Five Must-Have Linux System Monitoring Tools for System Administrators

A Linux system administrator needs a special set of skills, and if you are switching from another type of server, you need to know how to access some of the tools you can use to maintain and monitor the Linux server. These are particularly useful when the server experiences bottlenecks, whether this is hard disk, CPU, malware or network related. The following are a few built-in commands and add-on tools that clinics includes in its server system so administrators can monitor, maintain and fix issues.

1. NMAP
An important tool, which allows admins to scan the network for open ports, yet has enough flexibility to specify targeted areas or scan the entire network. This tool also functions well in testing your firewall configurations. It works just as well with large networks or with single hosts. The information offered includes the different types of operating systems that connect, the type of packet filters installed and information on whether these or the firewalls have been compromised. Administrators often use this tool to run routine maintenance tasks such as, network inventory, server monitoring and host monitoring.
2. Netstat
This command helps you find information about particular IP address connection. It allows you to find out how many connections were established and everything else that relates to that IP address. It offers a solution to possible infiltration or malware attacks.
3. Top
The top program gives you real-time view of the processes running on the system. It displays the most intensive tasks and updates the statistics every 5 seconds.
4. Pmap
System administrators use pmap to monitor memory usage. The command reports the memory usage of a process. When experiencing memory bottlenecks this can be a useful tool.
5. iostat
This is a command that offers the average CPU load or hard disk activity. It offers the CPU and input/output statistics for hard drives, partitions, devices and NFS network file systems.
Bottom Line
With the help of these basic Linux tools you can determine what hardware or software issue is causing a CPU bottleneck, a memory bottleneck or a hard drive slow down. While many administrators immediately associate a slowdown with a breach or infiltration, this can actually be a result of a variety of issues. That’s why it’s so important to monitor the different aspects of the Linux system.