I just got a server set up and running that was initially just a test of CentOS7. However after testing it out as a way to backup critical information from the rest of the network I believe I want to keep it where it is. But it seams a waste to have it ONLY back up files. I installed a webserver and was messing with that when I got the idea to use it to monitor my network.

My network is small. Talking about two windows boxes, a linux box running geebox and two laptops: one running linux one running windows. That is only 5 pc's (not counting the server) that I would be monitoring. It would be nice to know, at a glance, what the HD space on my girlfriends pc is (she never deletes anything) or what the current temp on my gaming rig is (when the filters clog it is prone to overheat).

I looked at nagios and it seamed... heavy handed for what I am attempting.

Any advice or suggestions on a network monitor that I can install on my server?

Not exactly what you want, but try 'arpwatch' to keep an eye on your network, and then 'logwatch' to email you reports every day.
Logwatch can be modified to include almost anything. See this post here : http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...-malarky-2308/

The thing to watch out for with monitoring software using a web interface is that they are a handy vector to all of your systems...think attack surface for hackers. Not much chance for your setup, but you never know.

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Not the direction I was headed but I will definitely give it a look cause you are right about the security angle. Still, I could restrict access to it to internal then ssh in to see it remotely

Exactly!


You want all sorts of "system health" checks and software suites like Centreon, Icinga, Munin, Nagios, Pandora, Shinken, Zabbix, etc, etc were built exactly for that. Don't think of them as "heavy handed" but regard them as Swiss Army knives: they're versatile and extensible enough to do what you want and more (including monitoring a kitchensink) or less (just enable what checks you need). Now I won't say that stuff like Nagios is easy as the process of getting to understand its documentation itself has connotations of perverse initiation rites but then again it's not like building a Space Shuttle from a 10M pcs kit :-]

OTOH if you enjoy writing stuff yourself: most of what you want can be exposed via SNMP, so just "walk" the OIDs you need, put the values in a database and write some triggers that email alerts. Soon you'll be wanting a web-based interface, plugins for executing local checks and then it would be time to visit them Swiss Army knives again...

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Thank you unSpawn. I am going to be looking at all those this morning.