–RRDtool

RRD stands for Round Robin Database. This is how the tool operates and can be used to store and graph any kind of time-related data you can plug into it. It’s an offshoot of MRTG which, while useful in it’s day, just isn’t as pretty as RRDtool. :)

For the Network engineering field, data pulled from SNMP is the preferred source. If you’re not familiar with SNMP, get familiar! It can be of great usefulness when trying to extract performance metrics from not only network devices, but host devices as well. You say you want to know if your CPU is being overtaxed during a certain time period? No problem. You say you want to be alerted when a mission-critical link goes down? Piece of cake. In my opinion, SNMP is an absolutle can’t-live-without tool for the network engineer.

I have found RRDtool to be quite invaluable when hard measurements are needed. Our department has plans to use this in order to help justify budgeting. These are the types of things that the bean counters look for and it makes it easier for us to say, “Hey, we need to upgrade this frame relay link. As you can see, capacity is almost maxed out and we’re seeing performance degradation as a result. This could cause our customers to be Unhappy, and unhappy customers == unhappy revenue numbers.” The message gets across pretty quickly.

Those of you who have experience with this tool, please share any insight, tips, etc that you might have!

Thanks,

neteng