contrib/exec-nagios.px: Added a Perl script which handles Nagios plugins.

[collectd.git] / README

diff --git a/README b/README
index f34555c..a16e9ec 100644 (file)
--- a/README
+++ b/README
@@ -5,8 +5,9 @@ http://collectd.org/
 About
 -----
 
-  collectd is a small daemon which collects statistics about a computer's
-  usage and writes then into RRD files.
+  collectd is a small daemon which collects system information periodically
+  and provides mechanisms to store and monitor the values in a variety of
+  ways.
 
 
 Features
@@ -80,6 +81,9 @@ Features
     - load
       System load average over the last 1, 5 and 15 minutes.
 
+    - libvirt
+      CPU, disk and network I/O statistics from virtual machines.
+
     - mbmon
       Motherboard sensors: temperature, fanspeed and voltage information,
       using mbmon(1).
@@ -130,9 +134,6 @@ Features
       write your own plugins in Perl and return arbitrary values using this
       API. See collectd-perl(5).
 
-      This plugin is still considered to be experimental and subject to change
-      between minor releases.
-
     - ping
       Network latency: Time to reach the default gateway or another given
       host.
@@ -209,9 +210,36 @@ Features
     - logfile
       Writes logmessages to a file or STDOUT/STDERR.
 
+    - perl
+      Log messages are propagated to plugins written in Perl as well.
+      See collectd-perl(5).
+
     - syslog
       Logs to the standard UNIX logging mechanism, syslog.
 
+  * Notifications can be handled by the following plugins:
+
+    - exec
+      Execute a program or script to handle the notification.
+      See collectd-exec(5).
+
+    - logfile
+      Writes the notification message to a file or STDOUT/STDERR.
+
+    - network
+      Send the notification to a remote host to handle it somehow.
+
+    - perl
+      Notifications are propagated to plugins written in Perl as well.
+      See collectd-perl(5).
+
+  * Miscellaneous plugins:
+
+    - uuid
+      Sets the hostname to an unique identifier. This is meant for setups
+      where each client may migrate to another physical host, possibly going
+      through one or more name changes in the process.
+
   * Performance: Since collectd is running as a daemon it doesn't spend much
     time starting up again and again. With the exception of the exec plugin no
     processes are forked. Caching in output plugins, such as the rrdtool and
@@ -277,16 +305,22 @@ Prerequisites
     platforms.
 
   * libcurl (optional)
-    If you want to use the `apache' plugin
+    If you want to use the `apache' and/or `nginx' plugins.
+
+  * libhal (optional)
+    If present, the uuid plugin will check for UUID from HAL.
 
   * libiptc (optional)
     For querying iptables counters.
 
   * libmysqlclient (optional)
+    Unsurprisingly used by the `mysql' plugin.
 
   * libnetlink (optional)
+    Used, obviously, for the `netlink' plugin.
 
   * libnetsnmp (optional)
+    For the `snmp' plugin.
 
   * liboping (optional, if not found a version shipped with this distribution
     can be used)
@@ -295,6 +329,10 @@ Prerequisites
   * libpcap (optional)
     Used to capture packets by the `dns' plugin.
 
+  * libperl (optional)
+    Obviously used by the `perl' plugin. The library has to be compiled with
+    ithread support (introduced in Perl 5.6.0).
+
   * librrd (optional; headers and library; rrdtool 1.0 and 1.2 both work fine)
     If built without `librrd' the resulting binary will be `client only', i.e.
     will send its values via multicast and not create any RRD files itself.
@@ -302,7 +340,7 @@ Prerequisites
     instead.
 
   * libsensors (optional)
-    To read from `lm_sensors'.
+    To read from `lm_sensors', see the `sensors' plugin.
 
   * libstatgrab may be used to collect statistics on systems other than Linux
     and/or Solaris. Note that CPU- and disk-statistics, while being provided
@@ -321,6 +359,32 @@ Prerequisites
     For compiling on Darwin in general and the `apple_sensors' plugin in
     particular.
 
+  * libvirt (optional)
+    Collect statistics from virtual machines.
+
+
+Configuring / Compiling / Installing
+------------------------------------
+
+  To configure, build and install collectd with the default settings, run
+  `./configure && make && make install'.  For detailed, generic instructions
+  see INSTALL. For a complete list of configure options and their description,
+  run `./configure --help'.
+  
+  By default, the configure script will check for all build dependencies and
+  disable all plugins whose requirements cannot be fulfilled (any other plugin
+  will be enabled). To enable a plugin, install missing dependencies (see
+  section `Prerequisites' above) and rerun `configure'. If you specify the
+  `--enable-<plugin>' configure option, you can force the plugin to be built.
+  This will most likely fail though unless you're working in a very unusual
+  setup and you really know what you're doing.
+
+  By default, collectd will be installed into `/opt/collectd'. You can adjust
+  this setting by specifying the `--prefix' configure option - see INSTALL for
+  details. If you pass DESTDIR=<path> to `make install', <path> will be
+  prefixed to all installation directories. This might be useful when creating
+  packages for collectd.
+
 
 Crosscompiling
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