Modifying Big Brother's Behavior

Option

Description

BBSLEEP

The interval, in seconds,  to wait before recreating the main Big Brother HTML pages: bb.html and bb2.html.

Option

Description

RUNOPTS

Runtime options:

ENABLE_DISABLE:  Allow enable/disable message types.

DATAMSG: Allow data message type.

NOTESMSG: Allow notes message type.

DONTCLEANSTRING: Allow `$;|&\ characters in a status log. You can change the affected characters with CLEANCHARS.

EMBEDHTML: Keep HTML in incoming status logs.

CONVERTHTML: Change < and > to &lt and &gt in incoming status logs.

NOTAMP: If DONTCLEANSTRING is not defined, allow the & character.

DEBUG: Create a trace log for debugging

PERF: Save incoming trending data

TRAP: Accept incoming SNMP traps

SAVE_IN_DB: Save data in a database (also needs etc/bbdb.cfg to be configured)

AVE_IN_FILES: Save data in flat files (default)

USEDB:  Use the data in a database for processing (implies SAVE_IN_DB)

USEFILES: Use the data from the flat files (implies SAVE_IN_FILE and is default value)

CLEANCHARS

List the characters which should be removed from incoming status logs as long as DONTCLEANSTRING is not set in RUNOPTS.

BBWEBHOST

The http://some.host.com portion of your Big Brother installation URL. Add the port number if you use a non-standard port for your web server: http://some.host.com:8080.

The format of BBWEBHOST must match the FQDN setting, which usually means it should be a fully-qualified domain name.

BBWEB

The directory path of the URL of your Big Brother installation. It is used with the BBWEBHOST variable to create the complete URL of your Big Brother installation.

CGIBINURL

URL location of the cgi-bin directory used by Big Brother. This value can be changed to a global cgi-bin directory. If you do change it, please copy the Big Brother cgi-bin programs to that directory.

BBLOGSTATUS

If BBLOGSTATUS=STATIC, status logs are converted immediately into HTML pages. If BBLOGSTATUS is set to DYNAMIC, the status logs are rendered into HTML only when you click a colored dot. This is useful when you have many hosts and want to minimize the resources used by the BBDISPLAY server.

WEBHISTORY

Determines if the historical view of a status log is to be as an HTML page or a simple text page.

SAVESTATUSLOG

If this is TRUE, each color change for a status log will be saved so it will be possible to view its previous log contents.

PURPLEDELAY

The delay, in minutes, before a status log is declared outdated. If a status log hasn't been updated after PURPLEDELAY minutes, the status log will change to a purple dot. This in turn may generate a notification depending on the value of PAGELEVELS.

BBREPWARN

The percentage at which the reporting feature returns red or yellow.  Reporting returns green for 100% availability, yellow if less than 100% and greater than BBREPWARN, and red below BBREPWARN.

BBNETTHREADS

The number of concurrent tests the BBNET server can execute. You can increase the value until you notice a degradation in system and Big Brother resources. A thread is based on a bb-hosts host line.

BBNETSVCS

The valid TCP-based protocol tests supported by Big Brother. They must be the exact spelling as found in the bb-hosts file.  Any new network TCP-based protocol test to be handled by Big Brother must be present here.

PINGTESTS

The number of packets to send during the connectivity test.

PINGWARN

How many failed ping tests are needed to turn yellow; if all ping tests fail the test returns red.

PINGSLEEPFCT

Sets the sleep factor between ping tests.

NOPINGCLEAR

Set to TRUE to have clear dots displayed for hosts with the noping directive in etc/bb-hosts as well as hosts with IP address 0.0.0.0 (DHCP hosts or hosts accessed only with the full name).  You can use the noconn directive in conjunction with NOPINGCLEAR to select which hosts you do not want a clear dot for.

LYNX

The command to use to test https (secure) Web pages. Be sure to enter the correct path for your installation.

NONETPAGE

The network services, if any, which should not cause a notification if the test fails. List the services exactly as they are listed in the etc/bb-hosts file.

BBHIST_IGNOREBLUE

 Set to TRUE to have Big Brother reporting ignore maintenance time when compiling statistics.

IPTEST_2_CLEAR_ON_FAILED_CONN

When set to TRUE, if both the connectivity test and another network test for the same host fail, set that host's status to clear. You can turn off this setting individually by test by using the ~ modifier for a test in etc/bb-hosts. For example, if this is TRUE and a host line in bb-hosts is:

123.123.123.123.host1 # ~ftp

If both the connectivity test to 123.123.123.123 and the FTP test fail (very likely), the status for both tests will display as red. If there was no tilde (~) before the FTP test, the status for both tests would display as clear.

This parameter has an effect only if the basic connectivity is enabled.

SUMMARY_SET_BKG

Set to TRUE if you want the summary dots to be considered when determining the background color for the Big Brother Web page display. Set it to anything else if you don't want summary dots to affect the background color.

BBHISTEXT

Enter the name(s) of script(s) to execute when bb-hist.sh runs. The scripts must be located in BBHOME/ext/hist. These scripts can add site-specific display information.

BBMKBBEXT

Enter the name(s) of script(s) to execute at the end of mkbb. The scripts must be located in BBHOME/ext/mkbb. These scripts can add site-specific functionality to the bb.html page.

BBMKBB2EXT

Enter the name(s) of script(s) to execute at the end of mkbb2. The scripts must be located in BBHOME/ext/mkbb. These scripts can add site-specific functionality to the bb2.html page.

CONNTEST

Set to FALSE if you do not want Big Brother to perform the standard connectivity test (the ping test). This is usually done when the fping.sh/fping.pl external script is used.

BBHOSTHISTLOG

Set to TRUE to keep historical data for each host in a separate file. If you are not interested in historical data, set both this and BBALLHISTLOG to FALSE.

BBALLHISTLOG

Set to TRUE to keep historical data for all hosts in a single file. If you are not interested in historical data, set both this and BBHOSTHISTLOG to FALSE.

WML_OUTPUT

Set to true to turn on WAP-enabled display.

MULTIOPTS

Settings related to multi-location feature (received same named status log from more than one location)

PROPAGATE_MULTI_RESULT

Send the "merged" status log to other BBDISPLAYs/BBPAGERs

BBCURRDISP

Name of the top-level display zone when using the display zones feature.

WMLMAXCHARS

If WML_OUTPUT Is TRUE, use this to set the size of the bb.wml and bb2.wml pages.

BBNETTIMER1
BBNETTIMER2
BBNETTIMER3

These parameters set the timeout values BBNET uses.

Option

Description

DOCPU
DOMSGS
DOPROCS
DODISK

To disable any of the test performed by the client, set the appropriate one of these parameters to FALSE.

NOCPUCOLOR
NOMSGSCOLOR
NODISKCOLOR
NOPROCSCOLOR

For any disabled client test, you can set the color the client will report using the appropriate one of these parameters. Set it to the color you want, or to null ("") if you do not want any message sent to the BBDISPLAY.

If you do not use one of these parameters, a disabled test reports clear status.

DFWARN

The disk test will return yellow status if the disk is more than this percent full. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-dftab file instead.

DFPANIC

The disk test will return red status if the disk is more than this percent full. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-dftab file instead.

CPUWARN

The CPU test will return yellow status if the load average for the CPU, multiplied by 100, is higher than this. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-cputab file instead.

CPUPANIC

The CPU test will return red status if the load average for the CPU, multiplied by 100, is higher than this. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-cputab file instead.

DISPREALLOADAVG

Set to TRUE to display  the load average in its original format (not stripped of its decimal point). By default, the load average is multiplied by 100 before display.

PROCS

List the processes which should generate a yellow condition when they are not running. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-proctab file instead.

PAGEPROC

List the processes which should generate a yellow condition if they are not running. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-proctab file instead.

MSGS

List the keywords you want Big Brother to look for in the system log; words listed here will cause a yellow status report. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-msgstab file instead.

PAGEMSGS

List the keywords you want Big Brother to look for in the system log; words listed here will cause a red status report. This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-msgstab file instead.

IGNMSGS

List messages which should not cause a yellow or red status, even if they include one of the keywords Big Brother is looking for. Separate multiple messages with semi-colons (;). This parameter is included for compatibility with prior releases: use the etc/bb-msgstab file instead.

MSGEXPIRE

Enter the number of minutes yellow and red conditions should last. Enter the number of minutes for yellow conditions, a colon (:), and the number of minutes for red conditions. For example, 30:60 means yellow conditions expire after 30 minutes and red after 60.

CHKMSGLEN

Set to TRUE to have the message test check for zero-length files.

YELLOW MSGLINES

Set to the number of yellow status message entries that the message test should return.

REDMSGSLINES

Set to the number of red status message entries that the message test should return.

OLDSTYLEBBMSGS

Set to TRUE to have the message file test not expire old messages (this was the behavior in Big Brother before the 1.6d version). Leave FALSE (the default) to have messages expire after the time set in MSGEXPIRE.

BBTOOMANYDAYSUP

If you want to be notified after a host has been up for a certain number of days, use this to set the number of days.

WARNMINSONREBOOT

The status set by WARNCOLORONREBOOT will be reported for this many minutes after the host is rebooted. This must be less than 60 minutes.

WARNCOLORONREBOOT

Enter either RED or YELLOW. This determines the status reported after a reboot.

Option

Description

BBACKS

The directory where acknowledgement toggle files are located.

BBDISABLED

The directory where the enable/disable feature toggle files are located.

BBHIST

The directory where raw historical data is saved.

BBHISTLOGS

The directory where the historical status logs are saved.

BBLOGS

The directory where incoming status logs are saved.

BBDATA

The directory where files for data messages are saved.

BBSKIN

Subdirectory of the www directory to use for files controlling the appearance of the Big Brother display.

Option

Description

BBDFTAB

Path to the bb-dftab file.

BBCPUTAB

Path to the bb-cputab file.

BBPROCTAB

Path to the bb-proctab file.

BBMSGSTAB

Path to the bb-msgstab file.