reference
REFERENCE(1) mrtg REFERENCE(1)
NAME
reference - MRTG 2.9.17 configuration reference
OVERVIEW
The runtime behaviour of MRTG is governed by a configuration file. Run
of the mill configuration files can be generated with cfgmaker. (Check
the cfgmaker manpage). But for more elaborate configurations some hand
tuning is required.
This document describes all the configuration options understud by the
mrtg software.
SYNTAX
MRTG configuration file syntax follows some simple rules:
o Keywords must start at the beginning of a line.
o Lines which follow a keyword line which do start with a blank are
appended to the keyword line
o Empty Lines are ignored
o Lines starting with a # sign are comments.
o You can add other files into the configuration file using
Include: file
Example:
Include: base-options.inc
GLOBAL PARAMETERS
WorkDir
WorkDir specifies where the logfiles and the webpages should be cre-
ated.
Example:
WorkDir: /usr/tardis/pub/www/stats/mrtg
OPTIONAL GLOBAL PARAMETERS
HtmlDir
HtmlDir specifies the directory where the html (or shtml, but we'll get
on to those later,) lives.
NOTE: Workdir overides the settings for htmldir, imagedir
and logdir
Example:
Htmldir: /www/mrtg/
ImageDir
ImageDir specifies the directory where the images live, they should be
under the html directory.
Example:
Imagedir: /www/mrtg/images
LogDir
LogDir specifies the directory where the logs are stored. This need
not be under htmldir directive.
Example:
Logdir: /www/mrtg/logs
Forks (UNIX only)
An a system that can fork (UNIX for example) mrtg can fork itself into
multiple instances while it is acquiring data via snmp.
For situations with high latency or a great number of devices this will
speed things up considerably. It will not make things faster though if
you query a single switch sitting next door.
As far as I know NT can not fork so this option is not available on NT.
Example:
Forks: 4
Refresh
How many seconds apart should the browser (Netscape) be instructed to
reload the page? If this is not defined, the default is 300 seconds (5
minutes).
Example:
Refresh: 600
Interval
How often do you call mrtg? The default is 5 minutes. If you call it
less often, you should specify it here. This does two things:
o the generated HTML page does contain the right information about
the calling interval ...
o a META header in the generated HTML page will instruct caches about
the time to live of this page .....
In this example we tell mrtg that we will be calling it every 10 min-
utes. If you are calling mrtg every 5 minutes, you can leave this line
commented out.
Example:
Interval: 10
WriteExpires
With this switch mrtg will generate .meta files for CERN and Apache
servers which contain Expiration tags for the html and gif files. The
*.meta files will be created in the same directory as the other files,
so you will have to set "MetaDir ." and "MetaFiles on" in your
apache.conf or .htaccess file for this to work
NOTE: If you are running Apache-1.2 or later, you can use the
mod_expire to achieve the same effect ... see the file htaccess.txt
Example:
WriteExpires: Yes
NoMib2
Normally we ask the SNMP device for 'sysUptime', 'sysName' properties
some do not have these. If you want to avoid getting complaints from
mrtg about these missing properties, specivy the nomib2 option.
An example of agents which do not implement base mib2 attributes are
Computer Associates - Unicenter TNG Agents. CA relies on using the
base OS SNMP agent in addition to its own agents to supplement the man-
agement of a system.
Example:
NoMib2: Yes
SingleRequest
Some SNMP implementations can not deal with requests asking for multi-
ple snmp variables in one go. Set this in your cfg file to force mrtg
to only ask for one variable per request.
Examples
SingleRequest: Yes
SnmpOptions
Apart form the per target timeout options, you can also configure the
behaviour of the snmpget process on a more profound level. SnmpOptions
accepts a hash of options. The following options are currently sup-
ported:
timeout => $default_timeout,
retries => $default_retries,
backoff => $default_backoff,
default_max_repetitions => $max_repetitions,
lenient_source_port_matching => 0,
lenient_source_address_matching => 1
The values behind the options indicate the current default value. Note
that these settings OVERRIDE the per target timeout settings.
Example:
SnmpOptions: retries => 2, only_ip_address_matching => 0
Note that AS/400 snmp seesm to be broken in a way which prevents mrtg
from working with it unless
SnmpOptions: lenient_source_port_matching => 1
is set.
IconDir
If you want to keep the mrtg icons in some place other than the working
(or imagedir) directory, use the IconDir variable for defining the url
to the icons directory.
Example:
IconDir: /mrtgicons/
LoadMIBs
Load the MIB file(s) specified and make its OIDs available as symbolic
names. For better efficiancy, a cache of MIBs is maintained in the
WorkDir.
Example:
LoadMIBs: /dept/net/mibs/netapp.mib,/usr/local/lib/ft100m.mib
Language
Switch output format to the selected Language (Check the translate
directory to see which languages are supported at the moment. In this
directory you can also find instructions on how to create new transla-
tions).
Currently the following laguages are supported: big5, brazilian, bul-
garian, catalan, chinese, czech, danish, dutch, eucjp, french, gali-
cian, gb, gb2312, german, greek, hungarian, icelandic, iso2022jp, ital-
ian, korean, lithuanian, malay, norwegian, polish, romanian, russian,
serbian, slovak, slovenian, spanish, swedish, turkish
Example:
Language: danish
LogFormat
Setting LogFormat to 'rrdtool' in your mrtg.cfg file enables rrdtool
mode. In rrdtool mode, mrtg relies on rrdtool to do its logging.
Graphs and html pages will be generated on the fly by the 14all.cgi
which can be found in the contrib section together with a short readme
... This feature has been contributed by Rainer.Bawidamann@infor-
matik.uni-ulm.de. Please check his website for more information:
http://www.uni-ulm.de/~rbawidam/mrtg-rrd/
Example:
LogFormat: rrdtool
LibAdd
If you are using rrdtool mode and your rrdtool Perl module (RRDs.pm) is
not installed in a location where perl can find it on its own, you can
use LibAdd to supply an appropriate path.
Example:
LibAdd: /usr/local/rrdtool/lib/perl/
PathAdd
If the rrdtool executable can not be found in the normal "PATH", you
can use this parameter to add a suitable directory to your path.
Example:
PathAdd: /usr/local/rrdtool/bin/
RunAsDaemon
The RunAsDaemon keyword enables daemon mode operation. The purpose of
daemon mode is that MRTG is launched once and not at regular basis by
cron as in native mode. This behavior saves computing resourses as
loading and parsing of configuration files only hapens once.
Using daemon mode MRTG itself is responible for timing the measurement
intervals. Therfore its important to set the Interval keyword to an
apropiate value.
Note that using daemon mode MRTG should no longer be started from cron
by regular basis as each started process runs forever. Instead MRTG
should be started from the command prompt or by a system startup
script.
If you want mrtg to run under a particular user and group (it is not
recomented to run MRTG as root) then you can use the --user=user_name
and --group=group_name options on the mrtg commandline.
mrtg --user=mrtg_user --group=mrtg_group mrtg.cfg
Also note that in daemon mode restart of the process is required in
order to activate changes in the config file.
Under UNIX, the Daemon switch causes mrtg to fork into background after
checking its config file. On Windows NT the MRTG process will detach
from the console, but because the NT/2000 shell waits for its children
you have to use the special start sequence when you launch the program:
start /b perl mrtg mrtg.cfg
You may have to add path information equal to what you add when you run
mrtg from the commandline.
Example
RunAsDaemon:Yes
Interval:5
Makes MRTG run as a daemon beginning data collection every 5 minutes
PER TARGET CONFIGURATION
Each monitoring target must be identified by a unique name. This name
must be appended to each parameter belonging to the same target. The
name will also be used for naming the generated webpages, logfiles and
images for this target.
Target
With the Target keyword you tell mrtg what it should monitor. The Tar-
get keyword takes arguments in a wide range of formats:
Basic
The most basic format is "port:community@router" This will generate
a traffic graph for the interface 'port' of the host 'router' (dns
name or IP address) and it will use the community 'community' (snmp
password) for the snmp query.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: 2:public@wellfleet-fddi.ethz.ch
If your community contains a "@" or a " " these characters mus be
escaped with a "\".
Target[bla]: 2:stu\ pi\@d@router
SNMPv2c
If you have a fast router you might want to try to poll the ifHC*
counters. This feature gets activated by switching to SNMPv2c.
Unfortunately not all devices support SNMPv2c yet. If it works,
this will prevent your counters from wraping within the 5 minute
polling interval. As we now use 64 bit instead of the normal 32
bit.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: 2:public@router1:::::2
Reversing
Sometimes you are sitting on the wrong side of the link, and you
would like to have mrtg report Incoming traffic as outgoing and
vice versa. This can be achieved by adding the '-' sign in front of
the "Target" description. It flips the incoming and outgoing traf-
fic rates.
Example:
Target[ezci]: -1:public@ezci-ether.ethz.ch
Explicit OIDs
You can also explicitly define the OID to query by using the fol-
lowing syntax 'OID_1&OID_2:community@router' The following example
will retrieve error counts for input and output on interface 1.
MRTG needs to graph two variables, so you need to specify two OID's
such as temperature and humidity or error input and error output.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14.1&1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.20.1:public@myrouter
MIB Variables
MRTG knows a number of symbolical SNMP variable names. See the
file mibhelp.txt for a list of known names. One example are the
ifInErrors and ifOutErrors. This means you can specify the above
as:
Example:
Target[ezwf]: ifInErrors.1&ifOutErrors.1:public@myrouter
Interface by IP
Sometimes SNMP interface index can change, like when new interfaces
are added or removed. This can cause all Target entries in your
config file to become wrong by offset, causing MRTG to graphs wrong
instances etc. MRTG supports IP address instead of ifindex in tar-
get definition. Then MRTG will query snmp device and try to map IP
address to current ifindex, You can use IP address in every type of
target definition, by adding IP address of the numbered interface
after OID and separation char '/'
Make sure that given IP address is used on your same target router,
your same target router, especially when graphing two different
OIDs and/or interface split by '&' delimiter.
You can tell cfgmaker to generate such references with the option
--ifref=ip.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: /1.2.3.4:public@wellfleet-fddi.ethz.ch
Target[ezci]: -/1.2.3.4:public@ezci-ether.ethz.ch
Target[ezwf]: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14/1.2.3.4&1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14/1.2.3.4:public@myrouter
Target[ezwf]: ifInErrors/1.2.3.4&ifOutErrors/1.2.3.4:public@myrouter
Interface by Description
If you can not use IP addresses you might want to use the interface
names. This works similar to the IP address aproach only that the
prefix to use is a \ instead of a /
You can tell cfgmaker to generate such references with the option
--ifref=descr.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: \My-Interface2:public@wellfleet-fddi.ethz.ch
Target[ezci]: -\My-Interface2:public@ezci-ether.ethz.ch
Target[ezwf]: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14\My-Interface2&1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14\My-Interface3:public@myrouter
Target[ezwf]: ifInErrors\My-Interface2&ifOutErrors\My-Interface3:public@myrouter
If your description contains a "&", a ":", a "@" or a " " you can
include them but you must escape with a backlash:
Target[ezwf]: \fun\: \ ney\&ddd:public@hello.router
Interface by Name
The only sensible way to reference interfaces of your switches.
You can tell cfgmaker to generate such references with the option
--ifref=name.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: #2/11:public@wellfleet-fddi.ethz.ch
Target[ezci]: -#2/11:public@ezci-ether.ethz.ch
Target[ezwf]: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14#3/7&1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14#3/7:public@myrouter
Target[ezwf]: ifInErrors#3/7&ifOutErrors#3/7:public@myrouter
If your description contains a "&", a ":", a "@" or a " " you can
include them but you must escape with a backlash:
Target[ezwf]: #\: \ fun:public@hello.router
Note that the # sign will be interpreted as a comment character if
it is the first non white-space character on the line.
Interface by Ethernet Address
When the SNMP interface index changes, you can key that interface
by its 'Physical Address', sometimes called a 'hard address', which
is the SNMP variable 'ifPhysAddress'. Internally, MRTG matches the
Physical Address from the *.cfg file to its current index, and then
uses that index for the rest of the session.
You can use the Physical Address in every type of target
definition, by adding the Physical Address after the OID and sepa-
ration char '!' (analogous to the IP address option). The Physical
address is specified as '-' delimited octets, such as
"0a-0-f1-5-23-18" (omit the double quotes). Note that some routers
use the same Hardware Ethernet Address for all their Interface
which prevents unique interface identification. Mrtg will notice
such problems and alert you.
You can tell cfgmaker to generate configuration files with hardware
ethernet address references by using the option --ifref=eth.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: !0a-0b-0c-0d:public@wellfleet-fddi.ethz.ch
Target[ezci]: -!0-f-bb-05-71-22:public@ezci-ether.ethz.ch
Target[ezwf]: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14!0a-00-10-23-44-51&!0a-00-10-23-44-51:public@myrouter
Target[ezwf]: ifInErrors!0a-00-10-23-44-51&ifOutErrors!0a-00-10-23-44-51:public@myrouter
Interface by Type
It seems that there are devices that try to defy all monitoring
efforts, the interesting interfaces have neither ifName nor a con-
stant ifDescr not to think of a persistant ifIndex. The only way to
get a constant mapping is by looking at the interface type, because
the interface you are interested in is unique in the device you are
looking at ...
You can tell cfgmaker to generate such references with the option
--ifref=type.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: %13:public@wellfleet-fddi.ethz.ch
Target[ezci]: -%13:public@ezci-ether.ethz.ch
Target[ezwf]: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14%13&1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.14%14:public@myrouter
Target[ezwf]: ifInErrors%13&ifOutErrors%14:public@myrouter
Extended Host Name Syntax
In all places where ``community@router'' is accepted, you can add
additional parameters for the SNMP communication using colon-sepa-
rated suffixes. The full syntax is as follows:
community@router[:[port][:[timeout][:[retries][:[backoff][:version]]]]]
where the meaning of each parameter is as follows:
port
the UDP port under which to contact the SNMP agent (default:
161)
timeout
initial timeout for SNMP queries, in seconds (default: 2.0)
retries
number of times a timed-out request will be retried (default:
5)
backoff
factor by which the timeout is multiplied on every retry
(default: 1.0).
version
for SNMP version if you have a fast router you might want to
put a '2' here. This will make mrtg try to poll the 64 bit
counters. And thus prevent excessive counter wrapping. Not all
routers support this though.
Example:
3:public@router1:::::2
A value that equals the default value can be omitted. Trailing
colons can be omitted, too.
Example:
Target[ezci]: 1:public@ezci-ether.ethz.ch:9161::4
This would refer to the input/output octet counters for the inter-
face with ifIndex 1 on ezci-ether.ethz.ch, as known by the SNMP
agent listening on UDP port 9161. The standard initial timeout
(2.0 seconds) is used, but the number of retries is set to four.
The backoff value is the default.
External Monitoring Scripts
if you want to monitor something which does not provide data via
snmp you can use some external program to do the data gathering.
The external command must return 4 lines of output:
Line 1
current state of the first variable, normally 'incoming bytes
count'
Line 2
current state of the second variable, normally 'outgoing bytes
count'
Line 3
string (in any human readable format), telling the uptime of
the target.
Line 4
string, telling the name of the target.
Depending on the type of data your script returns you might want to
use the 'gauge' or 'absolute' arguments for the Options keyword.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: `/usr/local/bin/df2mrtg /dev/dsk/c0t2d0s0`
Note the use of the backticks (`), not apostrophes (') around the
command.
If you want to use a backtick in the command name this can be done
but you must escape it with a backslash ...
Multi Target Syntax
You can also use several statements in a mathematical expression.
This could be used to aggregate both B channels in an ISDN connec-
tion or multiple T1s that are aggregated into a single channel for
greater bandwidth. Note the whitespace arround the target defini-
tions.
Example:
Target[ezwf]: 2:public@wellfleetA + 1:public@wellfleetA
* 4:public@ciscoF
RouterUptime
In cases where you calculate the used bandwidth from several interfaces
you normaly don't get the router uptime and router name displayed on
the web page.
If these interfaces are on the same router and the uptime and name
should be displayed nevertheless you have to specify its community and
address again with the RouterUptime keyword.
Example:
Target[kacisco.comp.edu]: 1:public@194.64.66.250 + 2:public@194.64.66.250
RouterUptime[kacisco.comp.edu]: public@194.64.66.250
MaxBytes
The maximum value either of the two variables monitored are allowed to
reach. For monitoring router traffic this is normally specified in
bytes per second this interface port can carry.
If a number higher than MaxBytes is returned, it is ignored. Also read
the section on AbsMax for further info. The MaxBytes value is also
used in calculating the Y range for unscaled graphs (see the section on
Unscaled).
Since most links are rated in bits per second, you need to divide their
maximum bandwidth (in bits) by eight (8) in order to get bytes per sec-
ond. This is very important to make your unscaled graphs display real-
istic information. T1 = 193000, 56K = 7000, Ethernet = 1250000. The
MaxBytes value will be used by mrtg to decide whether it got a valid
response from the router.
If you need two different MaxBytes values for the two monitored vari-
ables, you can use MaxBytes1 and MaxBytes2 instead of MaxBytes.
Example:
MaxBytes[ezwf]: 1250000
MaxBytes1
Same as MaxBytes, for variable 1.
MaxBytes2
Same as MaxBytes, for variable 2.
Title
Title for the HTML page which gets generated for the graph.
Example:
Title[ezwf]: Traffic Analysis for Our Nice Company
PageTop
Things to add to the top of the generated HTML page. Note that you can
have several lines of text as long as the first column is empty.
Note that the continuation lines will all end up on the same line in
the html page. If you want linebreaks in the generated html use the
'\n' sequence.
Example:
PageTop[ezwf]: <H1>Traffic Analysis for ETZ C95.1</H1>
Our Campus Backbone runs over an FDDI line\n
with a maximum transfer rate of 12.5 megabytes per
Second.
OPTIONAL PER TARGET PARAMETERS
PageFoot
Things to add to the bottom of the generated HTML page. Note that you
can have several lines of text as long as the first column is empty.
Note that the continuation lines will all end up on the same line in
the html page. If you want linebreaks in the generated html use the
'\n' sequence.
The material will be added just before the </BODY> tag:
Example:
PageFoot[ezwf]: Contact <A HREF="mailto:peter@x.yz">Peter</A>
if you have questions regarding this page
AddHead
Use this tag like the PageTop header, but its contents will be added
between </TITLE> and </HEAD>.
Example:
AddHead[ezwf]: <link rev="made" href="mailto:mrtg@blabla.edu">
BodyTag
BodyTag lets you supply your very own <body ...> tag for the generated
webpages.
Example:
BodyTag[ezwf]: <BODY LEFTMARGIN="1" TOPMARGIN="1"
BACKGROUND="/stats/images/bg.neo2.gif">
AbsMax
If you are monitoring a link which can handle more traffic than the
MaxBytes value. Eg, a line which uses compression or some frame relay
link, you can use the AbsMax keyword to give the absolute maximum value
ever to be reached. We need to know this in order to sort out unreal-
istic values returned by the routers. If you do not set AbsMax, rateup
will ignore values higher than MaxBytes.
Example:
AbsMax[ezwf]: 2500000
Unscaled
By default each graph is scaled vertically to make the actual data vis-
ible even when it is much lower than MaxBytes. With the Unscaled vari-
able you can suppress this. It's argument is a string, containing one
letter for each graph you don't want to be scaled: d=day w=week m=month
y=year. In the example scaling for the yearly and the monthly graph
are suppressed.
Example:
Unscaled[ezwf]: ym
WithPeak
By default the graphs only contain the average values of the monitored
variables - normally the transfer rates for incoming and outgoing traf-
fic. The following option instructs mrtg to display the peak 5 minute
values in the [w]eekly, [m]onthly and [y]early graph. In the example we
define the monthly and the yearly graph to contain peak as well as
average values.
Examples:
WithPeak[ezwf]: ym
Suppress
By default mrtg produces 4 graphs. With this option you can suppress
the generation of selected graphs. The option value syntax is analo-
gous to the above two options. In this example we suppress the yearly
graph as it is quite empty in the beginning.
Example:
Suppress[ezwf]: y
Extension
By default, mrtg creates .html files. Use this option to tell mrtg to
use a different extension. For example you could set the extension to
php3, then you will be able to enclose PHP tags into the output (use-
full for getting a router name out of a database).
Example:
Extension[ezwf]: phtml
Directory
By default, mrtg puts all the files that it generates for each target
(the GIFs, the HTML page, the log file, etc.) in WorkDir.
If the Directory option is specified, the files are instead put into a
directory under WorkDir or Log-, Image- and HtmlDir). (For example the
Directory option below would cause all the files for a target ezwf to
be put into directory /usr/tardis/pub/www/stats/mrtg/ezwf/ .)
The directory must already exist; mrtg will not create it.
Example:
WorkDir: /usr/tardis/pub/www/stats/mrtg
Directory[ezwf]: ezwf
NOTE: the Directory option must always be 'relative' or bad things will
happen.
XSize and YSize
By default mrtgs graphs are 100 by 400 pixels wide (plus some more for
the labels. In the example we get almost square graphs ...
Note: XSize must be between 20 and 600; YSize must be larger than 20
Example:
XSize[ezwf]: 300
YSize[ezwf]: 300
XZoom and YZoom
If you want your graphs to have larger pixels, you can "Zoom" them.
Example:
XZoom[ezwf]: 2.0
YZoom[ezwf]: 2.0
XScale and YScale
If you want your graphs to be actually scaled use XScale and YScale.
(Beware while this works, the results look ugly (to be frank) so if
someone wants to fix this: patches are welcome.
Example:
XScale[ezwf]: 1.5
YScale[ezwf]: 1.5
YTics and YTicsFactor
If you want to show more than 4 lines per graph, use YTics. If you
want to scale the value used for the YLegend of these tics, use YTics-
Factor. The default value for YTics is 4 and the default value for
YTicsFactor is 1.0 .
Example:
Suppose you get values ranging from 0 to 700.
You want to plot 7 lines and want to show
0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 instead of 0, 100, 200,
300, 400, 500, 600, 700. You should write then:
YTics[ezwf]: 7
YTicsFactor[ezwf]: 0.01
Factor
If you want to multiply all numbers shown below the graph with a con-
stant factor, use this directive to define it ..
Example:
Factor[as400]: 4096
Step
Change the default step from 5 * 60 seconds to something else (I have
not tested this well ...)
Example:
Step[ezwf]: 60
Options
The Options Keyword allows you to set some boolean switches:
growright
The graph grows to the left by default. This option flips the
direction of growth causing the current time to be at the right
edge of the graph and the history values to the left of it.
bits
All the monitored variable values are multiplied by 8 (i.e. shown
in bits instead of bytes) ... looks much more impressive :-) It
also affects the 'factory default' labeling and units for the given
target.
perminute
All the monitored variable values are multiplied by 60 (i.e. shown
in units per minute instead of units per second) in case of small
values more accurate graphs are displayed. It also affects the
'factory default' labeling and units for the given target.
perhour
All the monitored variable values are multiplied by 3600 (i.e.
shown in units per hour instead of units per second) in case of
small values more accurate graphs are displayed. It also affects
the 'factory default' labeling and units for the given target.
noinfo
Suppress the information about uptime and device name in the gener-
ated webpage.
nopercent
Don't print usage percentages
transparent
make the background of the generated gifs transparent ...
integer
Print summary lines below graph as integers without comma
dorelpercent
The relative percentage of IN-traffic to OUT-traffic is calculated
and displayed in the graph as an additional line. Note: Only a
fixed scale is available (from 0 to 100%). Therefore for IN-traffic
greater than OUT-traffic also 100% is displayed. If you suspect
that your IN-traffic is not always less than or equal to your OUT-
traffic you are urged to not use this options. Note: If you use
this option in combination with the Colours options, a fifth
colour-name colour-value pair is required there.
gauge
Treat the values gathered from target as 'current status' measure-
ments and not as ever incrementing counters. This would be useful
to monitor things like disk space, processor load, temperature, and
the like ...
In the absence of 'gauge' or 'absolute' options, MRTG treats vari-
able as a counter and calculates the difference between the current
and the previous value and divides that by the elapsed time between
the last two readings to get the value to be plotted.
absolute
This is for counter type data sources which reset their value when
they are read. This means that rateup does not have to build the
difference between the current and the last value read from the
data source. The value obtained is still divided by the elapsed
time between the current and the last reading, which makes it dif-
ferent from the 'gauge' option. Useful for external data gatherers.
unknaszero
Log unknown data as zero instead of the default behaviour of
repeating the last value seen. Be careful with this, often a flat
line in the graph is much more obvious than a line at 0.
withzeroes
Normally we ignore all values which are zero when calculating the
average transfer rate on a line. If this is not desirable use this
option.
noborder
If you are using rateup to log data, MRTG will create the graph
images. Normally these images have a shaded border around them. If
you do not want the border to be drawn, enable this option. This
option has no effect if you are not using rateup.
noarrow
As with the option above, this effects rateup graph generation
only. Normally rateup will generate graphs with a small arrow show-
ing the direction of the data. If you do not want this arrow to be
drawn, enable this option. This option has no effect if you are not
using rateup.
noi When using rateup for graph generation, you can use this option to
stop rateup drawing a graph for the 'I' or first variable. This
also removes entries for this variable in the HTML page MRTG gener-
ates, and will remove the peaks for this variable if they are
enabled. This allows you to hide this data, or can be very useful
if you are only graphing one line of data rather than two. This
option is not destructive - any data received for the the variable
continued to be logged, it just isn't shown.
noo Same as above, except relating to the 'O' or second variable.
nobanner
When using rateup for graph generation, this option disables MRTG
adding the MRTG banner to the HTML pages it generates.
nolegend
When using rateup for graph generation, this option will stop MRTG
creating a legend at the bottom of the HTML pages it generates.
Example:
Options[ezwf]: growright, bits
kilo
Use this option to change the multiplier value for building prefixes.
Defaultvalue is 1000. This tag is for the special case that 1kB =
1024B, 1MB = 1024kB and so far.
Example:
kilo[ezwf]: 1024
kMG
Change the default multiplier prefixes (,k,M,G,T,P). In the tag Short-
Legend define only the basic units. Format: Comma seperated list of
prefixed. Two consecutive commas or a comma at start or end of the line
gives no prefix on this item. Note: If you do not want prefixes, then
leave this line blank.
Example: velocity in nm/s (nanometers per second) displayed in nm/h.
ShortLegend[ezwf]: m/min
kMG[ezwf]: n,u,m,,k,M,G,T,P
options[ezwf]: perhour
Colours
The Colours tag allows you to override the default colour scheme.
Note: All 4 of the required colours must be specified here. The colour
name ('Colourx' below) is the legend name displayed, while the RGB
value is the real colour used for the display, both on the graph and in
the html doc.
Format is: Col1#RRGGBB,Col2#RRGGBB,Col3#RRGGBB,Col4#RRGGBB
Important: If you use the dorelpercent options tag a fifth colour name
colour value pair is required:
Col1#RRGGBB,Col2#RRGGBB,Col3#RRGGBB,Col4#RRGGBB,Col5#RRGGBB
Colour1
First variable (normally Input) on default graph
Colour2
Second variable (normally Output) on default graph
Colour3
Max first variable (input)
Colour4
Max second variable (output)
RRGGBB
2 digit hex values for Red, Green and Blue
Example:
Colours[ezwf]: GREEN#00eb0c,BLUE#1000ff,DARK GREEN#006600,VIOLET#ff00ff
Background
With the Background tag you can configure the background colour of the
generated HTML page
Example:
Background[ezwf]: #a0a0a0a
YLegend, ShortLegend, Legend[1234]
The following keywords allow you to override the text displayed for the
various legends of the graph and in the HTML document
YLegend
The Y-axis label of the graph. Note that a text which is too long
to fit in the graph will be silently ignored.
ShortLegend
The units string (default 'b/s') used for Max, Average and Current
Legend[1234IO]
The strings for the colour legend
Example:
YLegend[ezwf]: Bits per Second
ShortLegend[ezwf]: b/s
Legend1[ezwf]: Incoming Traffic in Bits per Second
Legend2[ezwf]: Outgoing Traffic in Bits per Second
Legend3[ezwf]: Maximal 5 Minute Incoming Traffic
Legend4[ezwf]: Maximal 5 Minute Outgoing Traffic
LegendI[ezwf]: In:
LegendO[ezwf]: Out:
Note, if LegendI or LegendO are set to an empty string with
LegendO[ezwf]:
The corresponding line below the graph will not be printed at all.
Timezone
If you live in an international world, you might want to generate the
graphs in different timezones. This is set in the TZ variable. Under
certain operating systems like Solaris, this will provoke the localtime
call to give the time in the selected timezone ...
Example:
Timezone[ezwf]: Japan
The Timezone is the standard Solaris timezone, ie Japan, Hongkong, GMT,
GMT+1 etc etc.
Weekformat
By default, mrtg (actually rateup) uses the strftime(3) '%W' option to
format week numbers in the monthly graphs. The exact semantics of this
format option vary between systems. If you find that the week numbers
are wrong, and your system's strftime(3) routine supports it, you can
try another format option. The POSIX '%V' option seems to correspond
to a widely used week numbering convention. The week format character
should be specified as a single letter; either W, V, or U.
Example:
Weekformat[ezwf]: V
SetEnv
When calling external scrits from withing your cfg file (Threshold or
script targets) you might want to pass some data on to the script. This
can be done with the SetEnv configuration option ... it takes a series
of environment variable assignments. Note that the quotes are manda-
tory.
Example:
SetEnv[myrouter]: EMAIL="contact_email@someplace.net"
HOST="www.some_server.net"
URL="http://www.some_server.net/path/mrtg.html"
THRESHOLD CHECKING
Through its threshold checking functionality mrtg is able to detect
threshold problems for the various targets and can call external
scripts to handle those problems (send email or a page to an adminis-
trator).
Threshold checking is configured through the following parameters:
ThreshDir (GLOBAL)
By defining ThreshDir to point to a writable directory, MRTG will only
alert you when a threshold boundery has been crossed.
Example:
ThershDir: /var/mrtg/thresh
ThreshMinI (PER TARGET)
This is the minimum acceptable value for the Input (first) parameter.
If the parameter falls below this value, the program specified in
ThreshProgI will be run. If the value ends in '%' then the threshold is
defined relative to MaxBytes.
ThreshMaxI (PER TARGET)
This is the maximum acceptable value for the Input (first) parameter.
If the parameter falls above this value, the program specified in
ThreshProgI will be run. If the value ends in '%' then the threshold is
defined relative to MaxBytes.
ThreshDesc (PER TARGET)
Its value will be assigned to the environment variable THRESH_DESC
before any of the programs mentioned below are called. The programms
can use the value of this variable to produce more userfriendly output.
ThreshProgI (PER TARGET)
This defines a program to be run if ThreshMinI or ThreshMaxI is broken.
MRTG passes 3 arguments: the $router variable, the threshold value bro-
ken, and the current parameter value.
ThreshProgOKI (PER TARGET)
This defines a program to be run if the parameter is currently OK
(based on ThreshMinI and ThreshMaxI), but wasn't OK on the previous
running -- based on the files found in ThreshDir. MRTG passes 3 argu-
ments: the $router variable the un-broken threshold value, and the cur-
rent parameter value.
ThreshMinO, ThreshMaxO, ThreshProgO, and ThreshProgOKO
They work the same as their *I counterparts, except on the Output (sec-
ond) parameter.
Note, that you can use the SetEnv parameter explained above to pass
additional information to the threshold programs.
PER TARGET DEFAULT VALUES
Pre- and Postfix
To save yourself some typing you can define a target called '^'. The
text of every Keyword you define for this target will be PREPENDED to
the corresponding Keyword of all the targets defined below this line.
The same goes for a Target called '$' but its text will be APPENDED.
Note that a space is inserted between the prepended text and the Key-
word value, as well as between the Keyword value and the appended text.
This works well for text-valued Keywords, but is not very useful for
other Keywords. See the "default" target description below.
The example will make mrtg use a common header and a common contact
person in all the pages generated from targets defined later in this
file.
Example:
PageTop[^]: <H1>NoWhere Unis Traffic Stats</H1><HR>
PageTop[$]: Contact Peter Norton if you have any questions<HR>
To remove the prepend/append value, specify an empty value, e.g.:
PageTop[^]:
PageTop[$]:
NOTE: With PREPEND and APPEND there is normally a space inserted
between the local value and the PRE- or APPEND value. Sometimes this is
not desirable. You can use the NoSpaceChar config option to define a
character which can be mentioned at the end of a $ or ^ definition in
order to supress the space.
Example:
NoSpaceChar: ~
Target[^]: 1.3.6.1.4.1.482.50.2.4.20.0&1.3.6.1.4.1.482.50.2.4.21.0:get@~
Target[a]: a.tolna.net
Target[b]: b.tolna.net
Target[c]: c.tolna.net
Target[d]: d.tolna.net
Default Values
The target name '_' specifies a default value for that Keyword. In the
absence of explicit Keyword value, the prepended and the appended key-
word value, the default value will be used.
Example:
YSize[_]: 150
Options[_]: growright,bits,nopercent
WithPeak[_]: ymw
Suppress[_]: y
MaxBytes[_]: 1250000
To remove the default value and return to the 'factory default', spec-
ify an empty value, e.g.:
YLegend[_]:
There can be several instances of setting the default/prepend/append
values in the configuration file. The later setting replaces the previ-
ous one for the rest of the configuration file. The
default/prepend/append values used for a given keyword/target pair are
the ones that were in effect at the point in the configuration file
where the target was mentioned for the first time.
Example:
MaxBytes[_]: 1250000
Target[myrouter.somplace.edu.2]: 2:public@myrouter.somplace.edu
MaxBytes[_]: 8000
Title[myrouter.somplace.edu.2]: Traffic Analysis for myrouter.somplace.edu IF 2
The default MaxBytes for the target myrouter.somplace.edu.2 in the
above example will be 1250000, which was in effect where the target
name myrouter.somplace.edu.2 first appeared in the config file.
COMMAND LINE OPTIONS
--user username and --group groupname
Run as the given user and/or group. (Unix Only)
--lock-file filename
Use an alternate lock-file (the default is to use the configura-
tion-file appended with "_l").
--confcache-file filename
Use an alternate confcache-file (the default is to use the configu-
ration-file appended with ".ok")
--logging filename|eventlog
If this is set to writable filename, all output from mrtg (warn-
ings, debug messages, errors) will go to filename. If you are run-
ning on Win32 you can specify eventlog instead of a filename which
will send all error to the windows event log.
NOTE:Note, there is no Message DLL for mrtg which has the side
effect that the windows event logger will display a nice message
with every entry in the event log, complaing about the fact that
mrtg has no message dll. If any of the Windows folks want to con-
tribute one, they are welcome.
EXAMPLES
Minimal mrtg.cfg
WorkDir: /usr/tardis/pub/www/stats/mrtg
Target[r1]: 2:public@myrouter.somplace.edu
MaxBytes[r1]: 8000
Title[r1]: Traffic Analysis ISDN
PageTop[r1]: <H1>Stats for our ISDN Line</H1>
Cfg for several Routers.
WorkDir: /usr/tardis/pub/www/stats/mrtg
Title[^]: Traffic Analysis for
PageTop[^]: <H1>Stats for
PageTop[$]: Contact The Chief if you notice anybody<HR>
MaxBytes[_]: 8000
Options[_]: growright
Title[isdn]: our ISDN Line
PageTop[isdn]: our ISDN Line</H1>
Target[isdn]: 2:public@router.somplace.edu
Title[backb]: our Campus Backbone
PageTop[backb]: our Campus Backbone</H1>
Target[backb]: 1:public@router.somplace.edu
MaxBytes[backb]: 1250000
# the following line removes the default prepend value
# defined above
Title[^]:
Title[isdn2]: Traffic for the Backup ISDN Line
PageTop[isdn2]: our ISDN Line</H1>
Target[isdn2]: 3:public@router.somplace.edu
AUTHOR
Tobias Oetiker <oetiker@ee.ethz.ch> and many contributors
3rd Berkeley Distribution 2.9.17 REFERENCE(1)
