Systems crash unexpectedly, users make bizarre claims about how the Internet is slow, and managers request statistics that leave you scratching your head wondering how to collect them in a way that’s meaningful and doesn’t consign you to the headache of hitting Refresh and spending half the day writing down numbers on a piece of scratch paper just to get a baseline for a report.
The answer to all these challenges (and many, many more) lies in systems monitoring — effectively monitoring the serv- ers and applications in your environment by collecting sta- tistics and/or checking for error conditions so you can act or report effectively when needed.
To build an effective systems monitoring solution, the true starting point is understanding the fundamental concepts. You have to know what monitoring is before you can set up what monitoring does. For that reason, this book introduces you to the underpinnings of monitoring techniques, theory, and philosophy, as well as the ways in which systems moni- toring is accomplished.
Oh, and please note that at no point do I discuss specific soft- ware. At the end of the day, ping is still just ping, no matter how pretty a wrapper you put around it.