Cacti 0.8 Beginner's Guide: Learn Cacti and design a robust Network Operations Center

Login as an admin user to your new Cacti installation.

Click on the Devices link under the Management menu. This will open a table with all devices added so far. For a new installation there should only be the localhost device showing its status as Up.

On the top right of the new page click on Add. This is the default position for this Add link.

You will now be presented with the Devices [new] screen. Have a look at this screen and make yourself comfortable with the different fields.

Enter a Description and Hostname (or IP address).

If you add an SNMP-enabled device, select SNMP as the Downed Device Detection method. Otherwise select Ping. When selecting Ping you can choose the protocol type and port to use.

Enter the SNMP community and select the correct version (some additional fields will show up when you choose SNMP Version 3). If the device is not SNMP compatible, you can select Not used.

You can also add some notes. Click on the Create button...

Go back to the device overview page by clicking on the Devices link under the Management menu.

Click on the device (the description) you have just created.

In the Host Template drop-down box, select a template that fits your device best.

Click on the Save button.

Note the additional entries in the Associated Graph Templates and Associated Data Queries fields.

Go back to the device overview page by clicking on the Devices link under the Management menu.

Click on the device you have just created.

In the Associated Graph Templates section select the Unix - Ping Latency from the drop-down list and click on the Add button.

Click on the Save button at the bottom of the page.

Go to the top of the page and click on, Create Graphs for this Host .

Select Create: Unix - Ping Latency.

Click on the Create button.

A new screen will appear, where you can choose a legend color and text, but for now, just click on Create.

You will be redirected back to the graphs selection screen with the entry we selected being greyed out.

Go back to the device overview page by clicking on the Devices link under the Management menu.

Click on the device you have just created or create any other SNMP capable device having network interfaces.

Configure the device to use SNMP and click on the Save or Create button.

Make sure that the following information appears at the top of the page. This will show that the device is SNMP capable.

In the Associated Data Queries section select the SNMP – Interface Statistics from the drop-down list and click on the Add button. If it is already there, then skip this step.

Click on the Save button at the bottom of the page.

Go to the top of the page and click on Create Graphs for this Host.

On the new page which appears, select the interfaces you want to monitor and select a Graph type from the drop-down list.

Click on the Create button.

Click on Graph Trees under the Management menu.

You will see the Default Tree. Click on the Add link to the top right of that table.

Enter a name, for example, Customer A.

Click on the Create button.

Click on Add at the top right of the Tree Items table.

Select Header as the Tree Item Type.

Enter Country A as the title.

Click on the Create button.

Click on the (Add) link next to the new Country A entry.

Keep the Parent Item to Country A and the Tree Item Type to Header.

Enter Site A as the title.

Click on the Create button.

Click on the (Add) link next to the Site A entry.

Select Host as Tree Item Type.

From the Host drop-down list, select the host which you created earlier. There should also be a Localhost listed. This is the Cacti server.

Leave all the others to their defaults.

Click on the Create button.