Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux

In this article we are going to cover Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux-Prometheus, Grafana, Elastic search, Nagios Core, Zabbix, Cacti, Icinga, MRTG, Netdata, Sensu, Pandora FMS

Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux

#1. Prometheus

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 1

Key Features:-

  • Prometheus is an open source tool used for event monitoring and altering.
  • Prometheus has changed the way of monitoring systems and that is why it has become the Top-Level project of Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF).
  • Prometheus components are written in Go.
  • Prometheus uses a powerful query language i.e. “PromQL”.
  • The Prometheus servers are independent and able to gather time series by a pullover method over HTTP.

Advantages:-

  • In Prometheus tabs are on and handles hundreds of services and micro services.
  • Works as effectively one service to rule them all.
  • Prometheus use multiple modes used for graphing and dashboarding support.

#2. Grafana

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 2

Key Features:-

  • Grafana is an open source tool used for event monitoring.
  • Grafana is a multi platform open source analytics and interactive visualization web application.
  • Grafana provides i) Charts ii) Graphs iii) Alerts
  • Grafana supports many databases and mix them together in the same dashboard.

In Grafana we can discover hundreds of dashboards and plugins in the official library of Grafana.

Advantages:-

  • Grafana is a completely open source and backed by a vibrant community or Grafana cloud.
  • Grafana cloud can be easily installed and used on any platform.
  • Due to backed by vibrant community, new ones (plugins) are added to it almost every week.

#3. Elastic Stack

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 3

Key Features:-

  • Elasticsearch is a open source search, distributed and analytics engine which is build on Apache Lucene and developed in Java.
  • Elasticsearch allows you to store, search, and analyse huge volumes of data quickly
  • Elasticsearch gives the result as per your searches on milliseconds.
  • Elasticsearch is a server that can process JSON requests and give you back JSON data.
  • Elasticsearch backend components includes

i) Cluster

 ii) Nodes

 iii) Shards

 iv) Replicas

Advantages:-

  • Elasticsearch searches an index, due to this it is able to achieve fast search response.
  • Elasticsearch monitors the Cluster Health.
  • In Elasticsearch we can enable Self-monitoring.
  • We can also easily enable monitoring Elasticsearch nodes with Metric beat.

#4. Nagios Core

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 4

Key Features:-

  • Nagios core is used for continuous monitoring of servers, network, applications, business processes and infrastructure.
  • Nagios core is scalable, manageable and secure server monitoring tool.
  • Nagios core detects network errors, server crashes and automatically sends the alerts.
  • In Nagios issues occurred can also be fixed automatically.

Nagios uses the results from the plugins to determine the current status of the hosts and services on your network.

Advantages:-

  • Nagios is built on a server/agents architecture which makes easy to communicate with servers.
  • In Nagios core, fast detection of server and network protocol failures can be done.
  • In Nagios core 3500 different addons available to monitor your servers.
  • Using Nagios core, saves our time as monitoring everything is done at one single platform.

#5. Zabbix

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 5

Key Features:-

  • Zabbix is purely open source and free server monitoring tool.
  • We can easily monitor severs, applications and network devices, which gives accurate statistics and performance data
  • Data collected by Zabbix, it will be easy to analyze our infrastructure.
  • Types of monitoring done by Zabbix-

i) Network monitoring

ii) Server monitoring

iii) Cloud monitoring

iv) Application monitoring

v) Services monitoring

  • Zabbix has end to end encryption and well authentication, and due to this Zabbix has a strong security.
  • In Zabbix there are multiple branches that is why distributed monitoring is possible at same time.

Advantages:-

  • Zabbix is designed to scale from small environments to large environments.
  • Zabbix is trusted by global brands worldwide like Dell, HP, Salesforce, T Systems, etc.
  • Zabbix has high availability because it has multiple servers like proxy servers, so load is distributed.

#6. Cacti

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 6

Key Features:-

  • Cacti is a open source network monitoring tool which is developed by The Cacti Group, Inc
  • Most useful feature of Cacti is its unlimited graph creation tool
  • Hardware monitoring is possible in Cacti.
  • We can also perform web server monitoring operations on Cacti.
  • Cacti Is build in SNMP support.
  • In Cacti we can graph network bandwidth utilization, ram usage, CPU load and other statistics.

Advantages:-

  • Cacti is user based management due to which it allows administrators to create and assign users.
  • Cacti can be extended to monitor any source via shell scripts.
  • Cacti has flexible data sources.
  • Remote data allocation can be done using Cacti. 

#7. Icinga

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 7

Key Features:-

  • Icinga is completely open source and free monitoring tool.
  • Icinga is a scalable and extensible server monitoring system.
  • Icinga monitoring tool checks the availability of the resources and notifies you.
  • High availability is maintained in Icinga monitoring tool.
  • Distributed monitoring can be done in Icinga monitoring tool.
  • Clusters are present in Icinga

Advantages:-

  • Multithreaded design is implemented in Icinga that is why it runs thousands of check per second and due to this, Icinga is fast.
  • Icninga is completely top to bottom object oriented designed.
  • Icinga is flexible to use and to make hands on.
  • Services Monitoring problem are easily detected in Icinga and also recently resolved problems are also displayed.
  • Icinga monitoring tool also monitors the infrastructure health.
  • Icinga is ease of use.

#8. MRTG

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 8

Key Features:-

  • MRTG stands for Multi Router Traffic Grapher.
  • MRTG monitoring tool is network monitoring tool.
  • MRTG uses SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol) to monitor network traffic.
  • MRTG has Agent which has local knowledge of management information.
  • NMS (Network Management System) is present in MRTG which runs applications that monitor and control managed device.
  • In managed device it contain an SNMP agent and reside on a managed network.

Advantages:-

  • MRTG provides resources required for network management.
  • Agent makes the information available using SNMP.
  • Network traffic is properly analyzed using MRTG.
  • Live network traffic is analyzed in MRTG.
  • Network traffic is also monitored on our network ports and links.
  • MRTG is a open source monitoring tool.
  • Well network optimization.
  • Well network troubleshooting.
  • Good network administration is obtained.

#9. Netdata

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 9

Key Features:-

  • Netdata is a distributed, performance and health monitoring for systems.
  • Netdata gives real time performance systems, applications.
  • Using Netdata we can monitor:-

i) Server

ii) System Application

iii) Containers

iv) Web Applications

v) Virtual Machines

vi) Databases

vii) IOT Devices.

  • We can monitor 1000 devices using Netdata.
  • We will need to install a python plugin for monitoring PostgreSQL databases.

Advantages:-

  • Netdata is mostly used tool which is an open source monitoring tool.
  • Netdata can also monitor specific SNMP devices.
  • Netdata has a good interactive web dashboards.
  • Netdata is fast and efficient.
  • Netdata is open source and platform independent.
  • RAM usage, kernel optimization monitoring becomes very easy by using Netdata.

#10. Sensu

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 10

Key Features:-

  • Sensu is an open source event monitoring tool.
  • Sensu includes

 i) Event

ii) Filter

iii) Mutator

iv) Handler

  • Sensu monitors Servers, Services, Applications health, network.
  • Sensu monitoring tool uses third-party integration.
  • Sensu monitoring tool uses sensu agent for operating system checks and metrics.
  • We can monitor cloud infrastructure using sensu monitoring tool.
  • Sensu is written in Ruby.

Advantages:-

  • Sensu monitoring tool is portable.
  • Sensu monitoring tool is easier.
  • Sensu monitoring tool fast.
  • We can create

i) Checks

ii) Register entities

iii) Handlers

iv) Filters, etc

using API.

#11. Pandora FMS

Top 11 Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux 11

Key Features:-

  • Pandora FMS stands for Pandora Flexible Monitoring Solution.
  • Pandora FMS is a IT infrastructure monitoring tool in a single console.
  • Pandora FMS elements consists of Console, database, Servers, Agents.
  • By using Pandora FMS we can monitor:-
    1. Network
    2. Logs
    3. Database
    4. Cloud
    5. Applications
    6. User Experience
    7. Servers  
    8. IPAM
    9. SAP   
    10. IoT
  • It can do both remote monitoring and monitoring based on agents installed on the servers.

Advantages:-

  • Pandora FMS has an open source community edition.
  • It also has a Enterprise version which is used by many IT companies.
  • Pandora FMS’s both open source and enterprise versions are regularly updated every month.
  • It has direct access from the console.

Conclusion:

We have covered Open Source Monitoring Tools for Linux-Prometheus, Grafana, Elastic search, Nagios Core, Zabbix, Cacti, Icinga, MRTG, Netdata, Sensu, Pandora FMS.

Related Articles:

Monitoring Tools Tutorial

Reference:

Opensource official site

Akash Padwal

I am Akash Padwal working as a DevOps Engineer Intern in Product Company. Likes to explore new DevOps tools and share knowledge.

Leave a Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Share via
Copy link
Powered by Social Snap