AWS EC2 Instances Test

An Amazon Machine Image (AMI) contains all information necessary to boot instances of your software. For example, an AMI might contain all the software to act as a web server (e.g., Linux, Apache, and your web site) or it might contain all the software to act as a Hadoop node (e.g., Linux, Hadoop, and a custom application). After an AMI is launched, the resulting running system is called an instance. All instances based on the same AMI start out identical and any information on them is lost when the instances are terminated or fail.

Users with valid AWS user accounts can sign into the cloud to view and use available instances, or purchase and launch new ones. With the help of this test, you can determine the total number of instances that are currently available for the configured AWS user account, the number of instances that were newly purchased/terminated, and the count of powered-off instances.

Target of the test: Amazon Cloud

Agent deploying the test: A remote agent

Output of the test: One set of results for the AWS Cloud being monitored

Configurable parameters for the test
Parameter Description

Test Period

How often should the test be executed.

Host

The host for which the test is to be configured.

Access Type

eG Enterprise monitors the AWS cloud using AWS API. By default, the eG agent accesses the AWS API using a valid AWS account ID, which is assigned a special role that is specifically created for monitoring purposes. Accordingly, the Access Type parameter is set to Role by default. Furthermore, to enable the eG agent to use this default access approach, you will have to configure the eG tests with a valid AWS Account ID to Monitor and the special AWS Role Name you created for monitoring purposes.

Some AWS cloud environments however, may not support the role-based approach. Instead, they may allow cloud API requests only if such requests are signed by a valid Access Key and Secret Key. When monitoring such a cloud environment therefore, you should change the Access Type to Secret. Then, you should configure the eG tests with a valid AWS Access Key and AWS Secret Key.

Note that the Secret option may not be ideal when monitoring high-security cloud environments. This is because, such environments may issue a security mandate, which would require administrators to change the Access Key and Secret Key, often. Because of the dynamicity of the key-based approach, Amazon recommends the Role-based approach for accessing the AWS API.

AWS Account ID to Monitor

This parameter appears only when the Access Type parameter is set to Role. Specify the AWS Account ID that the eG agent should use for connecting and making requests to the AWS API. To determine your AWS Account ID, follow the steps below:

  • Login to the AWS management console. with your credentials.

  • Click on your IAM user/role on the top right corner of the AWS Console. You will see a drop-down menu containing the Account ID (see Figure 1).

    Identifying AWS Account ID

    Figure 1 : Identifying the AWS Account ID

AWS Role Name

This parameter appears when the Access Type parameter is set to Role. Specify the name of the role that you have specifically created on the AWS cloud for monitoring purposes. The eG agent uses this role and the configured Account ID to connect to the AWS Cloud and pull the required metrics. To know how to create such a role, refer to Creating a New Role.

AWS Access Key, AWS Secret Key, Confirm AWS Access Key, Confirm AWS Secret Key

These parameters appear only when the Access Type parameter is set to Secret.To monitor an Amazon cloud instance using the Secret approach, the eG agent has to be configured with the access key and secret key of a user with a valid AWS account. For this purpose, we recommend that you create a special user on the AWS cloud, obtain the access and secret keys of this user, and configure this test with these keys. The procedure for this has been detailed in the Obtaining an Access key and Secret key topic. Make sure you reconfirm the access and secret keys you provide here by retyping it in the corresponding Confirm text boxes.

Proxy Host and Proxy Port

In some environments, all communication with the AWS cloud and its regions could be routed through a proxy server. In such environments, you should make sure that the eG agent connects to the cloud via the proxy server and collects metrics. To enable metrics collection via a proxy, specify the IP address of the proxy server and the port at which the server listens against the Proxy Host and Proxy Port parameters. By default, these parameters are set to none , indicating that the eG agent is not configured to communicate via a proxy, by default.

Proxy User Name, Proxy Password, and Confirm Password

If the proxy server requires authentication, then, specify a valid proxy user name and password in the proxy user name and proxy password parameters, respectively. Then, confirm the password by retyping it in the CONFIRM PASSWORD text box. By default, these parameters are set to none, indicating that the proxy sever does not require authentication by default.

Proxy Domain and Proxy Workstation

If a Windows NTLM proxy is to be configured for use, then additionally, you will have to configure the Windows domain name and the Windows workstation name required for the same against the proxy domain and proxy workstation parameters. If the environment does not support a Windows NTLM proxy, set these parameters to none.

Exclude Region

Here, you can provide a comma-separated list of region names or patterns of region names that you do not want to monitor. For instance, to exclude regions with names that contain 'east' and 'west' from monitoring, your specification should be: *east*,*west*

Cloudwatch Enabled

This parameter only applies to the AWS - Aggregated Resource Usage test. This test reports critical metrics pertaining to the resource usage of the server instances launched in the cloud. If you want this test to report resource usage metrics very frequently - say, once every minute or lesser - you will have to configure the tests to use the AWS CloudWatchservice. This is a paidweb service that enables you to monitor, manage, and publish various metrics, as well as configure alarm actions based on data from metrics. To enable is test to use this service, set the CloudWatch Enabled flag to Yes. On the other hand, to report resource usage metrics less frequently - say, once in 5 minutes or more - this test does not require the AWS CloudWatchservice; in this case therefore, set the cloudwatch enabled flag to No. Note that for enabling CloudWatch, you will have to pay CloudWatch fees. For the fee details, refer to the AWS web site.

Exclude Instance

This parameter applies only to AWS- Instance Connectivity, AWS- Instance Resources , and AWS- Instance Uptime tests. In the Exclude Instance text box, provide a comma-separated list of instance names or instance name patterns that you do not wish to monitor. For example: i-b0c3e*,*7dbe56d. By default, this parameter is set to none.

Detailed Diagnosis

To make diagnosis more efficient and accurate, the eG Enterprise embeds an optional detailed diagnostic capability. With this capability, the eG agents can be configured to run detailed, more elaborate tests as and when specific problems are detected. To enable the detailed diagnosis capability of this test for a particular server, choose the On option. To disable the capability, click on the Off option.

The option to selectively enable/disable the detailed diagnosis capability will be available only if the following conditions are fulfilled:

  • The eG manager license should allow the detailed diagnosis capability
  • Both the normal and abnormal frequencies configured for the detailed diagnosis measures should not be 0.

Measures reported by the test:

Measurement Description Measurement Unit Interpretation

Total instances:

Indicates the total number of instances currently available for the configured AWS user account.

Number

The detailed diagnosis capability of this measure, if enabled, shows the details of all the instances available for use for the configured AWS account, regardless of the current state of the instances.

Instances powered on:

Indicates the total number of instances that are currently powered-on.

Number

The detailed diagnosis capability of this measure, if enabled, shows the details of all the powered-on instances available for use for the configured AWS account.

Instances powered off:

Indicates the total number of instances that are currently powered-off.

Number

The detailed diagnosis capability of this measure, if enabled, shows the details of all the powered-off instances available for the configured AWS account.

Added instances:

Indicates the total number of instances that were newly purchased by the configured AWS user account during the last measurement period.

Number

The detailed diagnosis capability of this measure, if enabled, shows the details of all the instances that were newly purchased and launched by the configured AWS user account.

Removed instances:

Indicates the total number of instances that were newly terminated by the configured AWS user account during the last measurement period.

Number

The detailed diagnosis capability of this measure, if enabled, shows the details of all the instances that were newly terminated/removed by the configured AWS user account.