Re: How To Find/List Remote Unix Servers

I guess the question is: Are you the administrator of these machines?

If so, you should already know about them and keep a database of them so you know what and why they are. We have had to create a mysql datase and use it to keep track of the 200+ servers that we maintain. It was a lot of work but has been more that well worth the effort. From that list we maintain a status of each server and scripts (shell and perl) that keep track of the configurations to a central webserver.

If you are just looking for any Unix server thay may be out there on your network I would have to agree that nmap is what you might need but should be used with a lot of caution.

-Kurt

Comment on Re: How To Find/List Remote Unix Servers

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Re: Re: How To Find/List Remote Unix Servers by Mitch (Sexton) on Feb 14, 2003 at 17:22 UTC
Actually, I'm an administrator for the Windows systems. We have created and automated server inventory for our Windows domains and systems. However, I've been recently asked to do the same for the UNIX devices. The UNIX team doesn't have dynamic/semi-dynamic inventory records. I'm trying to get as much background information as possible before working with them. Once I can discover the UNIX servers the rest of the code should be easy accessing and reporting the inventory - OS information. Mitch	[reply]
Re: How To Find/List Remote Unix Servers by skx (Parson) on Feb 14, 2003 at 20:01 UTC
If, once you've found the machines, you want to run some sort of inventory system upon each of them, it sounds like you're going about this the wrong way. Rather than have one 'client' detect each Unix server - then demand it reports over it's software list/hardware information (or whatever) it seems to make more sense to get each server to send it's details to a "well known" reporting machine. This is what I've done upon my machines at work. Each server has SSH setup to allow automatic logins to a lowlevel account upon a spare Linux box. Once this is setup it's trivial to write a perl script to install upon each server to write out the machines users/load/package details/etc to a text file, and use 'scp' to store it upon the reporting server. The reporting server can then read the details from all hosts, and summerize to a daily email, or present the data interactively with CGI scripts, etc. If I've misunderstood your question please feel free to comment.. Steve --- steve.org.uk	[reply]
Re: Re: How To Find/List Remote Unix Servers by Mitch (Sexton) on Feb 18, 2003 at 16:22 UTC
This is a good idea and is in fact what we do on the windows side for some statistics. However, in addition to just finding UNIX system info we want to be able to "discover" servers. In other words we want to be able to find UNIX servers that haven't been properly documented over the years, so we can be sure we have a complete server inventory. Thanks for the feedback. Mitch	[reply]