| 1 |
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> |
| 2 |
|
| 3 |
<!-- |
| 4 |
gettingstarted.shtml |
| 5 |
Created by tdb1 27/05/2001 |
| 6 |
Last edited 27/05/2001 |
| 7 |
--> |
| 8 |
|
| 9 |
<html> |
| 10 |
|
| 11 |
<head> |
| 12 |
<title>Getting Started with the i-scream Central Monitoring System</title> |
| 13 |
</head> |
| 14 |
|
| 15 |
<basefont face="arial,sans-serif" size="2"> |
| 16 |
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" link="#0000ff" alink="#3333cc" vlink="#3333cc" text="#000066"> |
| 17 |
|
| 18 |
<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="2"> |
| 19 |
<tr> |
| 20 |
<td valign="top"> |
| 21 |
<!--#include virtual="../left.inc" --> |
| 22 |
</td> |
| 23 |
<td valign="top"> |
| 24 |
<!--#include virtual="../title.inc" --> |
| 25 |
|
| 26 |
<font face="arial,sans-serif" size="2"> |
| 27 |
|
| 28 |
<h2>Getting Started with the i-scream Central Monitoring System</h2> |
| 29 |
|
| 30 |
<h3>1. Installing the corba services (pre-requisite for the server)</h3> |
| 31 |
<p>The server requires a CORBA Naming Service to run. It may be that you already |
| 32 |
have such a system running, in which case you can use that. Simply edit the |
| 33 |
jacorb.properties file to point to your Naming service. If you don't have a |
| 34 |
naming service running you could just set up your own manually, but if like us |
| 35 |
you want the easy approach, install our corba services program.</p> |
| 36 |
<p>This program runs the naming service and provides a builtin webserver to |
| 37 |
serve requests to the server application. The documentation details how to get |
| 38 |
this running. It should simply be a case of extracting and running.</p> |
| 39 |
<h3>1. Installing the server</h3> |
| 40 |
<p>The first stage is to download and install the server application. The |
| 41 |
latest versions of all i-scream applications can be found at the following |
| 42 |
URL:</p> |
| 43 |
<p><a href="http://www.i-scream.org/downloads">http://www.i-scream.org/downloads</a></p> |
| 44 |
<p>Once downloaded, the archive should be extracted to a directory of your |
| 45 |
choice. The server will run on most Java enabled platforms (including |
| 46 |
Windows, Linux and FreeBSD).</p> |
| 47 |
<p>The archive consists of only a few files and directories. The main file is |
| 48 |
the iscream-server.jar archive which contains all the binary code for the |
| 49 |
server. The lib directory contains other JAR archives which the server |
| 50 |
requires to run. The etc directory contains (or will contain) |
| 51 |
configuration for most of the i-scream central monitoring system. The next |
| 52 |
step is to configure the server to suit your requirements.</p> |
| 53 |
<h3>2. Configuring the server</h3> |
| 54 |
<p>The configuration is split into two main files. The first, |
| 55 |
default.properties can be considered a bootstrap configuration. This means |
| 56 |
that it provides basic configuration to get the server started, after |
| 57 |
which point the main configuration system takes over. This file should be |
| 58 |
checked through, and is pretty well explained by comments.</p> |
| 59 |
<p>The rest of the server configuration is based on system.conf. This can |
| 60 |
hold the entire system configuration, including hosts. It may also specify |
| 61 |
other configuration files to be included in the main configuration. This |
| 62 |
file is also commented extensively.</p> |
| 63 |
<p>This step may well take some time to get right, and you can come back to |
| 64 |
it at any point. Lots of the configuration can be changed "on the fly" |
| 65 |
as well.</p> |
| 66 |
<p>For fuller and complete details of the configuration system, and the |
| 67 |
server in general, please see the Server User Guide in the documentation |
| 68 |
section of the website.</p> |
| 69 |
<h3>2a. Setting up the database</h3> |
| 70 |
<p>The i-scream central monitoring system can make use of a database for |
| 71 |
generating historical reports. The documentation explains how you would |
| 72 |
configure the system to do this. You will need to create a single basic |
| 73 |
table yourself, this is also explained in the documentation.</p> |
| 74 |
<h3>3. Starting the server</h3> |
| 75 |
<p>Starting up the server is a trivial task. Usually you can just get away |
| 76 |
with running the run script provided. This will boot the server up |
| 77 |
displaying some basic information to the console. If something goes wrong, |
| 78 |
the error message should point to the cause.</p> |
| 79 |
<h3>4. Setting up hosts</h3> |
| 80 |
<p>Hosts can be run on either Unix (tested with Solaris, FreeBSD and some |
| 81 |
Linux distributions) or Windows. Both are equally easy to setup.</p> |
| 82 |
<p>Firstly, the Unix host is called "ihost". This can be downloaded from the |
| 83 |
i-scream website. Once extracted it just needs to be started up. You need two |
| 84 |
pieces of information to do this: the filtermanager (part of the server) host |
| 85 |
and port number. If you haven't changed much in terms of configuration this will |
| 86 |
be the machine the server is running on, and port 4567. To start ihost you |
| 87 |
simply type:</p> |
| 88 |
</font> |
| 89 |
<pre>ihost.pl server.domain.com port</pre> |
| 90 |
<font face="arial,sans-serif" size="2"> |
| 91 |
<p>ihost will then contact the server to obtain it's configuration and start |
| 92 |
sending information.</p> |
| 93 |
<p>The windows host, winhost, is very similar. All you need to do is install it |
| 94 |
using the provided installer in the download, and then edit the ini file to |
| 95 |
provide the two bits of information above. Running the application starts up |
| 96 |
communication with the server and data sending commences.</p> |
| 97 |
<p>Full details of both of these hosts can be found in the relevant |
| 98 |
documentation on the website.</p> |
| 99 |
<h3>5. Using Conient</h3> |
| 100 |
<p>Conient allows you to view, in real time, the data being sent by the |
| 101 |
hosts. This is a perfect way to test that all the above steps have |
| 102 |
successfully been completed.</p> |
| 103 |
<p>At present Conient is simply another archive which can be extracted and |
| 104 |
run. However, in the near future we hope to have an installer to make life |
| 105 |
easier. Conient is a Java application and will run on most Java enabled |
| 106 |
platforms.</p> |
| 107 |
<p>After extracting, the run script can be used to start Conient, or in some |
| 108 |
cases the JAR file can be executed manually. The GUI will then load. The |
| 109 |
configuration section requires you to enter a host and port for the |
| 110 |
server. By default this will be the machine on which the server is running |
| 111 |
and port 4510. Conient will then connect upon request and start displaying |
| 112 |
information.</p> |
| 113 |
<p>Assuming data is displayed you have successfully setup the i-scream |
| 114 |
central monitoring system. Well done!</p> |
| 115 |
<p>This is explained in much more detail in the Conient documentation.</p> |
| 116 |
<h3>6. Setting up DBReporter</h3> |
| 117 |
<p>If you are making use of a database you can setup the DBReporter to |
| 118 |
generate web-based reports of the information collected. This is just a |
| 119 |
case of extracting the archive to a suitable location, configuring it, and |
| 120 |
setting it to run on a regular basis (we suggest daily). DBReporter will |
| 121 |
also ensure the database is kept relatively clean.</p> |
| 122 |
<p>Full instructions are available in the DBReporter documentation.</p> |
| 123 |
<h3>7. Setting up the Web Interface</h3> |
| 124 |
<p>The Web interface allows you to view various aspects of the i-scream |
| 125 |
central monitoring system's output. These include realtime viewing of data |
| 126 |
(much like Conient), links to the DBReporter above, and full displaying of |
| 127 |
the alerts that can be generated by the server.</p> |
| 128 |
<p>The archive contains a series of PHP scripts which should be placed on |
| 129 |
your PHP enabled web server. The configuration files allow you to tailor |
| 130 |
the setup to suit your needs.</p> |
| 131 |
<p>Full instructions are available in the relevant documentation.</p> |
| 132 |
<h3>8. Further</h3> |
| 133 |
<p>You may decide to expand your setup to cover a larger network. For example, a |
| 134 |
distributed filter arrangement could cut down on the amount of traffic |
| 135 |
being sent around the network. The server itself can be distributed to suit your |
| 136 |
needs. You may wish to run the database section of the server on the same |
| 137 |
machine as the database, while running the rest on another machine.</p> |
| 138 |
<p>Some discussion about this is available in the server documentation.</p> |
| 139 |
<p>If you have any questions about any of the above, please don't hesitate to |
| 140 |
contact us at <a href="mailto:dev@i-scream.org">dev@i-scream.org</a>. If you find we've missed something out, |
| 141 |
again, please let us know.</p> |
| 142 |
<p>Finally, we'd like to thank you for trying this i-scream product. We realise |
| 143 |
that it's still at an early stage, and we therefore appreciate you taking |
| 144 |
the time to try it out.</p> |
| 145 |
<p>The i-scream team. |
| 146 |
|
| 147 |
</font> |
| 148 |
|
| 149 |
<!--#include virtual="../bottom.inc" --></td> |
| 150 |
</tr> |
| 151 |
</table> |
| 152 |
|
| 153 |
</body> |
| 154 |
</html> |
