blog.monitoring-plugins.pro

Direct Distribution of NetApp Monitoring Plugins

Tue, 02 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

As of October 1, 2025, Activaria has taken over the distribution of the NetApp Monitoring Plugins. Previously distributed by Quorum Distribution GmbH, the plugins will now be provided directly by us as the original developer and manufacturer. Existing contracts, including active subscriptions remain fully in effect and will be serviced by Activaria. To ensure continued delivery, the necessary customer information has been securely transferred to us.

The latest software releases are always available for download at https://releases.monitoring-plugins.pro/ using your existing contract number.

Possible false negative: Broken disks have no node

Sat, 02 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The following text discusses the possibility of a false negative result, depending on your configuration. Please read it carefully.

Recently we got an interesting bug-report: A broken disk did not get alarmed by the check_netapp_disk container-type-plugin. This false negative happened because of a configuration, where disks are checked per node:

check_netapp_disk container-type -H filer … ‑‑include=~^NODE-B\.

This will check all disks on NODE-B. But a broken disk may not be related to any node and so it wont show up in the results.

Check NetApp REST v3.2.0 released

Tue, 20 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

New Check for Disk Stats (iops, throughput) in v3.2.0

New Check: check_netapp_disk stats to monitor disk-path-quality (failed iops), throughput and other disk-metrics.
New switch --no-include-exclude-message: Do not show the message with the count of included/excluded instances.

For further details please read the release notes and the documentation .

Lots of new checks in v3.1.0 (stable) and v3.2.0-beta.3

Tue, 11 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

New Checks in v3.1.0

check_netapp_node service-processor has got new subcommands to check the service-processor
- state (online/offline)
- last-update-state (passed/failed)
- is-ip-configured
- link-status
The firmware version is now printed into the message.
check_netapp_lun state : Checks if luns are online/offline and their mapping state.

New Check in v3.2.0-beta.3

check_netapp_disk stats monitors the disk-path-quality (failed IO-operations), througput and other disk-metrics.

For further details please read the release notes and the documentation .

v3.0.0 Released: Checks for Node-Hardware, Flexcache, Volume-State, Inodes in Aggregates and Volumes

Mon, 22 Jul 2024 00:00:00 +0000

❗️Check NetApp-REST introduces a breaking change beginning with v3.0.0.

New Checks

Beside of the above mentioned UI-change we offer a lot of new checks:

Node: fan, power-supply, temperature, NVRAm battery, node state (up/down), ha state, give-back state
Check for the the flexcache connection status
Volume: State- and autosize checks
Inode (max-files) checks for both volumes and aggregates
Aggregate-state check (online, offline)
LIF check (administrative-status, operational-status, is-home)

For further details please read the release notes and the documentation .

New String & Regex Values

Wed, 21 Feb 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Check NetApp-REST introduces a breaking change beginning with v3.0.0.

Change

For parameters that previously expected a regular expression: Beginning with the v3.0.0 release, values which do not start with a tilde (~) are interpreted as strings that must match exactly, and not as regex patterns.

Motivation

The new notation is more intuitive, as the former could lead to false negatives, as shown in this example:
The option ‑‑exclude=vol1 also excluded vol10 or vol11 or even somevol123. Now, with the new notation, it does exactly what you would expect at first glance: it only excludes vol1.

Check NetApp-ZAPI will not be able to monitor next year's ONTAPI releases

Mon, 28 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

NetApp’s ZAPI interface (now called ONTAPI) will reach end of availability (EOA) in January 2023. Therefore the checks from Check NetApp-ZAPI won’t be of much use in the near future. Fortunately all customers for Check NetAppPRO can use the future-proof Check NetApp-REST with the same license and therefore without additional costs.

ZAPI EOA: Timeline and Recommendations

NetApp announced that ONTAP release in FY22-Q4, will be the final ONTAP version to include ONTAPI (former called ZAPI).

RESTful Spare-Disk and -Partion Check

Thu, 27 Oct 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The RESTful Spare-Disk Check has got subcommands for checking both spare-disks and spare-partions.

Example for checking spare-disks

./check_netapp_spare disk -H filer
NETAPP_PRO SPARE OK - 28 disks checked
...

Checks all nodes for sufficient spare-disks.

Example for checking spare-partitions

./check_netapp_spare partition -H filer
NETAPP SPARE WARNING - 68 partitions checked, 68 WARNING
prod-na-01.1.0.23.P3: 1 spare-disks (WARNING)
prod-na-01.1.0.23.P2: 1 spare-disks (WARNING)
prod-na-02.1.0.23.P1: 1 spare-disks (WARNING)
...

Checks all nodes for sufficient spare-partitions.

About the Check NetApp-REST plugins

The monitoring plugins check_netapp_* for Nagios®-compatible monitoring frameworks like Nagios Core, Nagios XI, op5-monitor, Icinga, Shinken or Zabbix are enhanced check programs for NetApp filers.

Monitoring Check for E-Series Interfaces

Mon, 21 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The v1.2.0 release of our Check E-Series product brings a new monitoring plugin called check_eseries_interface to monitor the host-interfaces.

This plugin contacts the StorageGRID Management API (StorageGRID Webscale) and checks then several values for being as expected. Examples are:

channel type: driveside or hostside
is degraded: false or true
state: optimal
miswire type: should be none
current interface speed: speed16gig
link state: up or down

A typical output for the SAS state check looks like:

Searching the blog

Wed, 16 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Over the years, this blog has accumulated almost 300 articles. Unfortunately, the built-in JS-based search is overwhelmed by this. We have therefore switched the search bar at the top to an external search engine called MetaGer.

Why MetaGer?

MetaGer is a search engine supported by the non-profit SUMA-EV, Association for Free Access to Knowledge. MetaGer protects against censorship by combining results from many search engines. The source code is free and open source and respects your privacy.

New Check: Storage Port Status (degraded)

Thu, 27 Jan 2022 00:00:00 +0000

We have got this request:

Recently we have noticed that some of our fiber optic cables have degraded, this is sadly not reported anywhere else exept with the commands below…
STOR04-A1::*> storage port show -node STOR04-A1-01
 
                             Speed
Node               Port Type (Gb/s) State    Status
------------------ ---- ---- ------ -------- ---------------
STOR04-A1-01
                   0a   SAS       6 enabled  online
                   0b   SAS       0 enabled  offline
                   0c   SAS       6 enabled  online-degraded
                   0d   SAS       0 enabled  offline
                   3a   SAS       0 enabled  offline
                   3b   SAS       6 enabled  online
                   3c   SAS       0 enabled  offline
                   3d   SAS       6 enabled  online
                   6a   SAS      12 enabled  online
                   6b   SAS      12 enabled  online
                   6c   SAS      12 enabled  online
                   6d   SAS      12 enabled  online
12 entries were displayed.
 
The cable in question is a QSFP copper to optical LC and is used because the disk shelfs are located in another server room. As you can see from the details above it is degraded, and this is most likely because of dust on the connectors.

CONTACT

Tue, 21 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

How to buy

The monitoring plugins discussed in this blog are distributed by:

Activaria GmbH
Marchettigasse 5/10
1060 Vienna, AUSTRIA
phone: +43 664 143 84 18
e-mail: distribution@monitoring-plugins.pro

Website

For further information about the monitoring plugins for NetApp, E-Series and Websites please visit monitoring-plugins.pro

Impressum

This blog is maintained by / Für den Inhalt verantwortlich:

Activaria GmbH, FN 586550 z Handelsgericht Wien
Ingo Lantschner
Marchettigasse 5/10
1060 Wien
AUSTRIA
E-Mail: ila@monitoring-plugins.pro

Unternehmensgegenstand: Entwicklung von System-Monitoring Plugins (Software)

RESTful Volume Snapshot Check

Mon, 13 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

This new plugin monitors the space occupied by snapshots on a volume in its first stage of development. It is similar to its ZAPI predecessor check_netapp_pro.pl Snapshots in that it can calculate the space required by snapshots either relative to the volume size or the snapshot reserve. The parameter --base=volume|reserve is responsible for this.

Syntax and Options

With many options like --base=volume|reserve or --include/exclude=<regex> the check can be tailored to the needs of your organisation. Please have a look at the checks documentation page for explanations and examples.

Check for missing (accidentally deleted) volumes

Mon, 15 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The new check_netapp_volume missing plugin notifies you or your team, when a volume has been removed from the system.

Motivation and Workflow

NetApp has a “recovery queue” which is set to 12 hours by default. If the monitoring reports that a volume has been deleted, you have the chance to recover that volume.

Please check out the plugin’s Documentation Page for more details on how to implement this check into your monitoring framework and business-processes.

Check Site Simple v1.1.0 released

Mon, 23 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

We are pleased to announce the 1.1.0 release of our monitoring plugin check_site_simple.

The following is new in this version:

The links to images and other media are checked as well. This means that incorrectly embedded images or videos or those whose sources no longer exist are now recognized as well.
Links to external sources can be provided with their own grace period. The background for the introduction of this new option is that sometimes servers to which you want to link are unstable. However, a webmaster has no direct influence on external sources. Instead of deleting the link because of occasional instability, he can now use the grace-period to delay the alarm specifically for external sources only. Internal “broken links” are alerted immediately regardless of this.

RESTful volume check for NetApps ONTAP filer

Tue, 27 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The v1.2.0 release of our Check NetApp-REST product contains a new monitoring plugin called check_netapp_volume usage. It provides the monitoring of:

the used space of each volume (in Bytes)
the total used space of several volumes
the average used space of several volumes
the min/max of used space of several volumes

A typical output would look like:

$ check_netapp_volume usage -H filer -w 30GiB -c 50GiB
NETAPP VOLUME USAGE OK - 5 volumes checked
vserv_b.vol2: 1.254MiB
vserv_b.vol1: 1.23MiB
vserv_a.vol1: 1.184MiB
vserv_b.vol0: 1.27MiB
vserv_a.vol0: 1.238MiB
| 'vserv_a.vol0'=1298432B;32212254720;53687091200;0; 'vserv_b.vol0'=1331200B;32212254720;53687091200;0; 'vserv_a.vol1'=1241088B;32212254720;53687091200;0; 'vserv_b.vol1'=1290240B;32212254720;53687091200;0; 'vserv_b.vol2'=1314816B;32212254720;53687091200;0;

Reporting on groups of volumes

To get the sum of all used-space on all volumes use the aggregated subcommand:

Monitoring Check for E-Series Network Interfaces

Mon, 26 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The v1.1.0 release of our Check E-Series product brings also a new monitoring plugin called check_eseries_nic. This provides monitoring of:

the link-status (up/down)
the current-speed (1Gib/s, 10GiB/s, …)
setup-error (true/false)

A typical output would for the link-status check look like:

$ ./check_eseries_nic link-status -H 10.1.1.11 --system-id=1
NETAPP ESERIES NIC CRITICAL - 4 nics checked, 3 CRITICAL
wan1.280107001000000000000: down (CRITICAL), slot 1, label P2
wan0.280007001000000000000: up, slot 0, label P1...

Or for the current-speed subcommand:

E-Series Free Pool Space Monitoring

Fri, 23 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000

We have released a new monitoring plugin called check_eseries_pool. The first version has exactly one subcommand called free-space. This monitors the free space still available for thin volumes in the disk pool.

It is particularly useful when you start taking snapshots or mirroring to another system. In such cases, you will monitor the FreePoolSpace to track the changes until they are mirrored to the other system or until the snapshot is deleted.

EMS Log-Monitoring

Mon, 21 Jun 2021 00:00:00 +0000

How to integrate the EMS-Log into an existing System-Monitoring solution

In this article ONTAP REST APIs: Automate Notification of High-Severity Events Mahalakshmi describes how to use messages to get notified about system events, depending on their type and severity. It’s a really flexible and comprehensive way to monitor NetApps ONTAP.

What if you already have a system-monitoring solution like Nagios, Icinga, op5 Monitor or Shinken in place? In that case the destinations (the recipients of the notifications) are already defined in the monitoring system. So all you need is a monitoring-plugin which does the filtering-part.

RESTfull Disk Check for NetApp's Ontap

Fri, 18 Jun 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The family of Check NetApp REST monitoring plugins has grown. With the check_netapp_disk container-type plugin the storage admin has a constant eye on disks that have been moved into unwanted containers.

Let’s look at an example:

.$ check_netapp_disk container-type -H sim96
NETAPP DISK CONTAINER TYPE OK - 28 disks checked
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.28: spare
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.27: spare
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.26: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.25: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.24: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.23: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.22: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.21: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.20: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.19: spare
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.18: spare
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.17: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.16: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.15: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.14: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.13: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.12: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.11: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.10: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.9: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.8: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.7: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.6: spare
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.5: spare
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.4: spare
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.3: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.2: aggregate
sim96cluster-01.NET-1.1: aggregate

On this filer (it is a simulator) we have 28 disks. All disks are in either the aggregate or the spare container. Using the default switch of --ok-type=^aggregate|spare$ the check is OK.

check_site_simple checks media-sources as well

Tue, 01 Jun 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The latest release of check_site_simple (v1.1.0.beta.1 as of writing this article) will find broken links to image and media-sources as well.

Like it’s predecessors the integrated crawler of check_site_simple flags any broken link found somewhere on the checked site but now links to images and media files (e.g. audio or video files linked from your site) will get checked too.

To give users full control we have also integrated a new switch --disable-media-checks.

Check NetApp's E-Series

Thu, 27 May 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The first stable release (v1.1.0) of our brand new Check E-Series product brings an automated health check for e-series nodes.

check_eseries_health will run the health checks regularly and automatically report any errors found.

Example

$ ./check_eseries_health --host=10.1.1.125 --system-id 1 [...]
NETAPP ESERIES HEALTH CRITICAL - 16 health checks checked, 1 CRITICAL
StorageGRID-XG-102.missingVolumes: notCompleted (CRITICAL)
StorageGRID-XG-102.integratedHealthCheck: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.dbSubRecordsValidation: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.melEventCheck: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.validPassword: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.failedDrivesPresent: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.exclusiveOperations: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.driveCheck: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.nvsramDisableCfwDownloads: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.hotSparesInUse: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.controllerStatusOptimal: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.volumeGroupsComplete: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.objectGraphSyncCheck: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.configurationDatabaseCheck: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.spmDatabaseVerification: ok
StorageGRID-XG-102.storageDeviceAccessible: ok

Technical Details

Check E-Series is a monitoring-plugin for Nagios-compatible system-monitoring frameworks like Nagios-XI, Nagios-Core, Icinga, op5-monitor or Shinken. It is written in Go and distributed as a ready-to-run precompiled binary without any dependencies.

Update function and Grafana compatibility

Sat, 17 Feb 2018 18:39:52 +0000

I can recommend the unstable release 3.10.1_10 to all experimenting monitoring admins. Above all, this has the character of a technology preview. Included are two major innovations:

The update mode for all getters
The option to output Grafana compatible performance data even for status checks.

Update Mode

The update mode for the getter is quickly explained: adding the option –update and an age, the getter is instructed to check the existing store first to its age before contacting the filer. Example:``` $ ./get_netapp_cm.pl -H filer -o volume –update=3min Data for object ‘volume’ collected within 0.576s. Number of instances stored: 6

Ignore Case for -exclude

Tue, 13 Jun 2017 20:31:14 +0000

The parameter ‑‑exclude= can be used to exclude specific instances from a check. For instance, a group of volumes (provided they have a naming convention) can be excluded, e.g.: $ ./check_netapp_pro.pl Usage ‑o volume ‑‑exclude=VMWare This snippet excludes all volumes containing ‚VMWare‘ in their name (AB_VMWare_vol1, AB_VMWare_vol2, …). But the devil is in the detail: storage admins have to take great care for case-sensitive names otherwise unwanted side effects can occur: for volumes AB_VMWare_vol1 and_ AB_vmware_vol2_ the pattern above would only exclude the first volume. Using the new switch ‑‑ignore_case we no longer have this issue. $ ./check_netapp_pro.pl Usage ‑o volume ‑‑exclude=VMWare ‑‑ignore_case In this case, all possible notations of VMWare would be matched, such as:

Testing/Fixing Release 3.4.1_01

Wed, 16 Mar 2016 18:17:54 +0000

3.4.1_01 FIXES USAGE/SHELF-ENVIRONMENT, DISKCOUNT, WORKLOAD, LUNSIZE

Released 2016-03-18

Fixed

Usage-Check: Handling of volumes with no state-attribute
shelf-environment-object in cm-getter needs a node-name (sometimes)

New and improved

new DiskCount check (counts spare-disks per type or storage-pool)
new workload-object in the perf-getter (in preparation for a cdot total-ops check)
extended lun-object in the 7m/cm-getters (in preparation for a LunSize check)

DiskCount counts SSD spare disks

Tue, 08 Mar 2016 20:01:51 +0000

Our new DiskCount check counts available disks on a system. This can be quite handy when setting a filter, e.g. only counting SSD drives in the spare container. This way, one can use thresholds to send warning messages as soon as the number of spare SSD disks falls below a certain threshold. In contrast to the previously available check check_netapp_spare, DiskCount can be configured with a detailed set of criteria for its alert messages. Example: ./check_netapp_pro.pl DiskCount ... ‑‑container_type=spare ‑‑disk_type=SSD ‑w 1 ‑c 1 NETAPP_PRO DISKCOUNT OK - 1 disk with matching criteria found. NA17-01 1.1.12: - spare SSD | disk_count=1;1;1;0;

Alarm for non-zeroed Spare Disks

Fri, 11 Dec 2015 23:03:58 +0000

Our Disk check is going to have a new feature. Using the switch ‑‑what=non-zeroed-spare an alarm is sent as soon as non-zeroed spare disks have been found. Depending on wether the zeroing process is currently running or not, a WARNING (including progress) will be sent or else CRITICAL.

Check the Is-home flag of a network port

Wed, 29 Apr 2015 10:34:00 +0000

Today we announce a new check NetInterface which monitors the Is-Home flag of a network interface and sends an alarm if current-port differs from home-port. This enables us to monitor the output of the following CLI command in a continuous and automated way:

clu1::> network interface show -is-home false 
Logical    Status   Network . Current      Is-Home 
----------- -------- ---------- ------------ ------- 
upgradelif  up/up    10.24.33.82/24 clu1-02 e0a   false

Also refer to Enabling and reverting LIFs to home ports (library.netapp.com/ecmdocs/ECMP1196799/html/GUID-7865FB3E-F57B-4976-803D-A87F2F760342.html “NetApp Support Article Enabling and reverting LIFs to home ports” (not openly available any more)

Monitoring Network Interfaces in DataONTAP 8.2.1

Tue, 21 Oct 2014 13:39:00 +0000

In cmode DataONTAp 8.2.1, the object ifnet, used for monitoring the network performance will no longer be available. It will be replaced by the new performance object lif.

Since there have been quite a few changes with the counters, the next release will include an additional check: PerfLif .

This check works as follows:

--------------------------------------------------------
 recv_data = Number of bytes received per second 
--------------------------------------------------------
 recv_errors = Number of received Errors per second
--------------------------------------------------------
 recv_packet = Number of packets received per second
--------------------------------------------------------
 sent_data = Number of bytes sent per second 
--------------------------------------------------------
 sent_errors = Number of sent errors per second
--------------------------------------------------------
 sent_packet = Number of packets sent per second 
--------------------------------------------------------

The life uptime could also be monitored, but this feature is not yet implemented.

Monitoring Network Interfaces

Fri, 10 Oct 2014 15:18:49 +0000

All in all, we are offering three different checks to monitor network interfaces from a NetApp Filer in the next release. All three of them support 7-mode as well as cluster mode filers:

NetPort or NetPort7m checks if the network interfaces are activated or not.
IfGrp checks if an interface group has enough links in the status up in order to remain redundant.
PerfIf (or PerfLif if you are monitoring a cluster-mode filer with DataONTAP >=8.2.x) checks and counts the transfer rates or error for each network interface.