---
title: "Discover Proactive Linux Monitoring with Pandora FMS"
description: "Learn about how Pandora FMS is a powerful Linux monitoring tool that helps admins stay ahead of problems, identify trends, and optimize system performance."
canonical: "https://adamtheautomator.com/pandora-fms/"
---
# Discover Proactive Linux Monitoring with Pandora FMS
> Learn about how Pandora FMS is a powerful Linux monitoring tool that helps admins stay ahead of problems, identify trends, and optimize system performance.
Source: https://adamtheautomator.com/pandora-fms/
---
ATA Learning
Tap to hide
[
ATA Learning
](/)
* [Home](/)
* [Tutorials](/tutorials/)
* [Instructors](/author/)
* [Advertising](/advertising/)
* [Recommended Resources](/resources/)
* [About Adam](/about-adam/)
Search for:
* [](https://twitter.com/adbertram)
* [](https://github.com/Adam-the-Automator)
* [](https://www.linkedin.com/company/adam-the-automator-llc)
* [](/feed/)
# Discover Proactive Linux Monitoring with Pandora FMS
[Arvid Larson](https://adamtheautomator.com/author/arvid-larson/)13 January 20235 min. read
Categories: [IT Ops](/category/it-ops/)
Tags:[Monitoring](/tag/monitoring/)
Table of Contents
* [Prerequisites](#prerequisites)
* [Installing Pandora FMS via the Installer Script](#installing-pandora-fms-via-the-installer-script)
* [Logging in to Pandora FMS Administration Dashboard](#logging-in-to-pandora-fms-administration-dashboard)
* [Monitoring Servers via the Pandora FMS Agent](#monitoring-servers-via-the-pandora-fms-agent)
* [Checking the Target Monitoring via the Pandora FMS Dashboard](#checking-the-target-monitoring-via-the-pandora-fms-dashboard)
* [Conclusion](#conclusion)
Monitoring systems that allow you to monitor both networking devices and servers are essential in keeping your servers in tip-top shape. And if you do not have a monitoring system yet, why not consider Pandora FMS?
The Pandora FMS is an open-source monitoring tool that can be used to monitor networking devices, servers, and various applications. And in this tutorial, you will learn how to proactively monitor your server.
Ready? Stay tuned and keep tabs of your server activities real-time!
## Prerequisites
This tutorial will be a hands-on demonstration. To follow along, ensure you have the following:
* Two Rocky Linux Servers – This tutorial uses Rocky Linux 8.4 (Green Obsidian). Below are the details of the Rocky Linux servers:
| Hostname | IP Address | Used as |
| pfms-rocky | 192.168.5.50 | Pandora FMS Server |
| machine1 | 192.168.5.20 | Target Monitoring |
* A non-root user with sudo privileges on both servers.
## Installing Pandora FMS via the Installer Script
Pandora FMS supports high-availability monitoring for large datacenter and infrastructure. But before taking advantage of this monitoring tool, you must first install it on your server.
Pandora FMS can be installed in two ways:
* **Manual** – This option takes time since you will install Pandora FMS for each component, but gives you an insightful installation process.
* **Automatic** – This option lets you run an installer script, which is recommended by the official Pandora FMS Documentation.
But in this tutorial, you will install Pandora FMS via the installer script as follows:
1\. Log in to your Pandora FMS server via SSH.
Related:[How to Install and Use Kitty SSH Client](https://adamtheautomator.com/kitty-ssh/)
2\. Next, run the below `su` command to grab the root privileges. This command does not produce output but changes your prompt to root.
```bash
sudo su
```
3\. Once you are on the root, run the below [`env`](https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/env-command-in-linux-with-examples/) command to install the Pandora FMS monitoring Tool.
This command downloads the Pandora FMS installer script and runs it on your system. Be sure to adjust the following environment variables with your current environment.
```bash
env TZ='Europe/Stockholm' \
DBHOST='127.0.0.1' \
DBNAME='pandora' \
DBUSER='pandora' \
DBPASS='pandora' \
DBPORT='3306' \
DBROOTPASS='pandora' \
MYVER=57 \
PHPVER=8 \
SKIP_PRECHECK=0 \
SKIP_DATABASE_INSTALL=0 \
SKIP_KERNEL_OPTIMIZATIONS=0 \
PANDORA_SERVER_PACKAGE="https://firefly.artica.es/centos8/pandorafms_server-7.0NG.760.noarch.rpm" \
PANDORA_CONSOLE_PACKAGE="https://firefly.artica.es/centos8/pandorafms_console-7.0NG.760.noarch.rpm" \
PANDORA_AGENT_PACKAGE="https://firefly.artica.es/centos8/pandorafms_agent_unix-7.0NG.760_x86_64.rpm" \
PANDORA_BETA=0 \
sh -c "$(curl -fsSL )"
```
Installing Pandora FMS via the installer script
At first, the installer automatically detects your operating system (OS) and checks some basic tools for the Pandora FMS installation. Ensure the status for each process is `OK`, as shown below.
Checking the OS and basic tools
The installer then sets up additional repositories and installs dependencies for Pandora FMS.
Configuring repositories and installing dependencies
Once dependencies are installed, the installer script downloads and installs Pandora FMS packages. The installer script starts services, such as httpd, php-fpm, mariadb, and pandora\_server.
Installing Pandora FMS packages and starting services
After Pandora FMS is installed, you will see the default Pandora FSM administrator user `admin` with the password `pandora`.
Verifying Pandora FMS installation is complete
4\. Now, run the `systemctl status` command below to verify the Pandora FMS service (`pandora_server`) and ensure that the service is running.
```bash
sudo systemctl status pandora_server
```
Related:[Correct Way of Using Ubuntu systemctl to Control Systemd](https://adamtheautomator.com/ubuntu-systemctl/)
If the pandora\_service runs, you will see an output like the one below.
Checking the pandora\_server status
## Logging in to Pandora FMS Administration Dashboard
With the Pandora FMS installed, you will then visit and log in to your Pandora FMS to ensure the installation is successful. Moreover, you must change the default password of the Pandora FMS admin user to strengthen your Pandora FMS security.
To access your Pandora FMS administration dashboard:
1\. Open your favorite web browser and visit your Pandora FMS Server [IP address](https://adamtheautomator.com/get-an-ip-address-on-linux/) followed by the URL path `/pandora_console` (i.e., [http://192.168.5.50/pandora\_console/](http://192.168.5.50/pandora_console/*)).
Related:[Get an IP Address on Linux : Discover the Many Ways](https://adamtheautomator.com/get-an-ip-address-on-linux/)
Input the default user `admin` with the password `pandora`, and click **Login** to log in to the Pandora FMS dashboard.
Logging in to Pandora FMS Dashboard
Once logged in, you will see the following page, the Pandora FMS administration dashboard.
Overviewing the Pandora FMS administration dashboard
2\. Next, click **Profiles** (left pane) → **Manage users**, redirecting your browser to the USER MANAGEMENT page where you can modify user information.
Accessing the USER MANAGEMENT page
3\. Click the edit/setting button to modify the default **admin** user. You must change the default Pandora FMS admin password to secure your deployment.
Editing the default admin user
4\. Now, input and confirm the new password for your Pandora FMS server. Remember that setting a strong password is always the golden rule when providing credentials.
Changing the default admin password
5\. Lastly, scroll to the bottom of the page and click **Update** (bottom-right) to confirm changing the password.
Confirm change password
When the update is successful, you will see a message confirmation like the one below.
Verifying the successful password change
## Monitoring Servers via the Pandora FMS Agent
Without visibility into your servers’ activity can lead to everything going haywire. With this demand, server monitoring is crucial in keeping your business systems running. Luckily, Pandora FMS addresses both immediate and unforeseen operational issues.
The Pandora FMS supports two types of monitoring:
* **Agent-based monitoring** – executed locally and sends the result to the Pandora FMS server via software agent.
* **Remote** – executes processes through network checks.
But in this example, you will monitor a Rocky Linux host (machine1) via the former, the Pandora FMS agent, as follows:
1\. Log in to the machine1 server, and run the below [`dnf install`](https://dnf.readthedocs.io/en/latest/command_ref.html#install-command-label) command to install package dependencies for the Pandora FMS agent.
```bash
sudo dnf install -y unzip perl-Sys-Syslog perl-Archive-Zip perl-IO-Compress
```
Installing package dependencies for the Pandora FMS agent
2\. Next, run the following [`rpm`](https://linuxize.com/post/rpm-command-in-linux/) command to install the Pandora FMS agent.
```bash
sudo rpm -Uvh http://firefly.artica.es/pandorafms/latest/RHEL_CentOS/pandorafms_agent_unix-7.0NG.noarch.rpm
```
Installing the Pandora FMS Agent
3\. Once installed, open the Pandora FMS agent config file _/etc/pandora/pandora\_agent.conf_ using your preferred editor.
On the top of the line, change the `server_ip` value with your Pandora FMS server’s IP address, as shown below, save the changes and close the file.
Configuring Pandora FMS Agent
4\. Now, run the below `systemctl` commands to start and verify the `pandora_agent_daemon` service is running.
```bash
sudo systemctl start pandora_agent_daemon
sudo systemctl status pandora_agent_daemon
```
The output below confirms the **pandora\_agent\_daemon** is running.
Starting and verifying the pandora\_agent\_daemon service
## Checking the Target Monitoring via the Pandora FMS Dashboard
You have just added a Rocky Linux (machine1) to the Pandora FMS server via agent-based monitoring. But what comes next? You will have to verify the list of agents on the Pandora FMS server and ensure that the monitoring is successful.
1\. Click the Resource menu on the Pandora FMS administration dashboard and select **Manage Agents**. Your browser redirects to a page where you can see the list of available agents (step two).
Checking Pandora FMS agents
2\. Next, click **View** under the **machine1** node, as shown below, to access the node.
Seeing the **machine1** node available on the list of agents indicates you have successfully monitored the **machine1** node via the Pandora FMS Agent.
Accessing a Pandora FMS agent
At the top of the page, you will see information about the **machine1** node, like in the image below.
Monitoring node details
3\. Lastly, scroll to the bottom page to get a list of enabled modules for monitoring the machine1 node.
Below, you can see enabled modules for monitoring CPU, memory, disk usage, system load, and swap usage.
Viewing enabled modules for system monitoring
## Conclusion
Secure server monitoring undoubtedly is a top priority, which Pandora FMS provides. And in this tutorial, you have seen how the Pandora FMS dashboard helps you monitor and assess your servers in one place and in real time.
With this newfound knowledge, why not add target [monitoring via SNMP](https://pandorafms.com/manual/en/documentation/03_monitoring/03_remote_monitoring#snmp_monitoring) protocol for networking devices? At the same time, you can secure Pandora FMS with SSL/TLS certificates and set up [notifications or alerting systems](https://pandorafms.com/manual/en/documentation/04_using/01_alerts) for any events via email or SMS.
Share this article
[Share on X](https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Fpandora-fms%2F&text=Discover%20Proactive%20Linux%20Monitoring%20with%20Pandora%20FMS)[Share on Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Fpandora-fms%2F)[Share on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Fpandora-fms%2F)
## Related Posts
### [Utilizing Grafana & Prometheus Kubernetes Cluster Monitoring](/prometheus-kubernetes/)
Learn how to effectively monitor your Grafana and Prometheus Kubernetes cluster in this tutorial!
### [Deploying an EFK Stack with Docker](/efk-stack/)
Learn how to deploy the EFK stack, one of the most popular software stacks for log analysis and monitoring, in this step-by-step tutorial!
### [Getting Started with the Datadog Agent on Ubuntu Linux](/datadog-agent/)
Be alerted to problems before they get out of control by monitoring your Ubuntu hosts with the Datadog agent!
## Categories
* [IT Ops](/category/it-ops/)
* [Cloud](/category/cloud/)
* [DevOps](/category/devops/)
* [Home Ops](/category/home-ops/)
* [Information Security](/category/infosec/)
* [Software Development](/category/software-development/)
## Site
* [Home](/)
* [Tutorials](/tutorials/)
* [Instructors](/author/)
* [Advertising](/advertising/)
* [Recommended Resources](/resources/)
* [About Adam](/about-adam/)
Copyright 2026© ATA Learning | [Privacy Policy](/privacy/)