Package: nagios-plugins
Version: 1.4-6
Severity: normal

Check_ntp calls "ntpdate -q $host", which determines the offset of the
nagios host from $host. It then has this gem:

        $offset = $2;

        # An offset of 0.000000 with an error is probably bogus. Actually,
        # it's probably always bogus, but let's be paranoid here.
        if ($offset == 0) { undef $offset;}

        $ntpdate_error = defined ($offset) ? $ERRORS{"OK"} : 
$ERRORS{"CRITICAL"};

There's two problems: the first is that the comment doesn't match the
actual code; there's no check for an error, just the assumption that
"offset == 0.0" is an error.

The second problem is that if "$host" is "localhost" (i.e the host
running nagios), it's completely legitimate that the offset is 0 --
that's the whole *point* of ntp. As a practical matter, it tends to
flip between 0 and very small values, so nagios is continually swappign
between OK and CRITICAL.

For that matter, there's a third problem: the whole ntpdate check is
wrong headed. It compares the time on the nagios host to the time on the
host being monitored, which is irrelevant to the quality of time on the
remote host. The ntpq check is the proper one; the ntpdate check should
be removed entirely, which, since ntpdate is deprecated, would be just
as well.

Regards,
Steve

-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (900, 'unstable'), (500, 'stable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell:  /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.11-1-686
Locale: LANG=C, LC_CTYPE=C (charmap=ANSI_X3.4-1968)

Versions of packages nagios-plugins depends on:
ii  dnsutils               1:9.3.1-2         Clients provided with BIND
ii  fping                  2.4b2-to-ipv6-11  sends ICMP ECHO_REQUEST packets to
ii  host                   20000331-9        utility for querying DNS servers
ii  iputils-ping           3:20020927-2      Tools to test the reachability of 
ii  libc6                  2.3.2.ds1-22      GNU C Library: Shared libraries an
ii  libldap2               2.1.30-11         OpenLDAP libraries
ii  libmysqlclient12       4.0.24-10         mysql database client library
ii  libnet-snmp-perl       5.0.1-1           Script SNMP connections
ii  libpq3                 1:7.4.8-13        PostgreSQL C client library
ii  libssl0.9.7            0.9.7g-1          SSL shared libraries
ii  ntp                    1:4.2.0a+stable-8 Network Time Protocol: network uti
ii  ntp-simple             1:4.2.0a+stable-8 Network Time Protocol: daemon for 
ii  ntpdate                1:4.2.0a+stable-8 The ntpdate client for setting sys
ii  procps                 1:3.2.5-1         /proc file system utilities
ii  qstat                  2.8-1             Command-line tool for querying qua
ii  radiusclient1          0.3.2-8           /bin/login replacement which uses 
ii  smbclient              3.0.14a-6         a LanManager-like simple client fo
ii  snmp                   5.1.2-6.1         NET SNMP (Simple Network Managemen

Versions of packages nagios-plugins recommends:
ii  nagios-text [nagios 2:1.3-cvs.20050402-4 A host/service/network monitoring 

-- no debconf information


-- 
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Reply via email to