Installation Notes¶

This template utilizes the Python script and boto module (Python interface to Amazon Web Services) to get various RDS metrics from CloudWatch.

To make the script working, please follow the instructions:

• Install the package: yum install python-boto or apt-get install python-boto
• Create a config /etc/boto.cfg or ~cacti/.boto with your AWS API credentials. See http://code.google.com/p/boto/wiki/BotoConfig

The script ~cacti/scripts/ss_get_rds_stats.py that is run under cacti user should have permissions to read the config /etc/boto.cfg or ~cacti/.boto.

For example:

[root@centos6 ~]# cat /etc/boto.cfg
[Credentials]
aws_access_key_id = THISISATESTKEY
aws_secret_access_key = thisisatestawssecretaccesskey

If you do not use this config with other tools such as our Nagios plugin, you can secure this file the following way:

[root@centos6 ~]# chown cacti /etc/boto.cfg
[root@centos6 ~]# chmod 600 /etc/boto.cfg

IMPORTANT: If you decide to create ~cacti/.boto instead, which is not secure as it falls under the web directory, ensure this file is not accessible from Web. Check out Hardening Cacti setup guide.

Test the script assuming DB instance identifier is blackbox:

[root@centos6 ~]# sudo -u cacti ~cacti/scripts/ss_get_rds_stats.py --ident=blackbox --metric=CPUUtilization
gh:6.53

To check RDS details you can run:

[root@centos6 ~]# sudo -u cacti ~cacti/scripts/ss_get_rds_stats.py --ident=blackbox --print
...

Now, you can add a device to the Cacti using Amazon RDS Server template and graph it.

NOTE: you need to specify DB instance identifier as Hostname on adding device page.

By default, the region is set to us-east-1. You can re-define it globally in boto config or specify per instance on data source level in Cacti. You can also set region to all which will have the script to find region for a given instance automatically. However, this will work much slower than specifying region explicitly.

Also you can specify boto profile name on data source level in Cacti in case you have multiple in use.

Sample Graphs¶

The following sample graphs demonstrate how the data is presented.

The amount of disk space occupied by binary logs on the master.

The percentage of CPU utilization.

The number of database connections in use.

The average number of disk I/O operations per second.

The average amount of time taken per disk I/O operation.

The number of outstanding IOs (read/write requests) waiting to access the disk.

The average number of bytes read from/written to disk per second.

The amount of used random access memory. The total available memory is the value according to the instance class. See http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonRDS/latest/UserGuide/Concepts.DBInstanceClass.html

The amount of time a Read Replica DB Instance lags behind the source DB Instance.

The amount of used storage space.

The amount of swap space used on the DB Instance.