Cacti tool is an open-source web-based network monitoring and system monitoring graphing solution for IT business. Cacti enable a user to poll services at regular intervals to create graphs on resulting data using RRDtool. Generally, it is used to graph time-series data of metrics such as network bandwidth utilization, CPU load, running processes, disk space, etc.
In this how-to, we are going to show you how to install and set up a complete network monitoring application called Cacti using Net-SNMP tool on RHEL, CentOS and Fedora systems using YUM and DNF package manager tool.
Cacti Required Packages
The Cacti required the following packages to be installed on your Linux operating systems like RHEL / CentOS / Fedora.
Apache : A Web server to display network graphs created by PHP and RRDTool.
MySQL : A Database server to store cacti information.
PHP : A script module to create graphs using RRDTool.
PHP-SNMP : A PHP extension for SNMP to access data.
NET-SNMP : A SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol) is used to manage the network.
RRDTool : A database tool to manage and retrieve time series data like CPU load, Network Bandwidth, etc.
Note: The installation instructions were shown here are written based on CentOS 7.5 Linux distribution.
Installing Cacti Required Packages on RHEL / CentOS / Fedora
First, we need to install following dependency packages one-by-one using the default package manager tool as shown.
# yum install mysql mysql-server [On RHEL/CentOS 6]
MariaDB
is a community-developed fork of the MySQL database project and
provides a replacement for MySQL. Previously the official supported
database was MySQL under RHEL/CentOS and Fedora.
Recently, RedHat makes a new transaction from MySQL to MariaDB, as MariaDB is the default implementation of MySQL in RHEL/CentOS 8/7 and Fedora 19 onwards.
We need to configure MySQL for Cacti, to do this we need to secure a newly installed MySQL server and then we will create Cacti database with user Cacti. If you’re MySQL is already installed and secured, then don’t need to do it again.
# mysql_secure_installation
Create MySQL Cacti Database
Login into MySQL server with a newly created password and create Cacti database with user Cacti and set the password for it.
On RHEL/CentOS 6 and Fedora 18-12
[root@tecmint ~]# mysql -u root -p
Enter password:
Welcome to the MySQL monitor. Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MySQL connection id is 3
Server version: 5.1.73 Source distribution
Copyright (c) 2000, 2013, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.
Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation and/or its
affiliates. Other names may be trademarks of their respective
owners.
Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the current input statement.
mysql> create database cacti;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)
mysql> GRANT ALL ON cacti.* TO cacti@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'tecmint';
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
mysql> FLUSH privileges;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
mysql> quit;
Bye
On RHEL/CentOS 8/7 and Fedora 19 Onwards
[root@tecmint ~]# mysql -u root -p
Enter password:
Welcome to the MariaDB monitor. Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MariaDB connection id is 3
Server version: 5.5.41-MariaDB MariaDB Server
Copyright (c) 2000, 2014, Oracle, MariaDB Corporation Ab and others.
Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the current input statement.
MariaDB [(none)]> create database cacti;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)
MariaDB [(none)]> GRANT ALL ON cacti.* TO cacti@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'tecmint';
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
MariaDB [(none)]> FLUSH privileges;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
MariaDB [(none)]> quit;
Bye
Install Cacti Tables to MySQL
Find out the database file path using RPM command, to install cacti tables into newly created Cacti database, use the following command.
# rpm -ql cacti | grep cacti.sql
Sample Output:
/usr/share/doc/cacti-1.2.6/cacti.sql
OR
/usr/share/doc/cacti/cacti.sql
Now we’ve of the location of Cacti.sql file, type the following command to install tables, here you need to type the Cacti user password.
[root@tecmint ~]# mysql -u cacti -p cacti < /usr/share/doc/cacti-0.8.8b/cacti.sql
Enter password:
Configure MySQL settings for Cacti
Open the file called /etc/cacti/db.php with any editor.
# vi /etc/cacti/db.php
Make the following changes and save the file. Make sure you set password correctly.
/* make sure these values reflect your actual database/host/user/password */
$database_type = "mysql";
$database_default = "cacti";
$database_hostname = "localhost";
$database_username = "cacti";
$database_password = "your-password-here";
$database_port = "3306";
$database_ssl = false;
Configuring Firewall for Cacti
On RHEL/CentOS 6 and Fedora 18-12
[root@tecmint ~]# iptables -A INPUT -p udp -m state --state NEW --dport 80 -j ACCEPT
[root@tecmint ~]# iptables -A INPUT -p tcp -m state --state NEW --dport 80 -j ACCEPT
[root@tecmint ~]# service iptables save
Open file called /etc/httpd/conf.d/cacti.conf with your choice of editor.
# vi /etc/httpd/conf.d/cacti.conf
You need to enable access to Cacti application for your local network or per IP level. For example, we’ve enabled access to our local LAN network 172.16.16.0/20. In your case, it would be different.
Alias /cacti /usr/share/cacti
<Directory /usr/share/cacti/>
Order Deny,Allow
Deny from all
Allow from 172.16.16.0/20
</Directory>
In the latest version of Apache (ex: Apache 2.4), you may need to change according to the following settings.
Alias /cacti /usr/share/cacti
<Directory /usr/share/cacti/>
<IfModule mod_authz_core.c>
# httpd 2.4
Require all granted
</IfModule>
<IfModule !mod_authz_core.c>
# httpd 2.2
Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from all
</IfModule>
</Directory>
Finally, restart the Apache service.
[root@tecmint ~]# service httpd restart [On RHEL/CentOS 6 and Fedora 18-12]
[root@tecmint ~]# systemctl restart httpd.service [On RHEL/CentOS 8/7 and Fedora 19 onwards]
Setting Cron for Cacti
Open file /etc/cron.d/cacti.
# vi /etc/cron.d/cacti
Uncomment the following line. The poller.php script runs every 5mins and collects data of known host which is used by Cacti application to display graphs.
Finally, Cacti is ready, just go to http://YOUR-IP-HERE/cacti/ & follow the installer instruction through the following screens. Enter the default login details and hit Enter button.
User: admin
Password: admin
Cacti User Login
Next, change default Cacti password.
Accept Cacti License Agreement
Next, the screen shows Pre-installation Checks for Cacti installation, please correct the suggested settings in your /etc/php.ini file as shown and restart Apache after making changes.
Cacti Pre-installation Checks
Similarly, you also need to grant access to the MySQL TimeZone
database for user Cacti, so that the database is populated with global
TimeZone information.
mysql> use mysql;
mysql> GRANT SELECT ON mysql.time_zone_name TO cacti@localhost;
mysql> flush privileges;
Cacti MySQL Pre-Installation Checks
Please choose the installation Type as “New Install“.
Select Cacti Installation Type
Make sure all the following directory permissions are correct before continuing.
Cacti Directory Permission Checks
Make sure all of these Critical Binary Locations and Versions values are correct before continuing.
Critical Binary Locations and Versions
Please choose the default Data Source Profile to be used for polling sources.
Select Data Source Profile
Please, choose the Device Templates that you wish to use after the Cacti Install.
Select Cacti Device Templates
Set the Server Collation in your MySQL configuration file /etc/my.cnf under the [mysqld] section as shown.
This howto explains howto install Google Chrome Web browser onFedora 19/18/17/16. Best way to install and keep up-to-date with Google Chrome browser is use Google’s own YUM repository.
Note: I changed jobs a couple of years ago, and I no longer have access to a Citrix Server,
therefore these instructions are to the best of what I had at the time, and may have changed
or require tweaking since the last time I executed them.
Fortunately for us Linux users, Citrix provides binaries for connecting to Citrix
servers from Linux boxen. Unfortunately, they have made the attempt to oversimplify the
installation of their binaries by providing an installation script. The installation
script is flawed in that it assumes you want to use Netscape as your browser. And even
then it doesn’t seem to install ready-to-use. So for those of us that want to use it
with a different browser (and/or Netscape for that matter), we are relegated to hunting
google and/or searching for hidden documentation on how to manually install the client. So
to Citrix, I say "A for effort" and "F" for not realizing that us
linux techies also like to have detailed instructions on how to manually install when the
automated install doesn’t suit our needs. And that brings us to the purpose of this
page.
Obtaining the Citrix ICA Client
You need to obtain the Citrix ICA Client package. Citrix offers an RPM, but for the
purposes of this page, I’m recommending the tarball. Thus, these instructions will be
based off of the tarball download.
First, obtain the Citrix ICA Client tarball by going to http://www.citrix.com/ and selecting
"Downloads". Or if you specifically want the current Linux x86 tarball, go to http://download2.citrix.com/files/de/products/client/ica/current/linuxx86.tar.gz.
From this point on in the documentation, the tarball will be assumed to be the x86
version, so substitute accordingly if you have to.
Unpacking Citrix ICA Client
Once you've obtained the tarball, you need to unpack it. Pick a temporary location to
unpack this tarball. For this page, we’ll use /tmp/citrix/. So create the temporary
directory, move the tarball to that directory and change into that directory: mkdir /tmp/citrix/ mv linuxx86.tar.gz /tmp/citrix/ cd /tmp/citrix/
Now unpack the tarball: gzip –decompress linuxx86.tar.gz tar xf linuxx86.tar
Now to run the installation command you must be logged in as the super user (root). So
change to root (using su, or however).
Execute the installation script, and follow the instructions as prompted: ./setupwfc
Using the default installation directory is highly recommended. If you choose not to,
you’ll have to read the install.txt to figure out what environment variables need to
be set to get the Citrix ICA Client to work. The rest of this page will assume that the
Citrix ICA Client was installed to its default directory. If the default was chosen, the
binaries are now installed in /usr/lib/ICAClient/.
Note: I reccomend answering
"No" to the installer when it asks if you'd like to integrate Citrix automatically
since this How-To handles all of the setup needed.
Configuring Your Browser
These directions should work for Firefox, Mozilla, Netscape, and any other Linux
Mozilla-based browser. The first step is to find the plugins directory for the browser you
wish to configure. The plugins directory is typically found as a subdirectory of the
installation directory for your browser. If you are unsure of the location of your plugins
directory, you can try the following command to attempt to locate the plugins directory: find / -name plugins | grep -i
"netscape\|firefox\|mozilla"
We’ll assume that we are configuring Firefox, and that Firefox was installed to
/opt/firefox. Again the following will have to be done as the superuser (root). Change
into the plugins directory of your browser: cd /opt/firefox/plugins/
Next, create a symlink (aka softlink) to the Citrix ICA Client library: ln –s /usr/lib/ICAClient/npica.so npica.so
If the Citrix install script was able to find Netscape, it probably already did this
step for you.
Connecting to Citrix and Using the Citrix ICA Client
Close all running instances of the browser you configured (just to be safe). Open a new
instance of the browser. Type the URL of and connect to your Citrix Server (as though
installation were complete). Login to the Citrix server with your user id and password.
Once logged in, you should get the mini-desktop with all of your applications. The first
time you click on an application, your browser is likely going to popup a dialog box
giving you the choice to open the file or save the file. Choose the option to open the
file. Where it asks for the application to use on this type of file, type in the path to
the wfica application:
/usr/lib/ICAClient/wfica
If given the choice, tell the browser to use this application for all future downloads
of this file type.
Congratulations! You have installed and configured the Citrix ICA Client.
