MRTG Front-End Options

The simplest (and oldest) is indexmaker, which is included in the stock MRTG distribution. Indexmaker simply scans the MRTG configuration file and writes a single Web page that lists monitored variables with human-readable names. Although this is useful for a small number of systems, it is unwieldy for more than about a dozen data stores, since there is very little visual differentiation between each link.

Another option is BBMRTG, which integrates into Big Brother, an event monitoring system. Where MRTG provides baselines and service metrics, Big Brother provides event logging and notification, and is often used in parallel with MRTG to detect outages. For sites already using Big Brother, this is an excellent method for integrating the data streams, but BBMRTG is not of general use as it does not stand alone.

To provide a more general interface, 14all (pronounced "one for all") was created, which runs as a CGI script and provides a more flexible view of the data. In fact, it completely sidesteps the MRTG-created files and makes its own, allowing much more flexibility. Newer versions of 14all use the RRDTool file format; thus, it is no longer as useful if you need to keep using the old text format.

Another program, MRTG Viewer, is also a standalone front-end. It is an impressively detailed front-end, and includes CGI scripts to ping or traceroute to down hosts, as well as collecting statistics on the times that the link was unreachable. However, it needs PostgreSQL installed, so that it can store certain statistics. Although MRTG Viewer is an excellent tool, it is not trivial to install into an already configured MRTG deployment, and requires another system service to maintain.

Finally, there is the Ops Control Panel (or OCP), the subject of this article.