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How can I monitor Linux systems with a PRTG Mini Probe?

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I would like to monitor Debian based systems via the PRTG Mini Probe interface. How can I implement such a “Linux Probe”? Is there an example of how to gather monitoring data directly from my Linux based device with a mini probe?

debian linux mini-probe proof-of-concept prtg python-probe raspberry-pi ubuntu

Created on Jul 3, 2014 4:33:14 PM by Gerald Schoch [Paessler Support]

Last change on Jul 9, 2014 1:44:22 PM by Daniel Zobel [Product Manager]

38 Replies

Accepted Answer

Votes:

2

This article applies to PRTG Network Monitor 14.x.10 or later

Monitoring Linux Systems with the PRTG Mini Probe

Usually, PRTG monitors systems agentless so you do not have to install any software on target devices. PRTG probes connect directly to the remote system via SSH, WMI, SNMP, etc. to take the desired measurements. Agentless monitoring brings a lot of advantages for you because it is easy to set up and you do not have to maintain anything, but some situations require other methods than agentless.

For example, Linux monitoring is one of those because of its potential complexity and individual monitoring demands. In this case, installing a small piece of software on the target system might be a better idea to monitor data more easily. For this purpose, PRTG offers the option to use the PRTG Mini Probe interface .

PRTG Mini Probes work similar like the “big” local and remote probes but with a smaller set of sensor types. You are completely free in implementing and adjusting mini probes depending on which monitoring data you need. The Mini Probe API is publicly available so you can create your own individual probes. Or you simply extend the code of our PRTG Python Mini Probe proof-of-concept and add your own sensor types.

This article describes the Python-based open source code for a Mini Probe that you can run on any system that can run Python scripts.

Note: This article is provided for your information only. The steps described here have been tested carefully. However, we cannot offer deep technical support for customizing this proof of concept nor for writing your own mini probes.

Note: We do not further develop the currently available Mini Probe API because we plan major changes to the underlying API in PRTG. You can still use the Python Mini Probe, for example, if the available HTTP push sensors are not sufficient for your needs.

Python Mini Probe (Open Source)

You are free to use the Mini Probe API in order to implement probes and the corresponding sensors for any application scenario. So the Mini Probe helps you gather monitoring data from systems which do not run the supported Windows versions. You can find the full documentation of the Mini Probe API here.

Every PRTG installation already provides several natively available sensors for Linux monitoring. These gather monitoring data via SNMP or SSH connections but cannot run on a probe directly under Linux which is often demanded by PRTG users. So, in order to demonstrate the capabilities of the Mini Probe interface and to give you a starting point for implementing your own probe for Linux, we provide you a proof of concept for the Mini Probe: the Python Mini Probe.

Python Mini Probe for Linux

This Mini Probe proof of concept is written in Python. It runs the monitoring processes directly on a Debian based system and delivers the results back to the PRTG core server via the PRTG Mini Probe interface. We have successfully tested the Python Mini Probe on Debian, Ubuntu, and Raspbian.

For example, set up the Python Mini Probe on a small Raspberry Pi in your server room and get monitoring results directly from there! Of course, you can also enhance the functionalities of this open source implementation as you wish to get other desired data. Below we describe the sensors which this package contains by default and give instructions for running it on a Linux machine.

Get the Python Mini Probe on GitHub!

Requirements

You need to fulfill only a few prerequisites to monitor with the Python Mini Probe:

PRTG Core Server: version 14.x.10 or later
A Debian based system: e.g., Ubuntu, Debian, Raspbian
Python 2.7 or later: see python.org
Packages python-dev and build-essential (or at least gcc)
The package management system pip (see pip: Installation)

Important: Version 15.2.6 comes with major changes. Please see the migration documentation on GitHub to update from a previous version.

Note: In previous versions of the Python Mini Probe (before 15.2.6) you needed to install the following Python modules manually: pyasn1, pysnmp, requests. These modules are now included in the installer.

Installation

Please follow the steps below to get the Python Mini Probe up and running:

1) Prepare your PRTG server:

Set your PRTG server to use HTTPS: In the PRTG web interface, navigate to Setup | System Administration | User Interface, section Web Server, and choose Secure HTTPS server in section TCP Port for Web Server.
Note: Other connection methods are not allowed!
In the PRTG web interface, navigate to Setup | System Administration | Core & Probes and define the settings as following.
Define an Access Key for the Python Mini Probe. You can also use an existing one.
Add an appropriate IP filter in section Allow IPs. Use, for example, any.
Allow Mini Probe connections: Go to section Probe Connection Settings and choose Allow Mini Probes to connect.
Now check that you can reach your PRTG server from the machine on which the Python Mini Probe will run: e.g., execute the command wget https://<your_PRTG_server>

2) Prepare the Python Mini Probe:

Download and copy the Mini Probe folder to your Linux machine: Get it on GitHub!
Name the target directory with the unzipped files PythonMiniProbe
Run the Python Mini Probe installer: for example, use the command sudo python setup.py install and afterwards sudo python setup.py configure

You have to provide the following information in the command shell:

Please provide the username the script should run under: Enter the username the mini probe script will use to run on the Linux machine. At the moment, only root is supported here!
Please provide the desired name of your Mini Probe [Python MiniProbe]: Enter a name which will be displayed for the Mini probe in the PRTG web interface. If you do not enter anything, it will appear as the default Python MiniProbe.
Please provide the Probe GID (any unique alphanumerical sting): The Probe GID is a unique identifier for the probe. Enter any string.
Please provide the IP/DNS name of the PRTG Core Server: Enter the address of your PRTG server to which the Mini Probe will connect.
Please provide the port the PRTG web server is listening to (IMPORTANT: Only SSL is supported)[443]: The default port for SSL connections is 443. It will be used automatically because no other connections methods are allowed, so you can leave this field empty.
Note: You can specify a custom Mini Probe port in the Core & Probes settings as of PRTG version 14.x.13.
Please provide the base interval for your sensor [60]: Enter the scanning interval of the sensors on the Mini Probe in seconds. Default is 60 seconds.
Please provide the Probe Access Key as defined in the PRTG Core: Enter an access key to connect to the core server. For details, see PRTG Manual: System Administration—Core & Probes.
Please provide the path the probe files are located: Enter the path to the Python Mini Probe folder.
Do you want the mini probe flushing buffered and cached memory [y/N]: Please do not use this option in productive environments because this is an experimental feature!

After completing the setup, the Python Mini Probe will start automatically. You can start and stop the process using the following commands: sudo service prtgprobe start sudo service prtgprobe stop

3) Approve the Probe Connection

The last thing to do is: Approve the new probe connection in the PRTG web interface! The acknowledgement works like for a new remote probe connection.

Then you can work with the Python Mini Probe in the PRTG web interface as usual, for example, add sensors, review monitoring data, create notifications.

Default Sensors

By default, the Python Mini Probe contains the following sensors to monitor your Linux device:

CPU Load: Monitors the CPU load (average) on the system running the Mini Probe.
Disk Space: Monitors the free disk space on the system.
HTTP: Monitors a web server via HTTP.
Memory: Monitors free memory on the system.
Ping: Monitors the availability of a target device using ICMP.
Port Range: Checks the availability of a port range on the target device.
Probe Health: Monitors probe internal parameters to indicate the probe health.
SNMP Custom: Monitors a numerical value which is returned by a specific OID via SNMP.
SNMP Traffic: Monitors the traffic on a specified interface via SNMP.
DNS: Monitors a DNS server and supports all DNS types which are currently available in the Windows probe (A, AAA, NS, SOA, PTR, MX, CNAME)
APT: Checks if system updates are available.
External IP: Shows the external IP address of the probe.
NMAP: Monitors the availability of systems on a network.

You can adjust these default sensors or add even new ones to the probe package. Please refer to PRTG Manual: Mini Probe API for more information.

Debugging

In the case of issues with your Python Mini Probe, enable debugging:

Open the file probe.conf
Replace the line debug: with debug:True

This will enable detailed logging. The logs will be stored in the created \logs subfolder of the Mini Probe. For further debugging, stop the Mini Probe process (see above). Navigate to the folder that contains the file probe.py and run the command python probe.py

You will get the details and traceback on major errors directly on the console.

See Also

Created on Jul 3, 2014 4:41:49 PM by Gerald Schoch [Paessler Support]

Last change on Aug 14, 2018 8:08:28 AM by Brandy Greger [Paessler Support]

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0

Hey Paessler team,..

Very cool. We got the probe up and running. Works pretty well! For us, the next thing is to get it up and running out of the test environment in a real live situation.

We are going to use it in a cooled care with frozen fish in it. Fish is being transported every day around the country in big or small trucks, depending on the size/location. Well, the PRTG back-end and the mini probe will work great. We can measure it with a Watchdog(works!) and retrieve the data in the core by a mini probe (Works!) to see what the current (live) temperature is. But, we run into a problem.

We want to run an environment without "the internet of things" connection. By that i mean that without having a live internet connection in need. So, we tested it with an Wifi dongle on the raspberry and connect it to the headquarters Wi-Fi every time we get there. But the mini-probe doesn't have an cache for the sensoring it does?

Thanks,.. hope to hear from you.

Created on Sep 15, 2014 2:18:35 PM

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0

Hey Paessler team,

Can you tell me how i can add more types of censoring to the mini-probe? There is an folder that seems to have the types of sensors in it,.. but... how can i add more? Is there an "easy" way?

Thanks.

Peter

Created on Sep 15, 2014 2:21:37 PM

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Can the Python Mini Probe buffer results when the internet connection is lost?

Created on Sep 15, 2014 2:34:14 PM

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To answer these questions, the mini-probe cannot cache or buffer results as of yet and to have more sensors, they would need to be programmed yourself, as of yet the ones that are available in the probe are all that we have programmed.

Created on Sep 15, 2014 3:06:13 PM by Greg Campion [Paessler Support]

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root@prtgprobe:/home/pro/PythonMiniProbe# bash install.sh This script will guide you to install the PythonMiniProbe installing python-dev and build-essentials Correct python version! Starting to install the miniprobe and requirements Traceback (most recent call last): File "setup.py", line 26, in <module> from setuptools import setup, find_packages ImportError: No module named setuptools

I'm getting this Error when trying to install the probe. What am i doing wrong? ^^

Created on Sep 4, 2015 1:27:56 PM

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0

Can you run

sudo pip install setuptools

...and see if it works then?

Created on Sep 7, 2015 6:26:42 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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The requirements state that a Debian OS must be used. Looking through the files on GitHub, these are all Python scripts. What would be required to use this on a RedHat installation?

Created on Oct 12, 2016 6:22:10 PM

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It should run on RedHat out of the box, given that Python is installed as described in the readme of the mini probe. However, it has only been tested on Debian, so your mileage may vary :)

Created on Oct 13, 2016 7:47:38 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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i've got a lot of linux systems i'd like to monitor with the miniprobe and i'd like to have them all under one main folder, however prtg tells me that the different objects cant be moved since the are "fix". any possibility / workaround

Created on Jan 19, 2017 12:48:45 PM

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No, probes are always on the same level as the local probe and therefore cannot be moved.

Created on Jan 19, 2017 1:11:06 PM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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how group linux systems then? if i do "add device" under a mini probe it is only looking at the probe itself, even it allows me to add a device with different name / ip ?

Created on Jan 19, 2017 1:22:12 PM

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I'm not sure what you mean - you don't necessarily need mini probes for monitoring linux hosts. If your PRTG server can reach them, you can also add them directly to the local probe (as a device).

Created on Jan 19, 2017 1:26:13 PM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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yes but there i am not able to use the linux update sensor. is there an other way to monitor linux updates (standard debian installs)?

Created on Jan 19, 2017 1:31:16 PM

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Hm, not without a custom script you need to come up with. From what I know it simply checks and parses apt-get -u upgrade...

Created on Jan 19, 2017 1:34:06 PM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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are there any ambitions from paessler on getting (standard) things like this for linux systems working from the normal probes?

read: will i be able to monitor my apt / yum status from from windows probes in the future?

Created on Jan 19, 2017 2:41:24 PM

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There are currently no plans for a native sensor outside our mini probes, I'm afraid.

Created on Jan 23, 2017 9:30:13 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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I am not familiar with linux and trying to get the probe working on a Raspberry PI 3 running Raspbian Pixel. I am getting error: Installed distribution pyasn1 0.1.7 conflicts with requirement pyasn1>=0.2.3. When I run sudo apt-get install python-pyasn1 it tells me it's at the latest version. How do I update pyasn1 to be compatible with PRTG Mini Probe?

Created on May 12, 2017 10:20:03 AM

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I have also tried sudo pip install pyasn1 and that states Requirement already satisfied: pyasn1 in /usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages

Created on May 12, 2017 10:21:14 AM

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0

Hi there,

Could you issue the following command on your pi: pip install -Iv pyasn1==0.2.3

Does that do the trick?

Regards,
Stephan Linke, Paessler Tech Support

Created on May 12, 2017 11:00:11 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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That worked perfectly thanks Stephan :-) I had issues with sudo python setup.py configure. It would work but wouldn't save the inputs for key and PRTG server into the probe.conf file. I edited the file manually and saved the settings and all is working great! I notice their is no auto discovery option for the mini probe? Is that by design? Makes setting up SNMP for devices labour intensive as we need to add each sensor and item manually.

Created on May 13, 2017 6:26:48 AM

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0

Hi there,

Yeah, the probe doesn't have an auto discovery feature as far as I'm concerned.
I agree that it's somewhat more work then :/

Regards,
Stephan Linke, Paessler Tech Support

Created on May 15, 2017 7:02:58 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

Last change on May 15, 2017 7:03:28 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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i'am not able to start the setup.py following error:

This script will guide you to install the PythonMiniProbe
installing python-dev and build-essentials
Installing PIP!
Starting to install the miniprobe and requirements
  File "setup.py", line 36
    with open(path, 'r') as file:
            ^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax

There is an error in line 36,

Can you please help me?

I'm trying to install it on Raspberry3 using Debian Jessie

Thanks

Created on Jul 25, 2017 7:42:57 AM

Last change on Jul 25, 2017 8:28:41 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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0

Hi there,

With what line did you try to start/setup the probe? Like, which command showed that error?

Kind regards,
Stephan Linke, Tech Support Team

Created on Jul 25, 2017 8:29:10 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

Last change on Jul 25, 2017 8:29:36 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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0

Hello Stephan,

i'am logged in as normal user as example pi, then to become root:

sudo su
then the following commands:
root: cd PythonMiniProbe/
root: python setup.py install

/home/pi/PythonMiniProbe# sudo python setup.py install
  File "setup.py", line 36
    with open(path, 'r') as file:
            ^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax

...then the srcipts ends, the same for: bash install.sh

Best regards,
Stefan

Created on Jul 25, 2017 8:51:14 AM

Last change on Jul 25, 2017 10:04:16 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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0

Hi Stefan,

Could you try to get the installer script again from the github repo and make sure it's the same?

Kind regards,
Stephan Linke, Tech Support Team

Created on Jul 25, 2017 10:05:04 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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0

I tried within this way:

remove the repo folder with:
rm -r /home/pi/PythonMiniProbe
Copy the actual git repository:
git clone https://github.com/PaesslerAG/PythonMiniProbe
change to folder within the downloaded files:
cd /home/pi/PythonMiniProbe
bash install.sh

Same error ... tried to user setup.py, same error ...

Created on Jul 25, 2017 10:30:05 AM

Last change on Jul 25, 2017 10:38:26 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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0

I'll ping the developer, maybe he has an idea :)

Created on Jul 25, 2017 10:38:38 AM by Stephan Linke [Paessler Support]

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tronixinside, it would be nice to know what version of python you are running. You can run "python --version" to get that information.

Created on Aug 15, 2017 7:36:34 AM by Torsten Lindner [Paessler Support]

Last change on Aug 15, 2017 7:37:00 AM by Torsten Lindner [Paessler Support]

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How many this Mini Probes can support one Core Server? Limits are the same? 30?

Created on Nov 12, 2018 7:16:25 PM

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Dear Vasiliy, thank you for the KB-Post. Yes, please use the same recommendation for mini Probes as for normal Remote Probes.

Created on Nov 13, 2018 8:36:10 AM by Torsten Lindner [Paessler Support]

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the Python miniprobe still works with current PRTG (18.4.45) yet the github project state is a bit sad with 3 unanswered PR and no activity since one year. Is Paessler still interested ? I ask because I could do a PR for it but if it is wasted time anyway I'd prefer not bother.

Created on Nov 15, 2018 10:34:16 AM

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gpfr, to be honest, work's been halted on the mini probes for the time being.

Created on Nov 15, 2018 12:08:32 PM by Torsten Lindner [Paessler Support]

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Hi everyBody, Sometines needing to have this update for work :)

pip install pysnmp

Regards. HiBou Team :)

Created on Mar 21, 2019 3:19:26 PM

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The documentation states this - Name the target directory with the unzipped files PythonMiniProbe

It does not state where to put the directory Is it "/" directory or "/apps" ?

Created on Jun 6, 2022 7:47:27 PM

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Hello,

Thank you for your message.

Please note that the Python Mini Probe is not maintained since years and therefore we do not provide support for it.

I invite you to have a look at the pyprobe instead, available here: https://gitlab.com/paessler-labs/prtg-pyprobe. You will find all the information you need there. Please, note that the later is provided as is and not officially supported.

At the moment, our development team is also working on a new official probe call multi-platform probe, which can runs on multiple Linux distributions and devices. The latter is in Alpha version and therefore is not feature complete yet, but our developers will continue to add more sensors and feature to it.

Here is the corresponding KB article if you want to have a look and give it a try: https://kb.paessler.com/en/topic/90140-what-is-the-multi-platform-probe-and-how-can-i-use-it

Regards.

Created on Jun 9, 2022 1:49:53 PM by Florian Lesage [Paessler Support]

Last change on Jun 9, 2022 1:51:39 PM by Florian Lesage [Paessler Support]

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Hi team,

Would it be possible to be informed as soon as the new release of the multi-platform probe is available?

Thanks.

David

Created on Jul 5, 2022 2:48:46 PM

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Hi David,

When the new probe will be released (in stable version), we will definitely share it via out newsletter, release notes, blog post, etc. However, note that this most likely won't happen before next year as there is quite some work left (mostly regarding the sensors).

In the meantime, you can already check what we improved/added to the probe within the release notes.

Best, Florian

Created on Jul 6, 2022 10:32:20 AM by Florian Lesage [Paessler Support]

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