You know what it is, but do you know SNMP protocol history?

There was a dark time, more than dark, sepia or beige, in short, that tone in which we find the photos of our grandparents inside the drawer of the oldest and worst decorated closet in our house. A time that is hardly talked about anymore, but that points us as a weapon so that we continue to keep it in our memories. Those were the times of bank robbers and speakers, old rolls, borsalino hats and cameras with lightbulbs, they smoked more, the police were still called “coppers” and toothpaste brands had not yet produced any flavored toothpaste, not even menthol. We go back that far to get to know more about SNMP protocol history.

In this house, Pandora FMS blog, we had already talked before about the relation of the SNMP protocol with the noir part of life. It was hard, few reported that case, but we got to the media, and they, from Newcastle Tribuna to the smallest local newspaper, have endlessly asked us to come back and delve into the subject. That is why we want to make a little review of SNMP protocol history, a story full of caramel nuances and fish bones, swimming pools on the outskirts and tombs in the desert, long and slender legs and hard knuckles like the piles of prelates or pontiffs.

Naaah, in fact, if we want to find out SNMP protocol history and its evolution throughout the years, we just have to go back a couple of decades, no more. In 1988, we started having some news for the first time about this famous protocol. The 80s, pal, a very hard time too, we don’t want to take away any of its prominence. Leg heaters, carded hair and Mustangs ruled. It was around this time that what we know as the first data networks began their journey. More and more “cooler” and more and more widespread around the world.

At that time, with an administrator it was enough for an “analog” or manual way to understand a whole network infrastructure of a company. You can guess the kind of network infrastructure that could exist in a company at that time… It was made up of scarce resources or equipment because the immeasurable variety of services that are provided today did not exist, nor users, nor anything similar.

It was not until more or less the arrival of the 2000s, time of Nokias with poly tones, the return of the bell bottoms and the consolidation of Britney Spears at the highest levels of the music scene charts, that computers, Big Daddy (Internet) and the rest of the technology reached the necessary parameters to accommodate things as far ahead of their time as the SNMP protocol.

The range of services and possibilities was that expanded thanks to convergent networks that we were finally able to handle all kinds of information and data, including voice and video. Infrastructures were expanded by force, and users began to flock like flies to honey. A failure in the system could no longer be accepted. The stakes were high.

That was the time for the proliferation of monitoring systems, yes, like Pandora FMS, owner and master of this blog and my skin. They were shown as essential gadgets for the tasks of technology departments of any company that wanted to stay safe from possible incidents and even anticipate them by detecting them in advance. Monitoring systems, servers, applications, networks, events and a long list of devices. Collecting information, just what we wanted to monitor, all to collect it and represent it visually, in order to carry out the necessary actions that our systems might require. What a monitoring progress!

Like coffee, a morning shower and the geek figures in the office, it is impossible to remove monitoring systems from the daily lives of network administrators, and most of these systems are based on the Simple Network Management Protocol, also known on the streets as the SNMP Protocol, which makes the exchange of management information between network devices easier and fills our lives with hope and management data.

And this is the thick and outrageous SNMP Protocol history. in fact, it has stayed with us for many years. From that first version to SNMPv3, so focused on security and administration… And for many years more old friend! I personally hope you see my grandchildren grow old and I see you get implemented in a crass, ineluctable and ad infinitum way!

Some of the sources used for this article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_Network_Management_Protocol

https://coreun.com/2020/07/08/la-monitorizacion-protocolo-snmp-y-su-evolucio

Do you know everything about Office 365 Monitoring?

Microsoft Office 365 Monitoring (Known as Office 365)

Pandora FMS is a proactive, advanced and flexible monitoring tool which is also easy-to-configure according to each business and their needs. It can be integrated into all the needs of servers, network computers and terminals. Besides, in a world where the cloud has taken more prominence, it can also monitor its services or computers.

In this article, we will focus on Office 365 monitoring from Pandora FMS using the module available in the Enterprise library.

https://pandorafms.com/library/pandora-office-365-monitoring/

What is Office 365?

Microsoft 365, also known as Office 365, is the tool conceived by the giant Microsoft that allows you to create, access and share documents online with different users in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote, among others. To that end, you only need to have access to the Internet and have OneDrive of course.

Microsoft 365 offers different packages, depending on the size of your company or the number of users who will make use of these services. In addition, users may choose between three types of packages: for private use, for businesses or for students or teachers. Each one has its own features (number of users, integrated programs, space…) and it is offered at different prices accordingly.

Microsoft 365 Health

Microsoft 365 provides a page to see the health of cloud services. You may take a look at the following url:

https://status.office365.com

You may observe the health status of the services in Microsoft 365

What we can see is that, on demand, we can find out in what state the services are, but by having Pandora FMS, we will be able to improve this overview and also have all of this information and generate alerts about the services that may be essential for the daily work or tasks of our company.

Microsoft 365 in Pandora FMS

In order to carry out Office 365 monitoring, what we need is to be able to see the services in our Pandora FMS WEB console, as exemplified in the following image:

To get that result, we are going to use the Enterprise library module . But first, let’s take a look at the requirements you need to meet to achieve our goal:

• In Pandora FMS Environment: The plugin server must be enabled, Python 3.8.
• In Microsoft 365: Read permissions are required for the o365 API.

• Know the following Authentication data: TenantID, ClientID, Secret

The plugin is designed to run as a server plugin but can be run on an agent using module_plugin with no issues at all.

Script Running

So that you can notice, very simply, how the script is executed, we are going to see an example of that, where we will execute its binary version with the following command:

pandora_o365 -c xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx -t xxxxxxxx-xxxxx-xxxx-xxxxx-xxxxxxxxx -s xxxxxxxxxxxxxx~xxxxxxxxxx~xx~xxxxx

When executing the script, if the ClientIT, TenantID and Secret values are correct, we will get the following response:

Finding out the status of the services from Pandora FMS

We already have Microsoft 365 service agents, to finish up this idea let’s look at a service on Microsoft 365 health page and what it looks like in Pandora FMS.

Microsoft 365 Health Page:

We clearly see that there is a service degradation.

Health in Pandora FMS:

We check and verify that, indeed, we have the same information and that with these texts it is very easy to define alerts on the status of the different services.

Log collection

If we have Pandora FMS Syslog Server feature enabled, we can save all the issues that take place in Microsoft 365. For this, just add the parameter -l in the execution of pandora_o365 module -c xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx -t xxxxxxxx-xxxxx-xxxx-xxxxx-xxxxxxxxx -s xxxxxxxxxxxxxx ~ xxxxxxxxxx ~ xx ~ xxxxx -l

That way you can save, very easily and with no issues at all, Microsoft 365 incidences in Pandora FMS.

That way, you may now proactively monitor all Microsoft 365 services. And we achieved our goal, Office 635 monitoring is ready to work!

Would you like to find out more about what Pandora FMS can offer you? Find out clicking here .

If you have to monitor more than 100 devices, you can also enjoy a FREE 30-day Pandora FMS Enterprise TRIAL. Installation in Cloud or On-Premise mode, you choose!! Get it here !

Last but not least, remember that if you have a reduced number of devices to monitor, you can use the Pandora FMS OpenSource version. Find more information here .

Do not hesitate to send us your questions. Pandora FMS team will be happy to help you!

And if you want to keep up with all our news and you like IT, releases and, of course, monitoring, we are waiting for you in our blog and in our different social media, from Linkedin to Twitter not forgetting of course Facebook . We even have a YouTube channel, and with the best storytellers.

What’s new in the latest Pandora FMS release, Pandora FMS 753

Let’s check out together the new features and improvements related to the newest Pandora FMS release: Pandora FMS 753.

NEW FEATURES AND IMPROVEMENTS

New integrations

New plugins have been added to the module library for integration with: Telegram, Google Chat, Discord, MSteams and Slack.

New event widget configuration fields

The possibility of using recursion within group filtering has been added; in addition to columns for groups and tags and the possibility of loading a saved event filter within the widget.

Retrieve selenium variable as new module

The possibility of generating new modules from the getValue variable within a WUX module with selenium has been added.

New media token in Availability Graph

A new token has been added to the Availability Graph to obtain the average result of both the selected modules and their associated failovers.

Improved report histogram

By means of this new item, it will be possible to see the status of the module within the configured parameters in a histogram table.

What are Walking Meetings and how can they help us?

I hope you are not tired of “trend” terms, the neologisms that multiply everywhere and the upstart concepts that you can’t seem to memorize that well because they always sound like something else. I actually hope you are not, because here it comes another one, fresh from the oven. Take note, because as soon as you learn about it, as it usually happens, it will start mysteriously proliferating around your acquaintances. Today, in our alien-green Pandora FMS blog, we talk about what Walking Meetings are.

What are Walking Meetings?

Walking Meetings, *drum rolls*, are nothing more than work meetings while you walk. Yes, instead of sitting in an expensive and comfortable desk chair you take a stroll. Therefore, if you work remotely, we recommend you to have a pretty big living room, otherwise, it won’t work, we guarantee…

One of the excuses that surround the concept for its immediate implementation is that it helps us alleviate the sedentary lifestyle of today’s jobs. And it is true that we are all fed up with those pounds we seem to be gaining afterwork, a concept with which I hope you are familiar with, because it is one of the few that truly succeeds today and it is worth it. Although, as for me, I would continue to call it “things got out of hand and I ended up having a hard time the next day at the office.”

Walking Meetings or “Walking while you talk to your boss“, in addition to lowering the volume of your stomach, would help you relax, set you in a good mood and foster a positive environment. The bad thing is that if you are immersed in teleworking and you no longer have data on your business cell phone, your walk would be limited to the place where you still have Wi-Fi connection. That is why it is better to have a big living room.

As we already knew from the famous peripatetic school, walking while talking encourages creativity and reasoning. It is not surprising then that Aristotle strolled around the gardens bordering the temple of Apollo, along with his disciples, to teach them while they did some exercise to digest lunch better.

I know that maybe you are more of an oval noble wood table, blazer and tie, cards and Power Point, seriousness and silence person, while someone explains the new ideas that will no doubt relaunch the company. But things are evolving and what is trending now are Walking Meetings, something like walking the dog but with your work colleagues and while someone assigns, by Skype or in strict presence, the tasks of the week. Sorry, boomer, the elevator pitch is more popular than the static monologues of seniors of the company remembering better times, back in the old days. Dynamism and fluidity, relaxation and conversation, pedestrian exercise and rhythm, cardio and walking, project solutions and original answers. That is what prevails nowadays. And we welcome it with open arms. I have already bought my sneakers for that purpose!

But Walking Meetings already existed

As it is often the case with these types of newly coined concepts, Walking Meetings already existed. There we also have freeganism, for example. Which is basically, for those of you who may not know, “the collection of food that has previously been thrown away or discarded because its expiration date is near or past.” That was already in motion since garbage existed, however now it has a striking name, which some may consider unnecessary, and different nuances, ranging from hipsterism to anti-consumerism.

With Walking Meetings it is the same thing happening again, there were already conversations in the hallway on the way to the cafeteria or restroom, but they have finally become institutionalized and we now have a new excuse to wear shorts to work.

So what before could be a meal for those leading two different companies to reach an agreement of vital importance until way later after dinner, now they meet at the park to talk between gasps while keeping a light gallop. Of course, it is much better for strengthening the core, than the digestive gin tonics and a cigar after a good steak.

Possible benefits of Walking Meetings

• Promoting creativity:

For some causal reason, walking is better. Synapses proliferate, our neurons sparkle, everything seems clearer, and creativity arises, from ear to ear, with a rainbow glow. Stanford University does not have to come to tell us about its experiments with sedentary and athletic people, we all know that movement shakes our heads and favors creation.

• Exercise included:

Until we can eat popcorn without choking and pay attention to Netflix as we drive around with the porch, walking while working is the closest thing to doing something uplifting while exercising. You take a break from the screen for once, relax your burned corneas, and make other just as interesting muscles work.

• Ideal for dealing with complicated topics:

Being locked up, immobile and face to face with someone is not the healthiest way to deliver sensitive news. It is much better to enjoy the air, space, exercise to distress and see the landscape views. If things get ugly you can always accelerate until you leave your teammates behind.

• Good vibes:

Do you remember how good it felt when the teacher decided to teach the class outside because it was too good a day to be inside? Well, the same happiness and good vibes arouse Walking Meetings in the open air. Encouragement and positivism will flood us when we listen to something more than the photocopier in the background and we see something more than the gray facing of our cubicle.

I hope that with this information you can guess by yourself whether Walking Meeting instauration is worth it and you should give it a chance or whether you should just completely ignore them. Maybe you like them and they seem appropriate but with another name, something more simple and humble like “Meetings strolling” or the always cool “Marathon Meeting” or “Running Reunioning”.

But once you’ve gotten into these ins and outs, would you like to keep going? Go even further but into the world of technology? What about spending a couple of minutes to find out what computing system monitoring is and why it is also very important?

Monitoring systems are responsible for supervising technology (hardware, networks and communications, operating systems or applications, for example) in order to analyze its performance, and to detect and alert about possible errors. And this leads us to Pandora FMS, that wonderful tool thanks to which this blog is possible.

Pandora FMS is a flexible monitoring system, capable of monitoring devices, infrastructures, applications, services and business processes.

Everything Has a Beginning: The Genesis of Tentacle Protocol

You probably know all kinds of remarkable “genesis”: the biblical and canonized, where Adam and Eve have their first Tinder date, the British rock band from the 60s with excellent Peter Gabriel on vocals and Phil Collins on drums, and of course, the Hyundai Genesis, a passenger car manufactured by the South Korean brand Hyundai Motor Company since 2008… But this time, none of them interests us. We’ll leave the trunk capacity of the Hyundai for another day, but not today, today, in our ominous and greenish Pandora FMS Blog, we will talk about an even more important genesis for the history of the beginnings and the startings (drum roll), the beginnings of Tentacle Protocol.

And to talk about the origins of Tentacle Protocol, we had to make an effort to find our colleague Ramón Novoa Suñer, Head of the AI department and Senior Chief Programmer at Pandora FMS, a hero for the company, who has been here for as many years as it exists and that, therefore, houses all the possible knowledge on the matter, right within its experienced and ancient testa.

To find Ramón, we had to undertake a dangerous journey, crossing the icy glacier and the burning desert, traveling day and night without rest, risking our life and our physique, crossing the most spectral swamps and mountain slopes, enduring merciless winds, to finally reach the medieval fortress where he was, always involved in his chores and completely oblivious to the admiration that the world professes him.

Proposing an interview with Ramón was easy, but it took time to carry it out, that’s why I stayed with him as an apprentice. I slept in the highest tower of the castle and devoted myself to absorbing all kinds of technological knowledge that got thrown on me to the ground like little bones. I didn’t want to waste a second spent with him. After all, he is one of the most recognized geniuses in his field. The Dumbledore of programming.

Weeks passed, then years, but finally the long-awaited interview about the origin of the Tentacle Protocol that I longed for and that led me there came. Now I want to share it with you on this blog, as I ride away from the fortress as the voice of Master Ramón still resounds in my head:

Oh Master, what year would you say it was when the Tentacle Protocol was invented?

* Hmm … 2008, if I’m not mistaken, because by now it’s already been a few years… I would say shortly after I finished my degree and started working at Ártica. It still seems to me that it was yesterday, and here we are, more than a decade and a pandemic later…

*Important remark: All of the answers that Ramón gives us, should resonate in your head with the deep voice of a wise hermit, if not, you’re not reading this the right way.

¿Where does that science fiction name come from?

I’m very glad that you asked me that question, little Dim. You see, the Pandora FMS logo at that time was an octopus, so the name seemed like the most appropriate, don’t you think so? It is also a tribute to a popular video game from the 90s. You don’t need me to give you more clues, right? Authentic and pure people, the ones who are really worth it, will know what video game I refer to.

Do you remember who was involved in the project from the beginning?

The idea of the project came from Sancho Lerena, the famous CEO, and I was the developer. Keep in mind that at that time there were only two programmers in Ártica ST. We still had absolutely no idea about the people who would join us in this dream.

From what did the idea of this protocol arise? What is its true origin?

Well, at the very beginning, Pandora FMS agents used SSH or FTP to send data to the server. But users had a lot of trouble configuring these protocols correctly. So we decided to develop a simple protocol that would work without no more additional initial configuration than that of the IP address and the port of Pandora FMS server. Helping and simplifying has always been the purpose of the Tentacle Protocol, and boy did it do well.

What exactly is the Tentacle Protocol?

It is a text protocol (like SMTP or HTTP) to transfer files. The specification is very simple, it is given in our Wiki, the most sacred group of texts that I know, it contains from the Alpha to the Omega of this organization. The Tentacle Protocol is less efficient than a binary protocol, but more readable and easier to debug. Giving it that magic that it has.

What is it for?

Basically send and receive files. The advantage it has, as I mentioned before, is that it is very easy to configure. You don’t even need to specify the destination directory. It also supports slightly more advanced features such as data compression or the use of X.509 certificates.

How important is it for Pandora FMS?

It is essential for transferring XML data files from agents and satellite servers to Pandora FMS server. It is also used to manage remote configuration, file collections, etc. Also, the Tentacle server can work as a proxy.

Is it true that in good hands and used in the right way it could save the world?

If the instructions to save it had to be sent through a TCP/IP stack, I have no doubt.

Let’s fantasize, if you could rename it now, what would you call it?

A) Metal Gear Solid Protocol: Solid Snake you are the boss.
B) Testicle Protocol
C) Tenta-cool protocol
D) Protocol A Feira

E) “Octopus” too, in reference to Doctor Octopus as well.

And that was it for my story of how I managed to find Ramón Novoa at the end of the world and have him explain everything about the genesis of the Tentacle Protocol. I will never forget his hospitality, his erudition, or how the monk’s habit that I wore throughout the training in technological knowledge, there in the tower, was constantly killing my waist.