Custom Nagios script not firing

Question

Recently we've been experiencing a lot of spam hitting our servers causing apache to topple over. To tackle this we've installed nagios to notify us/run some restart commands if the issue arises. Notifications function fine, but the restart scripts just wont kick in. We've taken the following steps:

• Created our restart script located: /usr/share/nagios3/plugins/eventhandlers/restart_apache
• Tested and ran via ./restart_apache CRITICAL SOFT 3 - can confirm the script works
• Defined the command: /etc/nagios3/commands.cfg

define command{
        command_name restart-apache
        command_line /usr/local/nagios/libexec/eventhandlers/restart_apache $SERVICESTATE$ $SERVICESTATETYPE$ $SERVICEATTEMPT$
}

• Applied the command to fire when current load notifications run: /etc/nagios3/conf.d/localhost_nagios2.cfg

define service{
        use                             generic-service         ; Name of service template to use
        host_name                       localhost
        service_description             Current Load
        check_command                   check_load!5.0!4.0!3.0!10.0!6.0!4.0
        event_handler                   restart-apache
        }

• We've set the script to write to a text file when performing a restart, but nothing is happening (and apache stays down) - so something is not right. Any direction is much appreciated!Thanks

Answer 1

you should make sure that handlers are enabled and logging in your nagios.cfg

enable_event_handlers=1
log_event_handlers=1

then try to tail your nagios logs (in my case /var/spool/nagios/nagios.log ) and wait for your event, you should see the handler being executed or failing

tail -f /var/spool/nagios/nagios.log | egrep HANDLER
...
[1271946604] SERVICE EVENT HANDLER: $HOST:$SERVICE:CRITICAL:HARD:3:$YOUR_RESTART_HANDLER