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My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com)
Linux.com covers one
sysadmin's favorite tools, including OpenSSH, ps, netstat, lsof, vmstat,
iostat, Pine, ping, traceroute and tcpdump. "There are, of course,
many more tools that I need. As was mentioned in the original My Sysadmin
Toolbox article, vim is a must have. Also dmesg, uptime, netcat, nmap, and
even the who and last commands are all deserving of a spot in the
toolbox."
(Log in to post comments)
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 28, 2005 22:58 UTC (Wed) by dreadnought (subscriber, #27222) [Link] As a sys admin I've had a pretty good time with the following: ssl-explorer, rsync, wget, partimage, openldap, "openssl s_client -connect server:443".
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 28, 2005 23:28 UTC (Wed) by ncm (subscriber, #165) [Link] I don't know from openldap or ssl-explorer, but I'd suggest curl over wget. Maybe that's just me, but curl seems more carefully designed and pleasant to use.
What I'd find most helpful is a way to snoop on SSL connections I've opened myself. Hmm, googling "sniff ssl traffic" reveals ssldump, which seems to be exactly what I needed.
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 29, 2005 1:53 UTC (Thu) by sholdowa (guest, #34811) [Link] This is a great toolbox if you consider that the prime function of asysadmin is firefighting! Personally, I don't, so my main tools are things like Big Brother ( Sean's wonderful creation at http://www.bb4.org ), and Tobias's MRTG ( http://mrtg.org ). With them, I can monitor just about anything on my systems, and I also let the systems tell me when there's a problem, rather than reacting to user driven events. This way, you can provide a proactive, rather than reactive service, which users tent to prefer!
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 29, 2005 2:15 UTC (Thu) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link] actually you need both.
if you can't troubleshoot the system then you probably don't know enough to be able to setup good monitoring (or to be able to do something useful when your monitoring tells you something is happening)
in fact, without having a good understanding of troubleshooting, you probably don't have a really good handle on what you need to monitor (or for that matter, what you _can_ monitor)
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 29, 2005 11:53 UTC (Thu) by cpm (guest, #3554) [Link] I used Big Brother years ago, It's very nice. However, it's licensingis something less than friendly, in fact, it's almost uncivil.
So, I've been using big sister for a while now, and am pretty pleased
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 29, 2005 19:03 UTC (Thu) by sholdowa (guest, #34811) [Link] I pointed to the 'Better than Free' version of Big Brother that Sean originally created. Those licensing terms are pretty good - ie if you're monitoring your own servers, then go ahead!
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 29, 2005 19:50 UTC (Thu) by cpm (guest, #3554) [Link] I dunno, I've never read the license that way.
The way I read the license;
"Simply put, if Big Brother is helping you or someone else (in the case of outsourcing) make money then you'll need to get a commercial license."
Sean likes this license, and that's great, it's good software, and
But the moment any coin changes hands, this license ceases.
I use computers at work, and I need to monitor networks at work,
The gpl works for me.
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 29, 2005 20:46 UTC (Thu) by sholdowa (guest, #34811) [Link] Hmmm... now that you've pointed that out, I see that the old 'btf' license no longer exists. My mistake. Not too sure what kind of licensing is necessary though, as you can only use this for 30 days, and then you must buy a commercial license. This, of course, is not available, which forces you to upgrade to a multi-thousand dollar solution!
I'll be joining you soon, big sister!
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 29, 2005 16:35 UTC (Thu) by JohnBell (guest, #12625) [Link] I'm a big fan of Nagios, myself...
My sysadmin toolbox (Linux.com) Posted Dec 30, 2005 17:02 UTC (Fri) by AJWM (guest, #15888) [Link] Personally I prefer "w" to either "uptime" or "who" -- it combines both and extends the latter. Easier to type, too ;-) Of course that's just part of what I'd consider basic essentials (along with ps, ping, and even ls and tail), stuff you just can't do without.
Since nearly all the Linux boxes I get paid to sysadmin (vs the motley collection I have at home) are Proliants, my favorite tools have to include the iLO (integrated lights-out) processor -- which is hardware rather than software but lets me monitor the hardware health, and even power cycle the boxes, from home -- and the related software (Proliant Support Pack). I imagine other server-grade hardware has something similar.
Two other biggies: Google, to search for obscure error messages or conditions; and the source - which really does help in understanding why something is behaving the way it is.
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