trapper poller and agent

[ghislain]

hi,

It seems zabbix spawn a certain number of process when it start but does not increase them if the load requires it. I was trying to tune them but i have really no idea which does what. All i have in the docs is that trapper are process that trap, poller process that poll etc.. so i need a little help .

When zabbix agent active is used does they connect to the trapper process or to the poller processes ? Does the trapper proces are only used for trapper item type ?

To be short it would be kind if anyone can enlighten me on which process is used for what exactly so tuning the numbers would be easier.




StartDiscoverers seems obvious ok
StartHTTPPollers seems obvious ok
StartIPMIPollers seems obvious ok
StartPingers seems obvious ok
StartPollersUnreachable seems obvious ok

StartPollers there it is used to poll but , snmp, agent , agent active , all ?
StartTrappers only for trapper agent type items ?

thanks for your help.



As a side note it would be very cool to be able to have a debug level filtered by host or by process (like postfix you can increase debugging for a domain only and this is awesome, on large install with more that 50 hosts debuglevel4 is simply unreadable).

[ghislain]

still not able to figure out

anyone have an idea for that ?

[richlv]

regarding improved debugging, feel free to vote on https://support.zabbix.com/browse/ZBXNEXT-136

zabbix trappers are used for all incoming connections - active agents, zabbix_sender, proxies...

[vinny]

Hi Richards,
Isn't it possible to write down a description of the interaction flow/processes, between Zabbix master, proxies, agents, etc etc ?
Like a Visio schema

vinny

[richlv]

well.. it's probably possible, but who's doing that and what should it contain ?
also, visio is proprietary

[bashman]

Hi richlv,

I'm trying to tune StartPollers and StartTrappers.

If you say that:

zabbix trappers are used for all incoming connections - active agents, zabbix_sender, proxies...

StartTrappers most be at least equal to StartPollers.

1. Do the pollers open all the outgoing connections?.
2. Do the trappers listen for all the incoming connections?.
3. If you only have agents without any trapper item defined, do you need to define StartTrappers?.
4. Does a connection keep open for the agent to response when the polls opens a new connection?.
5. If you have a high StartPollers value, do you need a high StartTrappers value?.

[richlv]

StartTrappers most be at least equal to StartPollers.

not sure why would that be

1. Do the pollers open all the outgoing connections?.
2. Do the trappers listen for all the incoming connections?.

pretty much yes. well, there are also discoverers, pingers...

3. If you only have agents without any trapper item defined, do you need to define StartTrappers?.

as i mentioned, starttrappers are used for all kinds of incoming connections. if you need any, you need trappers. trapper items is just a subset of things starttrappers handle

4. Does a connection keep open for the agent to response when the polls opens a new connection?.

didn't understand the question

5. If you have a high StartPollers value, do you need a high StartTrappers value?.

no, these are not directly connected

[bashman]

Hi richlv, thanks for your response.

So trappers are used not only for item type trapper, but for any other incoming connection.

I have tuned MySQL, Apache and front-end already. Take a look at my zabbix_server.conf tuning, all values are default values, except from these:

StartPollers=30
StartIPMIPollers=1
StartTrappers=10
StartPingers=10
StartDiscoverers=0
StartHTTPPollers=5
CacheSize=128M
UnreachablePeriod=60
UnavailableDelay=120
UnreachableDelay=60

Zabbix server is running	Yes	 -
Number of hosts (monitored/not monitored/templates)	553	410 / 17 / 126
Number of items (monitored/disabled/not supported)	8409	6653 / 1730 / 26
Number of triggers (enabled/disabled)[problem/unknown/ok]	4876	3952 / 924  [80 / 60 / 3812]
Number of users (online)	26	5
Required server performance, new values per second	54.58	-

Average online users are 7.

Zabbix queue performance has improved due to the upgrade version to 1.8.3 from 1.8.2.

What do you think of my zabbix_server tune?.

[richlv]

hrm, i wouldn't want to give any specific performance advice, as that requires careful examination of the environment.
i'll just note that cache size most likely is too large - monitor configuration cache usage with internal item and see what the actual usage is

[bashman]

Right, I see, but what's CacheSize parameter for?, Isn't it to cache new values from incoming connections?.

[richlv]

Right, I see, but what's CacheSize parameter for?, Isn't it to cache new values from incoming connections?.

http://www.zabbix.com/documentation/.../zabbix_server

[bashman]

Ok, thanks.

So really it isn't only to cache new values for incoming connections, but to cache host as well.

I understand that If you have a large number of hosts and a high new values per second ratio, you need a high CacheSize value.

There is no memory space problem in my host.

Can a high Server Timeout penalize Zabbix queue performance?.

What I noticed in Zabbix v1.8.2 is a penalize Zabbix queue performance due to a high online users value.

[richlv]

So really it isn't only to cache new values for incoming connections, but to cache host as well.

I understand that If you have a large number of hosts and a high new values per second ratio, you need a high CacheSize value.

no !
you didn't look at config params like TrendCacheSize, HistoryCacheSize and HistoryTextCacheSize

Can a high Server Timeout penalize Zabbix queue performance?.

yes, if some hosts will be slow to respond they will tie up pollers

[bashman]

Thanks richlv for your help, with all this info I'll have no problem to tune my zabbix_server.conf.

[navinkumarrt]

Hey guys

From last 3 days I am frequently facing
"Problem: Zabbix server - Zabbix trapper processes more than 75% busy"
nd because of this complex server get down until restart of Zabbix service on the server.

I already tried https://www.zabbix.com/forum/zabbix-...e-than-75-busy