generated within a software agent. Pandora FMS| pg. 6 What Is Pandora FMS Events An event is everything that happens within the system; from the creation of a module to the login of a user in the console. The event itself is a text describing the problem, its origin (agent), and its creation date. Pandora FMS allows the visualization in real time of all the events of our systems that are monitored; with this information we can make the necessary actions according to the created event. It shows information that goes from any change of state of a module, launched or recovered alerts, to system restarts or personalized events. It is one of the most used views by operation teams in any type of professional monitoring software. An event can have three status: New: This is an event that has just been created by the system. In process: this is an event that a user has seen, and is performing some action related to the notice that has arrived. This status must be entered manually by a user. Validated: this is a visualized event for which the actions corresponding to the warning have already been carried out. This status can be entered manually by a user, or automatically by the server when there are two events related to the same warning, where the last event will prevail. Depending on the information carried by the event, it will appear in one color or another.