SNMP on Ubuntu 11.04

Introduction

SNMP is the Simple Network Management Protocol. You’ll find it on the more expensive routers, switches, and gadgets. It can allow you to keep an eye on various machines with tools like Nagios and Cacti. Watch for spikes of network activity, see how much memory is used in a day’s time, or do some customization and compare spams to hams.

A workstation can be watched, too. And that’s what I hope to show here.

I’m assuming you have a Dapper or Feisty release of Ubuntu, or something similar. This isn’t an involved project, it’s just hard to find a basic installation technique in one place. It’s hoped for this to be your starting point with SNMP, not an ending point.

Installing the software

root@ibsen:~# sudo apt-get install snmpd
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree      
Reading state information... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
  libmpich1.0gf libdc1394-22 genisoimage linux-headers-2.6.27-7 libgfortran2 dvd+rw-tools linux-headers-2.6.27-7-generic libcarp-clan-perl libxml-xql-perl libparse-yapp-perl
  rdate python-xml localechooser-data gcc-4.2-base libimage-size-perl libdebconfclient0 libvisual-0.4-0 libmyth-python perlmagick libvisual-0.4-plugins libavdevice52
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them.
The following extra packages will be installed:
  libperl5.10 libsensors3 libsnmp-base libsnmp15
Suggested packages:
  lm-sensors
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  libperl5.10 libsensors3 libsnmp-base libsnmp15 snmpd
0 upgraded, 5 newly installed, 0 to remove and 3 not upgraded.
Need to get 2463kB of archives.
After this operation, 7987kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]?

answer y

2. Configuration

backup existing /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf configuration file to /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf.org

cp /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf  /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf.org

Create a new /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf file:

rocommunity  public
syslocation  "Gedung Analisis, Datacentre- UPT Puskom"
syscontact   septa@polinela.ac.id

Uncheck comment

agentAddress udp:161,udp6:[::1]:161

Make snmpd use the newly created file and make it listen to all interfaces:

Edit /etc/default/snmpd

Change from:

# snmpd options (use syslog, close stdin/out/err).
SNMPDOPTS='-Lsd -Lf /dev/null -u snmp -I -smux -p /var/run/snmpd.pid 127.0.0.1'

To:

# snmpd options (use syslog, close stdin/out/err).
#SNMPDOPTS='-Lsd -Lf /dev/null -u snmp -I -smux -p /var/run/snmpd.pid 127.0.0.1'
SNMPDOPTS='-Lsd -Lf /dev/null -u snmp -I -smux -p /var/run/snmpd.pid -c /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf'

and restart snmpd

/etc/init.d/snmpd restart

3. Test

Do a snmpwalk from another host against your newly configured host.

[root@op5 ~]  snmpwalk -c public -v1 192.168.1.12 | less
SNMPv2-MIB::sysDescr.0 = STRING: Linux ibsen 2.6.27-9-generic #1 SMP Thu Nov 20 21:57:00 UTC 2008 i686
SNMPv2-MIB::sysObjectID.0 = OID: NET-SNMP-MIB::netSnmpAgentOIDs.10
DISMAN-EVENT-MIB::sysUpTimeInstance = Timeticks: (68869) 0:11:28.69
SNMPv2-MIB::sysContact.0 = STRING: septa@polinela.ac.id
SNMPv2-MIB::sysORLastChange.0 = Timeticks: (1) 0:00:00.01
SNMPv2-MIB::sysORID.1 = OID: SNMP-FRAMEWORK-MIB::snmpFrameworkMIBCompliance
SNMPv2-MIB::sysORID.2 = OID: SNMP-MPD-MIB::snmpMPDCompliance
SNMPv2-MIB::sysORID.3 = OID: SNMP-USER-BASED-SM-MIB::usmMIBCompliance
SNMPv2-MIB::sysORID.4 = OID: SNMPv2-MIB::snmpMIB
SNMPv2-MIB::sysORID.5 = OID: TCP-MIB::tcpMIB
SNMPv2-MIB::sysORID.6 = OID: IP-MIB::ip

Yes it works!!