Web Server Administration

1
Web Server Administration

• Chapter 11
• Monitoring and Analyzing the Web Environment

2
Overview

• Monitor operating systems
• Monitor Web servers
• Monitor other Web applications
• Learn about some analysis tools for Web servers

3
Monitoring Operating Systems

• Typically you analyze log files
• They contain information regarding certain events
• Logs are used to detect problems
• OS, application, or security problems
• Various tools can monitor performance
• Should create baseline at beginning of OS
  lifecycle for comparison purposes

4
Monitoring Windows

• Performance monitoring allows you to compare
  system performance over time
• You can set multiple counters and watch them in
  real-time
• Windows Task Manager highlights CPU and memory
  usage
• You can modify services to notify you if a
  service fails

5
Windows Event Viewer

• The event viewer contains six event types shown
  in the left pane

6
Windows Event Logs

• System and application events display three
  levels of messages
• Information
• Warning
• Error
• Because many messages can be generated, a filter
  focuses on what you want to see
• Over time, the logs fill up so you should clear
  them or save them

7
Monitoring IIS

• IIS has specific counters for use in the
  Performance Monitor
• The System event viewer provides specific
  information
• If IIS did not start, you can find out why
• IIS has extensive logging capabilities
• Default log format used by various third-party
  applications that analyze logs
• You can create custom logs

8
Sample IIS Log
9
Analysis Tools for the Web Server

• Analysis tools extract system data from logs and
  format the data
• Webalizer is popular in the Linux world but also
  available for Windows. It is free and generates
  reports in a graphic format.
• For IIS, one of the popular tools is WebTrends
  from NetIQ
• Helps you determine the source of Web traffic
• Determines which pages are most popular
• Nearly 50 different reports
• 123LogAnalyzer is available for both IIS and
  Apache
• Many reports are similar to WebTrends
• However, you cannot compare reports over time

10
Summary

• Monitoring operating systems typically involves
  performance monitor graphics and analyzing log
  files
• When monitoring systems, start with a baseline
• In Windows, Event Viewer is the primary utility
• BIND 9 DNS has extensive logging capability
• Analysis tools take data in logs and help you
  make sense of it in an easy to read format