3 collectd.conf - Configuration for the system statistics collection daemon B<collectd>
7 BaseDir "/path/to/data/"
8 PIDFile "/path/to/pidfile/collectd.pid"
9 Server "123.123.123.123" 12345
22 This config file controls how the system statistics collection daemon
23 B<collectd> behaves. The most significant option is B<LoadPlugin>, which
24 controls which plugins to load. These plugins ultimately define collectd's
27 The syntax of this config file is similar to the config file of the famos
28 B<Apache Webserver>. Each line containes either a key-value-pair or a
29 section-start or -end. Empty lines and everything after the hash-symbol `#' is
30 ignored. Values are either string, enclosed in double-quotes,
31 (floating-point-)numbers or a boolean extression, i.E<nbsp>e. either B<true> or
32 B<false>. String containing of only alphanumeric characters and underscores do
33 not need to be quoted.
39 =item B<BaseDir> I<Directory>
41 Sets the base directory. This is the directory beneath all RRD-files are
42 created. Possibly more subdirectories are created. This is also the working
43 directory for the daemon.
45 =item B<LoadPlugin> I<Plugin>
47 Loads the plugin I<Plugin>. There must be at least one such line or B<collectd>
48 will be mostly useless. The names of the plugins are listed in L<collectd(1)>.
50 =item B<PIDFile> I<File>
52 Sets where to write the PID file to. This file is overwritten when it exists
53 and deleted when the program ist stopped. Some init-scripts might override this
54 setting using the B<-P> commandline option.
56 =item B<Interval> I<Seconds>
58 Configures the interval in which to query the read plugins. Obviously smaller
59 values lead to a higher system load produces by collectd, while higher values
60 lead to more coarse statistics.
62 =item B<ReadThreads> I<Num>
64 Number of threads to start for reading plugins. The default value if B<5>, but
65 you may want to increase this if you have more than five plugins that take a
66 long time to read. Mostly those are plugin that do network-IO. Setting this to
67 a value higher than the number of plugins you've loaded is totally useless.
73 Some Plugins may register own options. These options must be inclosed in a
74 C<Plugin>-Section. Which options exist depends on the plugin used:
76 =head2 Plugin C<apache>
78 To configure the C<apache>-plugin you first need to configure the Apache
79 webserver correctly. The Apache-plugin C<mod_status> needs to be loaded and
80 working and the C<ExtendedStatus> directive needs to be B<enabled>. You can use
81 the following snipped to base your Apache config upon:
84 <IfModule mod_status.c>
85 <Location /mod_status>
86 SetHandler server-status
90 Since it's C<mod_status> module is very similar to Apache's, B<lighttpd> is
91 also supported. It introduces a new field, called C<BusyServers>, to count the
92 number of currently connected clients. This field is also supported.
94 The following options are accepted by the C<apache>-plugin:
98 =item B<URL> I<http://host/mod_status?auto>
100 Sets the URL of the C<mod_status> output. This needs to be the output generated
101 by C<ExtendedStatus on> and it needs to be the machine readable output
102 generated by appending the C<?auto> argument.
104 =item B<User> I<Username>
106 Optional user name needed for authentication.
108 =item B<Password> I<Password>
110 Optional password needed for authentication.
112 =item B<CACert> I<File>
114 File that holds one or more SSL certificates. If you want to use HTTPS you will
115 possibly need this option. What CA certificates come bundeled with C<libcurl>
116 and are checked by default depends on the distribution you use.
120 =head2 Plugin C<apcups>
124 =item B<Host> I<Hostname>
126 Hostname of the host running B<apcupsd>. Defaults to B<localhost>. Please note
127 that IPv6 support has been disabled unless someone can confirm or decline that
128 B<apcupsd> can handle it.
130 =item B<Port> I<Port>
132 TCP-Port to connect to. Defaults to B<3551>.
140 =item B<DataDir> I<Directory>
142 Set the directory to store RRD-files under. Per default RRD-files are generated
143 beneath the daemon's working directory, i.E<nbsp>e. the B<BaseDir>.
151 =item B<Device> I<Device>
153 Select partitions based on the devicename.
155 =item B<MountPoint> I<Directory>
157 Select partitions based on the mountpoint.
159 =item B<FSType> I<FSType>
161 Select partitions based on the filesystem type.
163 =item B<IgnoreSelected> I<true>|I<false>
165 Invert the selection: If set to true, all partitions B<except> the ones that
166 match any one of the criteria are collected. By default only selected
167 partitions are collected if a selection is made. If no selection is conifured
168 at all, B<all> partitions are selected.
176 =item B<Interface> I<Interface>
178 The dns plugin uses B<libpcap> to capture dns traffic and analyses it. This
179 option sets the interface that should be used. If this option is not set, or
180 set to "any", the plugin will try to get packets from B<all> interfaces. This
181 may not work on certain platforms, such as MacE<nbsp>OSE<nbsp>X.
183 =item B<IgnoreSource> I<IP-address>
185 Ignore packets that originate from this address.
189 =head2 Plugin C<email>
193 =item B<SocketGroup> I<Group>
195 If running as root change the group of the UNIX-socket after it has been
196 created. Defaults to B<collectd>.
198 =item B<SocketPerms> I<Permissions>
200 Change the file permissions of the UNIX-socket after it has been created. The
201 permissions must be given as a numeric, octal value as you would pass to
202 L<chmod(1)>. Defaults to B<0770>.
204 =item B<MaxConns> I<Number>
206 Sets the maximum number of connections that can be handled in parallel. Since
207 this many threads will be started immediately setting this to a very high
208 value will waste valuable resources. Defaults to B<5> and will be forced to be
209 at most B<16384> to prevent typos and dumb mistakes.
213 =head2 Plugin C<hddtemp>
217 =item B<Host> I<Hostname>
219 Hostname to connect to. Defaults to B<127.0.0.1>.
221 =item B<Port> I<Port>
223 TCP-Port to connect to. Defaults to B<7634>.
227 =head2 Plugin C<interface>
231 =item B<Interface> I<Interface>
233 Select this interface. By default these interfaces will then be collected. For
234 a more detailed description see B<IgnoreSelected> below.
236 =item B<IgnoreSelected> I<true>|I<false>
238 If no configuration if given, the B<traffic>-plugin will collect data from
239 all interfaces. This may not be practical, especially for loopback- and
240 similar interfaces. Thus, you can use the B<Interface>-option to pick the
241 interfaces you're interested in. Sometimes, however, it's easier/prefered
242 to collect all interfaces I<except> a few ones. This option enables you to
243 do that: By setting B<IgnoreSelected> to I<true> the effect of
244 B<Interface> is inversed: All selected interfaces are ignored and all
245 other interfaces are collected.
249 =head2 Plugin C<iptables>
253 =item B<Chain> I<Table> I<Chain> [I<Comment|Number> [I<Name>]]
255 Select the rules to count. If only I<Table> and I<Chain> are given, this plugin
256 will collect the counters of all rules which have a comment-match. The comment
257 is then used as type-instance.
259 If I<Comment> or I<Number> is given, only the rule with the matching comment or
260 the I<n>th rule will be collected. Again, the comment (or the number) will be
261 used as the type-instance.
263 If I<Name> is supplied, it will be used as the type-instance instead of the
264 comment or the number.
274 Select this irq. By default these irqs will then be collected. For a more
275 detailed description see B<IgnoreSelected> below.
277 =item B<IgnoreSelected> I<true>|I<false>
279 If no configuration if given, the B<irq>-plugin will collect data from all
280 irqs. This may not be practical, especially if no interrupts happen. Thus, you
281 can use the B<Irq>-option to pick the interupt you're interested in.
282 Sometimes, however, it's easier/prefered to collect all interupts I<except> a
283 few ones. This option enables you to do that: By setting B<IgnoreSelected> to
284 I<true> the effect of B<Irq> is inversed: All selected interupts are ignored
285 and all other interupts are collected.
289 =head2 Plugin C<logfile>
293 =item B<LogLevel> B<debug|info|notice|warning|err>
295 Sets the log-level. If, for example, set to B<notice>, then all events with
296 severity B<notice>, B<warning>, or B<err> will be written to the logfile.
298 =item B<File> I<File>
300 Sets the file to write log messages to. The special strings B<stdout> and
301 B<stderr> can be used to write to the standard output and standard error
302 channels, respectively. This, of course, only makes much sense when collectd is
303 running in foreground- or non-daemon-mode.
307 =head2 Plugin C<mbmon>
311 =item B<Host> I<Hostname>
313 Hostname to connect to. Defaults to B<127.0.0.1>.
315 =item B<Port> I<Port>
317 TCP-Port to connect to. Defaults to B<411>.
321 =head2 Plugin C<mysql>
325 =item B<Host> I<Hostname>
327 Hostname of the database server. Defaults to B<localhost>.
329 =item B<User> I<Username>
331 Username to use when connecting to the database.
333 =item B<Password> I<Password>
335 Password needed to log into the database.
337 =item B<Database> I<Database>
339 Select this database. Defaults to I<no database> which is a perfecly reasonable
340 option for what this plugin does.
344 =head2 Plugin C<network>
348 =item B<Listen> I<Host> [I<Port>]
350 =item B<Server> I<Host> [I<Port>]
352 The B<Server> statement sets the server to send datagrams B<to>. The statement
353 may occur multiple times to send each datagram to multiple destinations.
355 The B<Listen> statement sets the interfaces to bind to. When multiple
356 statements are found the daemon will bind to multiple interfaces.
358 The argument I<Host> may be a hostname, an IPv4 address or an IPv6 address. If
359 the argument is a multicast address the daemon will join that multicast group.
361 If no B<Listen> statement is found the server tries join both, the default IPv6
362 multicast group and the default IPv4 multicast group. If no B<Server> statement
363 is found the client will try to send data to the IPv6 multicast group first. If
364 that failes the client will try the IPv4 multicast group.
366 The default IPv6 multicast group is C<ff18::efc0:4a42>. The default IPv4
367 multicast group is C<239.192.74.66>.
369 The optional I<Port> argument sets the port to use. It can either be given
370 using a numeric port number or a service name. If the argument is omited the
371 default port B<25826> is assumed.
373 =item B<TimeToLive> I<1-255>
375 Set the time-to-live of sent packets. This applies to all, unicast and
376 multicast, and IPv4 and IPv6 packets. The default is to not change this value.
377 That means that multicast packets will be sent with a TTL of C<1> (one) on most
380 =item B<Forward> I<true|false>
382 If set to I<true>, write packets that were received via the network plugin to
383 the sending sockets. This should only be activated when the B<Listen>- and
384 B<Server>-statements differ. Otherwise packets may be send multiple times to
385 the same multicast group. While this results in more network traffic than
386 neccessary it's not a huge problem since the plugin has a duplicate detection,
387 so the values will not loop.
389 =item B<CacheFlush> I<Seconds>
391 For each host/plugin/type combination the C<network plugin> caches the time of
392 the last value being sent or received. Every I<Seconds> seconds the plugin
393 searches and removes all entries that are older than I<Seconds> seconds, thus
394 freeing the unused memory again. Since this process is somewhat expensive and
395 normally doesn't do much, this value should not be too small. The default is
396 1800 seconds, but setting this to 86400 seconds (one day) will not do much harm
401 =head2 Plugin C<ntpd>
405 =item B<Host> I<Hostname>
407 Hostname of the host running B<ntpd>. Defaults to B<localhost>.
409 =item B<Port> I<Port>
411 UDP-Port to connect to. Defaults to B<123>.
415 =head2 Plugin C<ping>
419 =item B<Host> I<IP-address>
421 Host to ping periodically. This option may be repeated several times to ping
424 =item B<TTL> I<0-255>
426 Sets the Time-To-Live of generated ICMP packets.
430 =head2 Plugin C<processes>
434 =item B<Process> I<Name>
436 Select more detailed statistics of processes matching this name. The statistics
437 collected for these selected processes are size of the resident segment size
438 (RSS), user- and system-time used, number of processes and number of threads,
439 and minor and major pagefaults.
443 =head2 Plugin C<rrdtool>
445 You can use the settings B<StepSize>, B<HeartBeat>, B<RRARows>, and B<XFF> to
446 finetune your RRD-files. Please read L<rrdcreate(1)> if you encounter problems
447 using these settings. If you don't want to dive into the depths of RRDTool, you
448 can savely ignore these settings.
452 =item B<DataDir> I<Directory>
454 Set the directory to store CSV-files under. Per default CSV-files are generated
455 beneath the daemon's working directory, i.E<nbsp>e. the B<BaseDir>.
457 =item B<StepSize> I<Seconds>
459 Sets the stepsize of newly created RRD-files. Ideally (and per default) this
460 setting is identical to the global B<Interval>-option and should not be
461 smaller. If unsure, don't set this option.
463 =item B<HeartBeat> I<Seconds>
465 Sets the heartbeat of newly created RRD-files. Ideally this setting is bigger
466 than the B<Interval>-setting, by default it's twice the B<Interval>-setting. If
467 unsure, don't set this option.
469 =item B<RRARows> I<NumRows>
471 The C<rrdtool plugin> calculates the number of PDPs per CDP based on the
472 B<StepSize>, this setting and a timespan. This plugin creates RRD-files with
473 three times five RRAs, i. e. five RRAs with the CFs B<MIN>, B<AVERAGE>, and
474 B<MAX>. The five RRAs are optimized for graphs covering one hour, one day, one
475 week, one month, and one year.
477 So for each timespan, it calculates how many PDPs need to be consolidated into
478 one CDP by calculating:
479 number of PDPs = timespan / (stepsize * rrarows)
481 Bottom line is, set this no smaller than the width of you graphs in pixels. The
484 =item B<XFF> I<Factor>
486 Set the "XFiles Factor". The default is 0.1. If unsure, don't set this option.
488 =item B<CacheFlush> I<Seconds>
490 When the C<rrdtool plugin> uses a cache (by setting B<CacheTimeout>, see below)
491 it writes all values for a certain RRD-file if the oldest value is older than
492 (or equal to) the number of seconds specified. If some RRD-file is not updated
493 anymore for some reason (the computer was shut down, the network is broken,
494 etc.) some values may still be in the cache. If B<CacheFlush> is set, then the
495 entire cache is searched for entries older than B<CacheTimeout> seconds and
496 written to disk every I<Seconds> seconds. Since this is kind of expensive and
497 does nothing under normal circumstances, this value should not be too small.
498 900 seconds might be a good value, though setting this to 7200 seconds doesn't
499 normally do much harm either.
501 =item B<CacheTimeout> I<Seconds>
503 If this option is set to a value greater than zero, the C<rrdtool plugin> will
504 save values in a cache, as described above. Writing multiple values at once
505 reduces IO-operations and thus lessens the load produced by updating the files.
506 The tradeoff is that the graphs kind of "drag behind" and that more memory is
511 =head2 Plugin C<sensors>
515 =item B<Sensor> I<chip-bus-address/type-feature>
517 Selects the name of the sensor which you want to collect or ignore, depending
518 on the B<IgnoreSelected> below. For example, the option "B<Sensor>
519 I<it8712-isa-0290/voltage-in1>" will cause collectd to gather data for the
520 voltage sensor I<in1> of the I<it8712> on the isa bus at the address 0290.
522 =item B<IgnoreSelected> I<true>|I<false>
524 If no configuration if given, the B<sensors>-plugin will collect data from all
525 sensors. This may not be practical, especially for uninteresting sensors.
526 Thus, you can use the B<Sensor>-option to pick the sensors you're interested
527 in. Sometimes, however, it's easier/prefered to collect all sensors I<except> a
528 few ones. This option enables you to do that: By setting B<IgnoreSelected> to
529 I<true> the effect of B<Sensor> is inversed: All selected sensors are ignored
530 and all other sensors are collected.
534 =head2 Plugin C<syslog>
538 =item B<LogLevel> B<debug|info|notice|warning|err>
540 Sets the log-level. If, for example, set to B<notice>, then all events with
541 severity B<notice>, B<warning>, or B<err> will be submitted to the
546 =head2 Plugin C<unixsock>
550 =item B<SocketFile> I<Path>
552 Sets the socket-file which is to be created.
554 =item B<SocketGroup> I<Group>
556 If running as root change the group of the UNIX-socket after it has been
557 created. Defaults to B<collectd>.
559 =item B<SocketPerms> I<Permissions>
561 Change the file permissions of the UNIX-socket after it has been created. The
562 permissions must be given as a numeric, octal value as you would pass to
563 L<chmod(1)>. Defaults to B<0770>.
573 Florian Forster E<lt>octo@verplant.orgE<gt>