NAME
pmie_check - administration of the Performance Co-Pilot
inference engine
SYNOPSIS
$PCP_BINADM_DIR/pmie_check [-NsV] [-c control]
DESCRIPTION
This shell script and associated control file may be used
to create a customized regime of administration and man
agement for the Performance Co-Pilot (see PCPintro(1))
inference engine, pmie(1).
pmie_check may be run at any time, and is intended to
check that the desired set of pmie(1) processes are run
ning, and if not to re-launch any failed inference
engines. Use of the -s option provides the reverse func
tionality, allowing the set of pmie processes to be
cleanly shutdown.
pmie_check is controlled by a PCP inference engine control
file that specifies the pmie instances to be managed. The
default control file is $PCP_VAR_DIR/config/pmie/control
(where $PCP_VAR_DIR is normally /var/pcp) but an alternate
may be specified using the -c option.
The control file should be customized according to the
following rules.
1. Lines beginning with a ``#'' are comments.
2. Lines beginning with a ``$'' are assumed to be
assignments to environment variables in the style
of sh(1), and all text following the ``$'' will be
eval'ed by the script reading the control file, and
the corresponding variable exported into the envi
ronment. This is particularly useful to set and
export variables into the environment of the admin
istrative script, e.g.
$ PMCD_CONNECT_TIMEOUT=20
Warning: The $PCP_VAR_DIR/config/pmie/control file
is a potential security risk if it is writable by
any user other than root.
3. There should be one line in the control file for
each pmie instance of the form:
host y|n logfile args
4. Fields within a line of the control file are sepa
rated by one or more spaces or tabs.
5. The first field is the name of the host that is the
default source of the performance metrics for this
pmie instance.
instance needs to be started under the control of
pmsocks(1) to connect to a pmcd through a firewall
(y or n). Note that pmsocks is part of the pcp
product distribution, rather than the pcp_eoe dis
tribution, and as such may not be installed on your
system. Refer to PCPintro (1) for full details.
8. The third field is the name of the pmie activity
log file. A useful convention is that pmie
instances monitoring the local host with hostname
myhost are maintained in the directory
$PCP_LOG_DIR/pmie/myhost, while activity logs for
the remote host mumble are maintained in
$PCP_LOG_DIR/pmie/mumble. This is consistent with
the way pmlogger(1) maintains its activity logs and
archive files.
9. All other fields are interpreted as arguments to be
passed to pmie(1). Most typically this would be
the -c option.
The following sample control lines specify one pmie
instance monitoring the local host (wobbly), and another
monitoring performance metrics from the host splat.
wobbly n $PCP_LOG_DIR/pmie/wobbly -c $PCP_VAR_DIR/config/pmie/config.default
splat n $PCP_LOG_DIR/pmie/splat -c $PCP_LOG_DIR/pmie/splat/cpu.conf
A typical crontab(5) entry for periodic execution of
pmie_check is given in $PCP_VAR_DIR/config/pmie/crontab
and shown below.
# every 30 minutes, check pmie instances are running
25,55 * * * * $PCP_BINADM_DIR/pmie_check
Alternate redirection of the output from the cron(1) exe
cution of the script may be controlled as follows:
(1) The -V option to the script will enable verbose trac
ing of their activity. By default the script gener
ates no output unless some error or warning condition
is encountered.
(2) To redirect the e-mail from cron(1) away from the root
login,
+ Instead of using the ``root'' login, create a spe
cial account with uid equal to 0, e.g. su_pcp. The
password may be locked and/or the shell invalid to
prevent login or su (1), but the home directory
should exist. For example the following entry in
/etc/passwd:
su_pcp:x:0:0:PCP Housekeeping:/usr/people/su_pcp:/dev/null
/usr/lib/aliases for su_pcp, redirecting the e-mail
to a real user or user(s).
+ Add the ``crontab'' entries above to the crontab
file for su_pcp not root, e.g. in the file
/usr/spool/cron/crontabs/su_pcp
The -N option enables a ``show me'' mode, where the
actions are echoed, but not executed, in the style of
``make -n''. Using -N in conjunction with -V maximizes
the diagnostic capabilities for debugging.
FILES
$PCP_VAR_DIR/config/pmie/control
the default PCP inference engine control file
Warning: this file is a potential security risk
if it is writable by any user other than root.
$PCP_VAR_DIR/config/pmie/crontab
sample crontab for automated script execution by
root
logfile.lock
transient lock file which is named using the
control-specified pmie logfile names, and is
used to guarantee mutual exclusion during
pmie_check execution - if present, can be safely
removed if pmie_check is not running
$PCP_LOG_DIR/NOTICES
PCP ``notices'' file used by pmie(1) and friends
PCP ENVIRONMENT
Environment variables with the prefix PCP_ are used to
parameterize the file and directory names used by PCP. On
each installation, the file /etc/pcp.conf contains the
local values for these variables. The $PCP_CONF variable
may be used to specify an alternative configuration file,
as described in pcp.conf(4).
SEE ALSO
chkconfig(1), cron(1), PCPintro(1), pmie(1) and
pmsocks(1).
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