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1 Zabbix definitions

Overview

In this section you can learn the meaning of some terms commonly used in Zabbix.

Definitions

host

- a networked device that you want to monitor, with IP/DNS.

host group

- a logical grouping of hosts; it may contain hosts and templates. Hosts and templates within a host group are not in any way linked to each other. Host groups are used when assigning access rights to hosts for different user groups.

item

- a particular piece of data that you want to receive off of a host, a metric of data.

trigger

- a logical expression that defines a problem threshold and is used to "evaluate" data received in items

When received data are above the threshold, triggers go from 'Ok' into a 'Problem' state. When received data are below the threshold, triggers stay in/return to an 'Ok' state.

event

- a single occurrence of something that deserves attention such as a trigger changing state or a discovery/agent auto-registration taking place

action

- a predefined means of reacting to an event.

An action consists of operations (e.g. sending a notification) and conditions (when the operation is carried out)

escalation

- a custom scenario for executing operations within an action; a sequence of sending notifications/executing remote commands

media

- a means of delivering notifications; delivery channel

notification

- a message about some event sent to a user via the chosen media channel

remote command

- a pre-defined command that is automatically executed on a monitored host upon some condition

template

- a set of entities (items, triggers, graphs, screens, applications, low-level discovery rules, web scenarios) ready to be applied to one or several hosts

The job of templates is to speed up the deployment of monitoring tasks on a host; also to make it easier to apply mass changes to monitoring tasks. Templates are linked directly to individual hosts.

application

- a grouping of items in a logical group

web scenario

- one or several HTTP requests to check the availability of a web site

frontend

- the web interface provided with Zabbix

dashboard

- section of the web interface displaying summaries and visualisations of important information in visual blocks.

Zabbix API

- Zabbix API allows you to use the JSON RPC protocol to create, update and fetch Zabbix objects (like hosts, items, graphs and others) or perform any other custom tasks

Zabbix server

- a central process of Zabbix software that performs monitoring, interacts with Zabbix proxies and agents, calculates triggers, sends notifications; a central repository of data

Zabbix agent

- a process deployed on monitoring targets to actively monitor local resources and applications

Zabbix proxy

- a process that may collect data on behalf of Zabbix server, taking some processing load off of the server

node

- a full Zabbix server configured as an element within a hierarchy of distributed monitoring; it is responsible for monitoring its own location

network discovery

- automated discovery of network devices.

low-level discovery

- automated discovery of low-level entities on a particular device (e.g. file systems, network interfaces, etc).

low-level discovery rule

- set of definitions for automated discovery of low-level entities on a device.

item prototype

- a metric with certain parameters as variables, ready for low-level discovery. After low-level discovery the variables are automatically substituted with the real discovered parameters and the metric automatically starts gathering data.

trigger prototype

- a trigger with certain parameters as variables, ready for low-level discovery. After low-level discovery the variables are automatically substituted with the real discovered parameters and the trigger automatically starts evaluating data.

graph prototype

- a graph with certain parameters as variables, ready for low-level discovery. After low-level discovery the variables are automatically substituted with the real discovered parameters and the graph automatically starts displaying data.

agent auto-registration

- automated process whereby a Zabbix agent itself is registered as a host and started to monitor.