Bounty $200: Monitor bandwidth use on IP adresses. NOW $250
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Newbie here - to both pfSense and the "Bounty" approach!
Just sent in 25.00. Thanks for the efforts.
Very simple pfSense installation here (AFAIK!). I just installed BandWidthD - no probs. It's the only package I've installed.
The "Config" screen pops up perfectly. But, the "Access" screen is not happy. On about 50% of attempts, it immediately says that there's no data. The other 50% just throws a totally blank screen, and sits there for a "helluva" long time - probably forever - I've sometimes left it for 15-20 mins. And I cannot explain why I'm getting these 2 variations…
So:
- Any quick suggestions. I've tried various settings on the Config screen, with no apparent affect on the results.
- I would also appreciate a few additional notes on each config option, preferably with recommendations on what to include or exclude... Right now, I don't know what some of them mean.Thank you.
- Mike -
Not sure why it would "pause" since its the same web server serving the webConfigurator and the bandwidthd static pages.
I'll look into expanding the option text. I basically copied the text verbatim from the bandwidth.conf file.
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Not sure why it would "pause" since its the same web server serving the webConfigurator and the bandwidthd static pages.
Absolutely nothing shows on the screen. So, it might be useful to show "some" message, and, if the generation of the graphs is likely to take some time, then, maybe, some sort of "progress-bar".
And, there's "loadsa" traffic through the router, so I reckon I should never get the "empty" message…
Oh, I tried Firefox and IE...
I'll look into expanding the option text. I basically copied the text verbatim from the bandwidth.conf file.
Thank you - I tried numerous combos of the options, hoping to get some data…, but it's still either nada, or the "nada" message.
Let me know if I can run any tests, traces...
- Mike -
I have had this problem too is seems to take a moment after install to generate the first graph. This looks ok after the first graph generation. Then after maybe one more cycle it fills index.html with nothing (if you look at the raw file via ssh it is empty) sometimes index2.html has some content for longer but leave it for a night and they are all blank.
If it helps I have a CARP setup that may be confusing it. I also have the snort package installed so are they both trying to use the same interface and that is confusing it.
If you restart the service the whole process starts again.
I am not hugely into using this package so I have removed it now but I will test any changes
As an aside we use Argus and rrd-tool on our current firewall to generate data like this. I installed argus from BSD (pkg_add etc) and it works fine on Pfsense. I started working on a package but haven't had any time to really work on it. Maybe someone else would do better.
for info on argus see http://www.qosient.com/argus/
Thanks for a great project
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Trivial updates…
I just installed NTOP and DarkStat, and they are collecting and displaying data with no obvious problems. Which suggests that the PC itself, pfSense, etc, etc, is probably running correctly, and that the "blank-page" is an issue with BandWidthD.
Also, any time today that I tried to access the graphs in BandWidthD, I always got the "blank-screen". Previously, I was randomly getting either the totally-blank-screen, or the logo and a note that there was no data to graph, but the latter has not appeared for some time.
Also, could someone please suggest what value I should use in each field in the Options page? I want to monitor "LAN" traffic, per internal IP.
Thank you,
- Mike -
By default you do not need to enable any options besides picking the LAN interface.
Sorry but I am having trouble reproducing the issue you outline. But I can say that running NTOP and BandwidthD at the same time is not a good idea…
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@MJK:
Also, could someone please suggest what value I should use in each field in the Options page? I want to monitor "LAN" traffic, per internal IP.
Your may have unsupported network cards (bandwidthd issue not pfsense). So if you ain't got errors in system logs try with another network adapter using default settings.
/Perry
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@MJK:
Also, could someone please suggest what value I should use in each field in the Options page? I want to monitor "LAN" traffic, per internal IP.
Your may have unsupported network cards (bandwidthd issue not pfsense). So if you ain't got errors in system logs try with another network adapter using default settings.
/Perry
That is very true. We discussed this in the beginning of the thread if someone has overlooked it.
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Thanks to Scott and Perry for responses.
I'll gladly uninstall NTOP - I was just wondering…..
I'm using the same card for the WAN and LAN sides - an old "standard" 10/100 SMC card; using the 83C171A2QF chip. I think this is very common NIC. Is there some list of supported cards that I can check, and I could then try one that's definitely supported.
It might be useful if BandWidthD could check for compatible NICs, or indicate if the NIC is not responding properly. Also, would an incompatible card be more likely to produce no traffic, or crazy traffic, rather than upset the reporting functions? IOW, are the reporting functions working on the data that has been previously collected, rather than accessing the NICs directly?
Also, the Router itself has been in serious use over recent days, with no comms problems whatsoever.
Many thanks again,
- Mike -
Slight update on the NICs…
SMC NIC, IC is 83c17x, also coded SMC 9432TX, also known as the EPIC version...
Seems it's supported wit the TX(4) drivers in FreeBSD/i386 6.1 - apologies if this info is useless...
http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=tx&sektion=4&manpath=FreeBSD+6.1-RELEASE
- Mike
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I've re-tried accessing the stats on BandWidthD, but I'm still getting a totally blank screen.
I looked in the HTDOCS folder; it contains:
- about 20 PNG files, typically about 2KB to 3KB in size
- a few "subnet"… HTML files, also about 2KB in size.
- 4 INDEX.HTML files (Index, Index2, Index3, and Index4), each has a size of 0.
- A few other misc files.Anyone know if all these are Ok, especially the "0" size in the Index files?
Thank you,
- Mike -
Most likely another bug in bandwidthd.
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WOW, that was fast! Thank you.
I presume you're referring to the "0" files? Do the 2KB/3KB files suggest that the SMC NICs are supported properly?
Seems many others have had similar experiences - ie, empty reports, and, perhaps, with similar causes.
Anything I can do to help investigate - let me know, but you'll have to give me "stooopid" instructions! I may have to install the Router at it's targeted site over the next few days, so we may not have unlimited time to crack this one.
- Mike -
I don't trust any nics except intel or 3com under FreeBSD. That very well could be the problem.
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OK.
I'll try to locate some Intel or 3com NICs, and let you know the results.
Thanks again,
- Mike -
Some more significant feedback:
Logging:
I tried with "Log to CDF" switched on; some large CDF files are being created/updated in /usr/local/bandwidthd/, one is 250KB, another 110KB, etc. These files have just integer values inside, as well as IP addresses, etc, and the layout seems exactly as expected, based on some websearches I ran. While there's active traffic on the LAN NIC, these files are being updated, which indicates that BandWidthD is monitoring the traffic…Analysing:
The PNG files, etc, in /usr/local/bandwidthd/htdocs/ are also being refreshed frequently, from every few minutes to every 10/15/20/30 mins, depending on traffic. Also as expected - these are being updated from the logged data. The 4 x INDEX.HTML files are also being refreshed every xx minutes, BUT, they are always totally empty. When I manually put some data into these files, that content appeared on the BWD Access screen.So... BandWidthD is simply not creating the INDEX files. Maybe we're getting real close! Anyone any ideas on where their contents comes from - from bandwidthd code, or from some other apps, or copied out of some other master files, or...
Seems many others have had similar experiences, including:
http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=1365577&group_id=89685&atid=591011...and it "got resolved"... somehow...
http://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?thread_id=986168&forum_id=308609
This user just re-cycled stopping and starting BWD, and, magically, the INDEX files were built again. I've tried that sequence a little also, with kill or killall, and with/without "-HUP", but, here, the INDEX files have not kicked into life.All suggestions welcome! I'm now guessing there's no need to change the NICs.
- Mike -
i will contrib $25 to this bounty
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Comment for Scott, in case it's of any interest:
While still messing with the non-creation of the INDEX files, I sometimes tweaked that actual BANDWIDTHD.CONF file manually. If this file is updated via the GUI, I noticed the following:
- If the LAN/WAN option is changed, then internal subnet is automatically inserted (LAN), or removed (WAN). Nice!
- The SKIP_INTERVALS, GRAPH (draw graphs), and META_REFRESH parameters are not inserted to the CONF file. However, they are retained (somewhere?) for the GUI!
- All other parameters are retained in the CONF file, as per the GUI.Re the persistent non-updating of the INDEX files:
- I looked, briefly, at the source.
- There's one proc to create "empty" INDEX files, with a message that there's no data to graph - I'm assuming that proc is not being used (though ASS-U-ME could be tragic!!).
- The proc "MakeIndexPages()" is defined in GRAPH.C, and called from BANDWIDTHD.C. It refreshes the INDEX files, and the SUBNET-xxx-xxx.HTML files. If it has trouble opening the INDEX files, a message should appear in the LOG files.In my case:
- I get no messages in the LOG file. Maybe "logging" is broken?
- The INDEX.HTML files are created/overwritten - based on the time-stamp. If I delete the files, they're re-created. But, no data is retained in them. Perhaps some data is written, but the "closing" is broken?
- The SUBNET-xx-xx.HTML files are NOT refreshed, through the code should attempt to re-build these also.
- …suggesting that the proc blows up at an early stage??
- File-Permissions look OK to me.
- Inserting some traces, and re-compiling the package is probably beyond me......just in case anything here rings bells with others who have had similar experiences...
- Mike
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Hi, thanks for this great package, I have it up running just fine but have a little problem
I got 2 WAN's and a wired LAN and a wireless LAN that is bridged to the wired and as such with monitoring on the LAN I am seeing the local traffic between the wired and wireless. I see that there is a field to enter in filter rules but I got no idea how to format them to ignore local traffic. Googling hasn't turned up anything that I can follow, so has anyone got a link to a page that shows all the options and how to use them or can even just give me the command needed to filter local traffic.
Thanks,
Dan. -
Thats a good question. I reinstalled the FreeBSD package and it did not contain a man page. I'll poke around and see if I can locate something.