
                           The Minotaur user manual
                                       
Gilles Lamiral

   v0.4, 17 Mars 2000
     _________________________________________________________________
   
   This document describes the Minotaur user interface. 
     _________________________________________________________________
   
1. Links

   Minotaur Home Page and online demonstration available at
   http://www.linux-france.org/prj/minotaure/
   
   A local instance may be minotaur.cgi.
   
   Any question can be requested on the mon mailing-list. Simply mail
   your question or suggestion to: mailto:mon@linux.kernel.org
   
   MON homepage is http://www.kernel.org/software/mon
   
2. Principles

   Minotaur is a web client for MON, a monitoring tool written by Jim
   Trocki.
   
   The MON software is a general scheduler executing periodic tests on a
   set of services and triggers alarms when a problem occurs.
   
   The scheduler can be consulted upon a simple textual protocol on a
   predefined port.
   
   The web interface is based on this protocol. The CGI script (Common
   Gateway Interface) consults the scheduler and presents the results on
   a HTML way. By concern for efficiency, simplicity, compatibility and
   stability, the java, javascript, frame and other web avatars are not
   used.
   
   To understand the web interface, you need to think about the following
   hierarchy:
   
     * The scheduler supervises groups.
     * Groups are made up with items. Generally, those items are just
       internet or intranet hosts.
     * Those items can be hosts presented by their name or their IP
       address, or everything else, directories for example.
     * Upon each group of items, the scheduler supervises one or more
       services. Each service is tested with a software called a monitor.
     * For each service, the scheduler can trigger one or more alarms
       when something goes wrong.
       
3. General presentation

   Everything is on the same page. There are five tables called Infos,
   Status, CrossView, Historic and Preferences.
   
   The page title displays the Mon server contacted, followed by the
   port, the date and time on this server.
   
   The top of the page shows the Mon server contacted, the date and time
   on this server.
   
   A link bar upon each table allows you to surf from one table to
   another or read this documentation.
   
   The infos table is just a place where the minotaur administrator may
   add useful information for you (links to other pages etc.).
   
   The status table presents the different states of services.
   
   The cross view table is used to present the status table in a very
   different way. The Minotaur administrator may have change this name to
   ``Aliases'' or ``Clients'' or anything else.
   
   The historic table is the historic of alerts.
   
   The preference table is always present at the bottom of the page. This
   table is used to set your preferences and login information.
   
4. The preference table

   [INLINE]
   
   CAPTION:
   The preferences table
   
   With the refresh pop-up you select the time refresh time of the whole
   page.
   
   With the language pop-up you select the user interface language.
   
   With the check-boxes named Infos, Status, Historic, Cross View, you
   select the tables you want to see.
   
   You can login with the User and Password text-fields. It may allow you
   to perform special action like enabling and disabling host or
   services.
   
5. The status table

   [INLINE]
   
   CAPTION: The status table
   
   The host column.
          This column contains the list of all hosts. The disabled hosts
          are selected. You can select or deselect some hosts.
          
   The ``group'' column.
          The group column just names the group.
          
   The ``Members'' column.
          The members column contains the group host lists, one in each
          cell, one for each ``group'' column cell.
          
   The ``Service'' column.
          The service column just names the services. There can be
          several services for each group. The checkbox button allow you
          to change the state of the service. If the service is enabled
          then it will be disabled, if the service is disabled il will be
          enabled.
          
   The ``Last at'' and ``Next in'' column.
          The ``Last at'' column tells you when the last test was done.
          The ``Next in'' column tells you the waiting time untill the
          next test. The chackbox button allow you to perform a test
          right now. You will not see the result immediatly because the
          test can take some time to end. Reloading the page a few
          seconds later is often enough.
          
   The ``Status'' column.
          The status column gives the service status, one cell for each
          service. If the tests were good then you see the string
          "succeeded" alone. Else, you see the string "failed" followed
          by an summary information, typically the host that failed the
          tests.
          
   Behevior.
          When a service is red or blue, the group is upped at the top of
          the table. The sort order is red, then blue. With this feature,
          you just have to look at the top part of the table. If you
          select an automatic refresh and the url minotaur.cgi#status
          then the view is always pertinent. You can put this url on a
          big screen and get worried only if red color happens.
          
   Color legend.
          
          + When everything is good the services are not colored.
          + When a service is ``down'' the service and its group are red.
            The up-brother services (in the same group) are green.
          + When a service is not yet tested, at the Mon reset or
            starting, it is yellow.
          + When a service is disabled (none alarm is triggered), it is
            blue.
          + The sorting rule to present the groups is : red, blue,
            yellow, alphanumeric.
          + The sorting rule to present services in a group is : red,
            blue, yellow, alphanumeric.
            
6. The Cross View table

   [INLINE]
   
   CAPTION: The aliases table, without selection
   
   By default, the cross view table lists the aliases in the first column
   but does not detail each alias.
   
   [INLINE]
   
   CAPTION: The aliases table, with one selection
   
   To see the alias details, just select it in the List column and click
   on a submit button. You can do a multiple selection.
   
   [INLINE]
   
   CAPTION: The full aliases table
   
   To see all the aliases, just select the all radio button and click on
   a submit button.
   
7. The historic table

   [INLINE]
   
   CAPTION: The historic table
   
   In red, the alerts. In green, the up-alerts and the start-alerts.
   
   You choose the number of line you want to see with the No column
   text-field. You filter the last happened events with the Filter
   pop-up. The last alerts within the interval are displayed with a
   broken blank background. You can filter with the date. You can filter
   which services or groups you wan to see. All those criteria are used
   with a ``logical and''.
   
8. License

   I put this documentation under the
   http://www.opencontent.org/opl.shtml license. This means this document
   is given without any warranty. You can use it, redistribute it, modify
   it, by respecting the following conditions: You have to clearly
   specify the nature and the content of the modifications, their date
   and keep the opencontent license in case of redistribution. If you
   sell it, you sell the medium, not the content. This is a summary, read
   the license to get more details.
