How to Install Icinga 2 and Icinga Web 2 on Ubuntu 16.04

Icinga 2 is a widely used open source network resource monitoring system, and Icinga Web 2 is the official web interface for Icinga 2.

In this tutorial, I will explain how to install both of them on an Ubuntu 16.04 server.

Prerequisites

• A newly deployed Vultr Ubuntu 16.04 server instance.
• A sudo user. To learn more about creating a sudo user on Ubuntu, see instructions on Debian in another Vultr tutorial.

Step 1: Update the system

Log in from an SSH terminal as a sudo user, and then update the system to the latest stable status using the following commands:

sudo apt-get update -y
sudo apt-get upgrade -y
sudo shutdown -r now

After the reboot, use the same sudo user to log in.

Step 2: Install Apache

Install Apache using the following command:

sudo apt-get install apache2 -y

Delete the default Ubuntu Apache welcome page:

sudo rm /var/www/html/index.html

For security purposes, you should prohibit Apache from exposing files and directories within the web root directory /var/www/html to visitors:

sudo sed -i "s/Options Indexes FollowSymLinks/Options FollowSymLinks/" /etc/apache2/apache2.conf

Start the Apache service and get it started on boot:

sudo systemctl start apache2.service
sudo systemctl enable apache2.service

Step 3: Configure the UFW firewall

By default, the UFW firewall is disabled on a newly deployed Vultr Ubuntu 16.04 server instance. Use the following commands to enable the UFW firewall and to allow inbound traffic of SSH, HTTP, and HTTPS:

sudo ufw app list
sudo ufw allow OpenSSH
sudo ufw allow in "Apache Full"
sudo ufw enable

Step 4: Install MariaDB

4.1) Use the following command to install MariaDB:

sudo apt-get install mariadb-client mariadb-server -y

4.2) Start the MariaDB service:

sudo systemctl start mysql.service
sudo systemctl enable mysql.service

4.3) Secure the installation of MariaDB:

sudo /usr/bin/mysql_secure_installation

During the interactive process, answer questions one by one as below:

Enter current password for root (enter for none): Enter
Set root password? [Y/n]: Y
New password: <your-password>
Re-enter new password: <your-password>
Remove anonymous users? [Y/n]: Y
Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n]: Y
Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n]: Y
Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n]: Y

Note: Replace <your-password> with your own MySQL root password.

4.4) Modify the authentication plugin of MySQL root user:

sudo mysql -u root -p

Use the MariaDB root password you set earlier to log in.

In the MySQL shell:

UPDATE mysql.user SET authentication_string=PASSWORD('<your-password>'), plugin='mysql_native_password' WHERE user='root';
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

Note: Replace <your-password> with your own MySQL root password.

Step 5: Install PHP

Install PHP 7.0 and several extensions for Icinga 2 and Icinga Web 2:

sudo apt-get install php7.0 libapache2-mod-php7.0 php7.0-gd php7.0-intl php7.0-xml php7.0-ldap php7.0-mysql php7.0-pgsql php-imagick -y

Install the current version of Composer:

cd
php -r "copy('https://getcomposer.org/installer', 'composer-setup.php');"
php -r "if (hash_file('SHA384', 'composer-setup.php') === 'e115a8dc7871f15d853148a7fbac7da27d6c0030b848d9b3dc09e2a0388afed865e6a3d6b3c0fad45c48e2b5fc1196ae') { echo 'Installer verified'; } else { echo 'Installer corrupt'; unlink('composer-setup.php'); } echo PHP_EOL;"
php composer-setup.php
php -r "unlink('composer-setup.php');"

Note: The above commands may be out of date in the future, so you should always get the latest version from the Composer official website.

As a matter of convenience, move the Composer script composer.phar to /usr/local/bin and rename it composer:

sudo mv ~/composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer

Install zip and unzip:

sudo apt-get install zip unzip -y

Install the ZendFramework Db component using Composer:

composer require zendframework/zend-db

Then you need to setup the proper timezone for your machine, which can be determined from the PHP official website. For example, if your server instance resides in the Vultr Los Angeles datacenter, then the timezone value for it is America/Los_Angeles.

Open the PHP configuration file with the vi editor:

sudo vi /etc/php/7.0/apache2/php.ini

Find the line:

;date.timezone =

Change it to:

date.timezone = America/Los_Angeles

Save and quit:

:wq!

Restart the Apache service in order to put new settings into effect:

sudo systemctl restart apache2.service

Step 6: Install Icinga 2 and its plugins

Setup the Icinga APT repo:

cd
wget -O - http://packages.icinga.org/icinga.key | sudo apt-key add -
sudo add-apt-repository 'deb http://packages.icinga.org/ubuntu icinga-xenial main'
sudo apt-get update

Install Icinga 2 and several plugins using the Icinga APT repo:

sudo apt-get install icinga2 nagios-plugins -y

To learn more about Icinga 2 plugins, please visit the Monitoring Plugins Project website.

Start the Icinga 2 service:

sudo systemctl start icinga2.service
sudo systemctl enable icinga2.service

By default, the Icinga 2 program will enable three features: checker, mainlog, and notification. You can confirm that using the following command:

sudo icinga2 feature list

Step 7: Setup the Icinga 2 IDO modules

7.1) Install the IDO (Icinga Data Output) modules for MySQL

sudo apt-get install icinga2-ido-mysql

In the Configuring icinga2-ido-mysql wizard, when being asked whether you want to enable Icinga 2’s ido-mysql feature, choose <No>. We will manually enable this feature later.

When being asked whether you want to configure a database for icinga2-ido-mysql, choose <No>. Instead, you can manually create a database as explained in step 7.2.

7.2) Create a database for Icinga 2

Log into the MySQL shell as root:

sudo mysql -u root -p

Use the MariaDB root password you set in step 4 to log in.

In the MySQL shell, create a database named icinga and a database user named icinga with the password icinga, and then grant privileges on this database to this database user.

CREATE DATABASE icinga;
GRANT SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, DROP, CREATE VIEW, INDEX, EXECUTE ON icinga.* TO 'icinga'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'icinga';
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
EXIT;

7.3) Import the Icinga 2 IDO schema

sudo mysql -u root -p icinga < /usr/share/icinga2-ido-mysql/schema/mysql.sql

When prompted, input the MariaDB root password to finish the job.

7.4) Enable the IDO MySQL module

sudo vi /etc/icinga2/features-available/ido-mysql.conf

Find these lines:

user = "icinga2",
password = "",
host = "localhost",
database = "icinga2"

Modify them as below:

user = "icinga"
password = "icinga"
host = "localhost"
database = "icinga"

Save and quit:

:wq!

Enable the ido-mysql feature:

sudo icinga2 feature enable ido-mysql
sudo systemctl restart icinga2.service

Step 8: Install Icinga Web 2

8.1) Setup external command pipe

sudo icinga2 feature enable command
sudo systemctl restart icinga2.service
sudo icinga2 feature list

Before you can send commands to Icinga 2 using a web interface, you need to add the www-data user to the icingacmd group:

sudo groupadd icingacmd
sudo usermod -a -G icingacmd www-data

Use the following command to confirm your setup:

id www-data

8.2) Install Icinga Web 2 packages

sudo apt-get install icingaweb2 icingaweb2-module-monitoring icingaweb2-module-doc icingacli -y

Point the Apache web root directory to a location specified by Icinga Web 2:

sudo icingacli setup config webserver apache --document-root /usr/share/icingaweb2/public
sudo systemctl restart apache2.service

8.3) Setup Icinga Web 2 database

sudo mysql -u root -p

CREATE DATABASE icingaweb2;
EXIT;

8.4) Load the Icinga Web 2 database schema

mysql -u root -p icingaweb2 < /usr/share/icingaweb2/etc/schema/mysql.schema.sql

8.5) Generate a setup token for later use in the Icinga Web 2 web installation wizard

sudo icingacli setup token create

8.6) Initiate the Icinga 2 installation wizard in the web interface

Point your web browser to the following URL:

http://<your-serve-ip>/icingaweb2/setup

8.7) On the Welcome page, input the setup token you generated earlier, and then click the Next button.

8.8) On the Modules page, select one or more modules you want to enable (at least, the Monitoring module is required), and then click the Next button.

8.9) On the Requirements page, make sure that every required item is satisfied, and then click the Next button.

8.10) On the Authentication page, you need to choose the authentication method when accessing Icinga Web 2. Here, you can choose Database, and then click the Next button.

8.11) On the Database Resource page, fill out all required fields as below, and then click the Next button.

• Resource Name*: icingaweb_db
• Database Type*: MySQL
• Host*: localhost
• Database Name*: icingaweb2
• Username*: root
• Password*: <MariaDB-root-password>

8.12) On the Authentication Backend page, using the default backend name icingaweb2, click the Next button to move on.

8.13) On the Administration page, setup the first Icinga Web 2 administrative account (say it is icingaweb2admin) and password (say it is icingaweb2pass), and then click the Next button.

8.14) On the Application Configuration page, you can adjust application- and logging-related configuration options to fit your needs. For now, you can use the default values listed below and click the Next button to proceed.

• Show Stacktraces: Checked
• User Preference Storage Type*: Database
• Logging Type*: Syslog
• Logging Level*: Error
• Application Prefix*: icingaweb2

8.15) On the Review page, double check your configuration, and then click the Next button.

8.16) On the Monitoring Module Configuration Welcome page, click the Next button.

8.17) On the Monitoring Backend page, use the default backend name icinga and backend type IDO, and then click the Next button.

8.18) On the Monitoring IDO Resource page, input IDO database details you setup earlier, and then click the Next button.

• Resource Name*: icinga_ido
• Database Type*: MySQL
• Host*: localhost
• Database Name*: icinga
• Username*: icinga
• Password*: icinga

8.19) On the Command Transport page, still use these default values listed below. Click the Next button to move on.

• Transport Name*: icinga2
• Transport Type*: Local Command File
• Command File*: /var/run/icinga2/cmd/icinga2.cmd

8.20) On the Monitoring Security page, still use the default value:

• Protected Custom Variables: *pw*,*pass*,community

Click the Next button to go to next page.

8.21) On the review page, double check your configuration, and then click the Finish button.

8.22) On the Congratulations! page, click the Login to Icinga Web 2 button to jump to the Icinga Web 2 login page. Use the Icinga Web 2 administrative account and password you setup earlier to log in. Feel free to explore the Icinga Web 2 dashboard.

That concludes our tutorial. Thank you for reading.