Frequently Asked Questions ************************** 1. Q: Where can I find documentation for plugin? A: All plugins that comply with minimal development guideline for this project include internal documentation. The documentation can be read executing plugin with the '-h' option ('--help' if long options are enabled). If the '-h' option does not work, that is a bug. 2. Q: What version of plugin am I running? A: All plugins that comply with minimal development guideline for this project include detailed version information. When executed with the '-V' option, a version string will be printed: check_radius (nagios-plugins 1.3.0-alpha1) 1.11 Note that this string include both the assigned package release name and the CVS-generated revision for the individual plugin. Authors should strictly adhere to this format. All bug reports and help requests should reference this information. 3. Q: What information do I need to include when asking for help or submitting a bug report? A: At a minimum, the output from 'uname -a' and the version string from ' -V' and, of course, a description of the problem and any solution/patch. 4. Q: I'm using Redhat Linux (or some other RPM-based distribution). Which packages should I install? A: The package nagios-plugins-..rpm contains only those plugins that should work on any POSIX compliant system. In other words, you should be able to install this package on your system, no matter what else is or in not installed. However, most of us have more complex systems than barebones POSIX. We tried creating a variety of separate packages so each dependency could be installed cleanly, but many people found that this resulted in too many packages. So in the end, all the non-POSIX plugins were folded into one RPM (nagios-plugins-..rpm). Most people will need to use RPM's '--nodeps' option to install this package. 5. Q: My system uses the .deb package format. What packages should I install? A: We strive for cooperation between all packagers and developers. The answers for .deb are the same as for RPM, after changing the package name suffixes accordingly. 6. Q: I prefer to build my own RPMs. Do I need to install all of the various dependencies? A: Beginning with the 1.2.9-1 release, you may run rpm --define 'custom 1' -ta nagios-plugins-.tar.gz In prior releases, you must unpack the tarball and build the RPM using nagios-custom.spec with 'rpm -ba'. 7. Q: I get an error like Warning: Return code of 127 for check of service 'PING' on host 'anyhost' was out of bounds. when I run Nagios. (Often check_ping runs just fine on the command line). A: Commonly, system administrators will make security as tight as possible on the monitoring system. Sometimes this includes OS options or hardening scripts that prevent unprivileged users from running the ping command. Nagios runs with no more privileges than 'nobody' -- check to be sure that the nagios user can actually run check ping. (This can also happen with other binaries executed by nagios, but ping seems to be far and away the biggest offender.) 8. Q: I have a plugin to offer. What do I do to get it accepted? A: Send it to nagiosplug-devel@lists.sourceforge.net. Usually, we just drop it into contrib until we have a chance to check if the standard options are used, etc. You can also get feedback on improving the plugin via the mailing list.