Install problems with 1.8.2

[Kerrygeek]

I've been trying to help a friend install 1.8.2 on Fedora 12, he's not really a Linux user so I've tried to talk him through the whole install process. Configure and Make both went fine, we copied the files into the /var/www/html/zabbix directory, etc. but when he points his browser to localhost/zabbix all he gets is a listing of the Zabbix directory. If he points it at http://localhost he sees the Apache page so we know the web server is running.

I've skipped over a lot of details of the install but I even set it up on my workstation to follow along with him. I don't have access to the box, just to him on the phone. Does anybody have any idea when the browser would only show a directory listing instead of rendering a web page for Zabbix?

Thanks,
Kerry

[Aly]

I assume PHP is installed?

[craigwelsh]

What happens if he manually clicks on index.php?

It does sound as if php isn't installed correctly for it not to display.

I am just about to upgrade one of my Fedora 12 installs from pre 1.8.2 to the final release but I ticked "Webserver" and "development" during the OS install ("what is this system going to be used for?") and didn't have any problems with php apart from a couple of modules like php-xml.

The following may be useful as its what I used on a 64bit system:

Fedora 12 Zabbix Server

== Compile and Install binaries ==

=== Prerequisites ===

* Mysql database support
yum install mysql-devel mysql-administrator mysql-server

* Jabber support
yum install iksemel-devel

* SNMP support
yum install net-snmp-devel

* SSH Testing
yum install libssh2-devel

* IPMI
yum install ipmitool
yum install OpenIPMI-devel

* Simple Ping Test
yum install fping

All of these devel packages add the main package and others as dependencies as required. mysql-administrator and ipmitool aren't strictly required but are incredibly useful.

=== Configure ===

./configure --prefix=/usr/local/zabbix_1.8.2 --enable-server --enable-agent \
--enable-ipv6 --with-mysql --with-jabber --with-libcurl --with-net-snmp \
--with-ssh2 --with-ldap --with-openipmi

=== Install ===

make install

== Database ==

/etc/init.d/mysqld start
chkconfig mysqld on

Set db root user password:
/usr/bin/mysqladmin -u root -h HOSTNAME password 'password'

You can then use the mysql admin tool to create a zabbix db user.

Then:
/usr/bin/mysql -u root -p
create database zabbix character set utf8;
exit;

give all permissions on the zabbix db to the zabbix db user via mysql administrator

cd create/schema
cat mysql.sql | mysql -u zabbix -p zabbix

cd ../data
cat data.sql | mysql -u zabbix -p zabbix
cat images_mysql.sql | mysql -u zabbix -p zabbix

== Config files ==

Config files reside in /etc directory
mkdir /etc/zabbix

Copy the example files
cp misc/conf/zabbix_agentd.conf /etc/zabbix/
cp misc/conf/zabbix_server.conf /etc/zabbix/

cp misc/init.d/fedora/core5/zabbix_server /etc/init.d/
cp misc/init.d/fedora/core5/zabbix_agentd /etc/init.d/

== Web Frontend ==

cp frontends/php /var/www/html/
mv /var/www/html/php /var/www/html/zabbix

/etc/init.d/httpd start
chkconfig httpd on

Now you can browse to the zabbix webpage.

=== Prerequisites ===

vi /etc/php.ini
Change the following:
date.timezone = "Europe/London"
memory_limit = 256M
post_max_size = 32M
max_execution_time = 600
max_input_time = 600
upload_max_filesize = 16M

yum install php-bcmath php-mbstring php-gd php-xml

/etc/init.d/httpd restart

=== Database ===

add details of your zabbix DB and the correct zabbix DB user

=== Config file ===

Download the given conf file into the correct location
cp /tmp/zabbix.conf.php /var/www/html/zabbix/conf/

Frontend should now be installed and you will be shown the login prompt

Default details:
user Admin
password zabbix

[Kerrygeek]

Thanks for your help guys, he was getting pretty frustrated (he's never used Linux before) and wiped out Fedora and installed CentOS before I got back to him. I found the install_zabbix.sh script and told him to try that since he had a fresh CentOS install and it worked perfectly. I had to talk him through installing and starting mysql but after that it worked great. Now he just has to figure out how to configure his machines, he's also never used SNMP so I imagine we'll spend more time on the phone. It would be easier if I had access to the box but he couldn't open up the router.

Thanks again for your help, he's running now so I guess that's what counts. And, he's learning some Linux in the process.

Kerry

[chimwana]

Installation Guide

Hie,
I'm another newbie in Linux. I'm planning to install zabbix on fedora 10. Would someone send me the how to guide to successfully install zabix 1.8 and add my windows machines and switches as hosts. I had a very unpleasant experience last time I tried installing another monitor software and I failed Miserably. You can send the guide to [email protected]
Thanks in advance.
Chimwana

[Kerrygeek]

Use the instructions craigwelsh posted, above, and the documentation in the online manual and you'll do fine. I don't think the manual mentions a few things like copying the php files to the /var/www/html/zabbix/ directory but it is close. Also, you can use this site:
http://www.zabbix.com/wiki/howto/ins.../centosinstall
for more instructions. This is probably the best set of instructions I've seen, it's more complete than the manual.

Good luck, I've been using it for over a year now and it works great. On your Windows client, you'll either need to use the agent or just do like I do, monitor it with SNMP. You can ping it for up/down tests, then use SNMP to check for bandwidth on each interface and cpu utilization.

If you have problems, search the forum, you're probably not the first!

Good Luck,
Kerry

[georgew]

install_zabbix.sh not so great if system is not clean

I tried the install_zabbix.sh script on a new Centos 5.5 server. The server was not 100% virgin, which created a problem with the install script. Before I ran the script, I read it, and it looked reasonable. However in retrospect I would have preferred not to have run it.

To be fair, I did use i to install 1.8.4, rather than the 1.8.3 it was designed for... That probably contributed to the issues I saw.

Things I don't like about the script:

>It installs some system components that are different than the standard centos yum packages. The difference is they are more current versions, however it also means that you can't expect to keep up to date with Yum any longer, those components now must be updated by hand. For a personal server that is fine, but for a production server it means more hand-patching to keep the system up to date.

>It modifies your yum configuration each time it is run, even if it was already modified in a previous failed run.

>Specifically it tells yum not to update PHP. PHP is one of the most frequently hacked packages, needing frequent updates to be safe. Turning off PHP updates is going to seriously hurt if the system is expected to be put on the Internet.

>It does not clean up after itself.

>It corrupted my /usr/local/share/zabbix/conf/zabbix.conf.php file by dropping all of the "$DB" strings, and some other vital parts of that file.

It DID make the installation of zabbix faster, however it took an experienced linux expert to correct problems introduced by the script.

I think the script is an excellent tool, and probably works well if your system is EXACTLY like the target system it was designed for. However it is in an alpha state, and does not have sufficient exception handling to make it reliable. I think the author did a reasonably good job writing the script, but it needs more work before inexperienced users should feel safe in running it.

If your server does not touch the Internet, and you don't expect to use yum to keep php up to date, this script is probably a great time saver (as long as it doesn't scramble zabbix.conf.php).


George