How to Enable and Monitor Nginx Stub_Status with Zabbix: Step-by-Step Guide

Detect Nginx Module

Nginx performance monitoring requires the ngx_http_stub_status_module to collect metrics.

1) Check whether the ngx_http_stub_status_module is compiled. /usr/local/nginx/sbin/nginx -V If the module is not enabled, recompile Nginx with the module (compilation steps omitted).

2) Add stub_status configuration to Nginx.

location /ngx_status {
    stub_status on; # enable stub_status
    allow 127.0.0.1; # only allow local access
    access_log off; # disable logging (remove to enable)
    deny all; # deny all other addresses
}

3) Restart Nginx.

/usr/local/nginx/sbin/nginx -t
/usr/local/nginx/sbin/nginx -s reload

4) Access the stub_status endpoint. curl http://127.0.0.1/ngx_status Typical output includes:

Active connections: 1
server accepts handled requests
16214 16214 8269
Reading: 0 Writing: 1 Waiting: 0

Parameter explanations: Active connections: current active client connections, including those waiting. accepts: total number of accepted client connections. handled: total number of connections handled by Nginx. requests: total number of client requests. Reading: number of connections where Nginx is reading request headers. Writing: number of connections where Nginx is writing a response. Waiting: number of idle connections waiting for a request.

Write Nginx Monitoring Script

1) Create the script file.

vim /usr/local/zabbix/scripts/ngx_status.sh

#!/usr/bin/env bash
HOST='127.0.0.1'
PORT='80'

# Check if Nginx process is running (1 if running, 0 if stopped)
function ping {
    /sbin/pidof nginx | wc -l
}

function active {
    /bin/curl "http://${HOST}:${PORT}/ngx_status" -s >/dev/null | grep 'Active' | awk '{print $NF}'
}

function reading {
    /bin/curl "http://${HOST}:${PORT}/ngx_status" -s >/dev/null | grep 'Reading' | awk '{print $2}'
}

function writing {
    /bin/curl "http://${HOST}:${PORT}/ngx_status" -s >/dev/null | grep 'Writing' | awk '{print $4}'
}

function waiting {
    /bin/curl "http://${HOST}:${PORT}/ngx_status" -s >/dev/null | grep 'Waiting' | awk '{print $6}'
}

function accepts {
    /bin/curl "http://${HOST}:${PORT}/ngx_status" -s >/dev/null | awk NR==3 | awk '{print $1}'
}

function handled {
    /bin/curl "http://${HOST}:${PORT}/ngx_status" -s >/dev/null | awk NR==3 | awk '{print $2}'
}

function requests {
    /bin/curl "http://${HOST}:${PORT}/ngx_status" -s >/dev/null | awk NR==3 | awk '{print $3}'
}

$1

2) Set script permissions.

chown -Rf zabbix.zabbix /usr/local/zabbix/scripts/ngx_status.sh
chmod u+x /usr/local/zabbix/scripts/ngx_status.sh

Zabbix GET Data Test

Run the following commands on the Zabbix server to test each metric:

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[ping]"

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[active]"

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[reading]"

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[writing]"

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[waiting]"

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[accepts]"

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[handled]"

zabbix_get -s 172.26.3.101 -p 10050 -k "ngx.status[requests]"

Create Zabbix Template and Items

1) Create a new template in Zabbix (Configuration → Templates → Create template).

2) Create an application group within the template.

3) Add monitoring items (Configuration → Templates → Items → Create item).

4) Create triggers for process monitoring and for waiting connections > 100.

5) Create graphs to visualize the Nginx performance metrics.

Host Linked Template

Configure the host (Configuration → Hosts → select the host → Templates → Link template) and select the template created above.

View Data

Navigate to Monitoring → Latest data, select the host and the application group to see the collected metrics.

Use the graphs to visualize the data.

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