ARGUS.CONF(5) ARGUS.CONF(5)
NAME
argus.conf - argus resource file.
SYNOPSIS
argus.conf
COPYRIGHT
Copyright (c) 2000-2004 QoSient. All rights reserved.
DESCRIPTION
Argus will open this argus.conf if its installed as /etc/argus.conf.
It will also search for this file as argus.conf in directories speci-
fied in $ARGUSPATH, or $ARGUSHOME, $ARGUSHOME/lib, or $HOME, $HOME/lib,
and parse it to set common configuration options. All values in this
file can be overriden by command line options, or other files of this
format that can be read in using the -F option.
Variable Syntax
Variable assignments must be of the form:
VARIABLE=
with no white space between the VARIABLE and the '=' sign. Quotes are
optional for string arguments, but if you want to embed comments, then
quotes are required.
ARGUS_DAEMON
Argus is capable of running as a daemon, doing all the right things
that daemons do. When this configuration is used for the system daemon
process, say for /etc/argus.conf, this variable should be set to "yes".
The default value is to not run as a daemon.
This example is to support the ./support/Startup/argus script which
requires that this variable be set to "yes".
Commandline equivalent -d
ARGUS_DAEMON=yes
ARGUS_MONITOR_ID
Argus Monitor Data is uniquely identifiable based on the source identi-
fier that is included in each output record. This is to allow you to
work with Argus Data from multiple monitors at the same time. The ID
is 32 bits long, and so legitimate values are 0 - 4294967296 but argus
also supports IP addresses as values. The configuration allows for you
to use host names, however, do have some understanding how `hostname`
will be resolved by the nameserver before commiting to this strategy
completely.
Commandline equivalent -e
ARGUS_MONITOR_ID=`hostname`
ARGUS_ACCESS_PORT
Argus monitors can provide a real-time remote access port for collect-
ing Argus data. This is a TCP based port service and the default port
number is tcp/561, the "experimental monitor" service. This feature is
disabled by default, and can be forced off by setting it to zero (0).
When you do want to enable this service, 561 is a good choice, as all
ra* clients are configured to try this port by default.
Commandline equivalent -P
ARGUS_ACCESS_PORT=561
ARGUS_BIND_IP
When remote access is enabled (see above), you can specify that Argus
should bind only to a specific IP address. This is useful, for example,
in restricting access to the local host, or binding to a private inter-
face while capturing from another. The default is to bind to any IP
address.
Commandline equivalent -B
ARGUS_BIND_IP="127.0.0.1"
ARGUS_INTERFACE
By default, Argus will open the first appropriate interface on a system
that it encounters. For systems that have only one network interface,
this is a reasonable thing to do. But, when there are more than one
suitable interface, you should specify which interface(s) Argus should
read data from.
Argus can read packets from multiple interfaces at the same time,
although this is limited to 2 interfaces at this time. Specify this in
this file with multiple ARGUS_INTERFACE directives.
Commandline equivalent -i
ARGUS_INTERFACE=le0
ARGUS_OUTPUT_FILE
Argus can write its output to one or a number of files, default limit
is 5 concurrent files, each with their own independant filters.
The format is:
ARGUS_OUTPUT_FILE=/full/path/file/name
ARGUS_OUTPUT_FILE=/full/path/file/name "filter"
Most sites will have argus write to a file, for reliablity and perfor-
mance. The example file name is used here as supporting programs, such
as ./support/Archive/argusarchive are configured to use this file.
Commandline equivalent -w
ARGUS_OUTPUT_FILE=/var/log/argus/argus.out
ARGUS_MAX_INSTANCES
There can be any number of Argus Monitors running on a single system.
While this is a blessing for some, this does cause some confusion in
traditonal system administration tasks, such as pid file creation and
failure recover methods. If you plan on having a more than one argus
daemon running on your system, say, monitoring different interfaces,
then set this variable to the number of daemons you expect to support.
Commandline equivalent -I
ARGUS_MAX_INSTANCES=1
ARGUS_SET_PID
When Argus is configured to run as a daemon, with the -d option, Argus
can store its pid in a file, to aid in managing the running daemon.
Creating a system pid file requires priviledges that may not be appro-
priate for all cases. To assist in managing pid file creation and sup-
port, argus
When configured to generate a pid file, if Argus cannot create the pid
file, it will fail to run. This variable is available to override the
default, in case this gets in your way.
The default value is to generate a pid in /var/run if it exists, and if
not in $ARGUSHOME.
Commandline equivalent -c
ARGUS_SET_PID=yes
ARGUS_PID_FILENAME
Argus has a mechanism for generating pid filenames, but in some circum-
stances, being able to specify the pid filename is required due to per-
mission restriction or just out of convenience. If this file exists,
argus will read the pid that the file contains, and test if that pro-
cess is running. If not, the old pid is replaced, and argus continues
to run.
When this variable is set, argus assumes "-I 1" and "-c".
Commandline equivalent -n <pid file>
ARGUS_PID_FILENAME=/var/run/argus.pid
ARGUS_GO_PROMISCUOUS
By default, Argus will put its interface in promiscuous mode in order
to monitor all the traffic that can be collected. This can put an undo
load on systems.
If the intent is to monitor only the network activity of the specific
system, say to measure the performance of an HTTP service or DNS ser-
vice, you'll want to turn promiscuous mode off.
The default value is go into prmiscuous mode.
Commandline equivalent -p
ARGUS_GO_PROMISCUOUS=yes
ARGUS_FLOW_STATUS_INTERVAL
Argus will periodically report on a flow's activity every
ARGUS_FLOW_STATUS_INTERVAL seconds, as long as there is new activity on
the flow. This is so that you can get a view into the activity of very
long lived flows. The default is 60 seconds, but this number may be
too low or too high depending on your uses.
The default value is 60 seconds, but argus does support a minimum value
of 1. This is very useful for doing measurements in a controlled
experimental environment where the number of flows is < 1000.
Commandline equivalent -S
ARGUS_FLOW_STATUS_INTERVAL=60
ARGUS_MAR_STATUS_INTERVAL
Argus will periodically report on a its own health, providing interface
status, total packet and bytes counts, packet drop rates, and flow ori-
ented statistics.
These records can be used as "keep alives" for periods when there is no
network traffic to be monitored.
The default value is 300 seconds, but a value of 60 seconds is very
common.
Commandline equivalent -M
ARGUS_MAR_STATUS_INTERVAL=300
ARGUS_DEBUG_LEVEL
If compiled to support this option, Argus is capable of generating a
lot of debug information.
The default value is zero (0).
Commandline equivalent -D
ARGUS_DEBUG_LEVEL=0
ARGUS_GENERATE_RESPONSE_TIME_DATA
Argus can be configured to report on flows in a manner than provides
the best information for calculating application reponse times and net-
work round trip times.
The default value is to not generate this data.
Commandline equivalent -R
ARGUS_GENERATE_RESPONSE_TIME_DATA=no
ARGUS_GENERATE_JITTER_DATA
Argus can be configured to generate packet jitter information on a per
flow basis. The default value is to not generate this data.
Commandline equivalent -J
ARGUS_GENERATE_JITTER_DATA=no
ARGUS_GENERATE_MAC_DATA
Argus can be configured to not provide MAC addresses in it audit data.
This is available if MAC address tracking and audit is not a require-
ment.
The default value is to not generate this data.
Commandline equivalent -m
ARGUS_GENERATE_MAC_DATA=no
ARGUS_CAPTURE_DATA_LEN
Argus can be configured to capture a number of user data bytes from the
packet stream.
The default value is to not generate this data.
Commandline equivalent -U
ARGUS_CAPTURE_DATA_LEN=0
ARGUS_FILTER_OPTIMIZER
Argus uses the packet filter capabilities of libpcap. If there is a
need to not use the libpcap filter optimizer, you can turn it off here.
The default is to leave it on.
Commandline equivalent -O
ARGUS_FILTER_OPTIMIZER=yes
ARGUS_FILTER
You can provide a filter expression here, if you like. It should be
limited to 2K in length. The default is to not filter.
No Commandline equivalent
ARGUS_FILTER=""
SEE ALSO
argus(8)
07 November 2000 ARGUS.CONF(5)
