2 Debian/Ubuntu/Raspbian

Overview

Official Zabbix packages are available for:

• Debian 10 (Buster)
• Debian 9 (Stretch)
• Debian 8 (Jessie)
• Ubuntu 20.04 (Focal Fossa) LTS
• Ubuntu 18.04 (Bionic Beaver) LTS
• Ubuntu 16.04 (Xenial Xerus) LTS
• Ubuntu 14.04 (Trusty Tahr) LTS
• Raspbian (Buster)
• Raspbian (Stretch)

Adding Zabbix repository

Install the repository configuration package. This package contains apt (software package manager) configuration files.

For Debian 10, run the following commands:

Note! For Debian 9, substitute 'buster' with 'stretch' in the commands. For Debian 8, substitute 'buster' with 'jessie' in the commands.

# wget https://repo.zabbix.com/zabbix/4.0/debian/pool/main/z/zabbix-release/zabbix-release_4.0-2+buster_all.deb
       # dpkg -i zabbix-release_4.0-2+buster_all.deb
       # apt update

For Ubuntu 20.04 (focal), run the following commands:

# wget https://repo.zabbix.com/zabbix/4.0/ubuntu/pool/main/z/zabbix-release/zabbix-release_4.0-3+focal_all.deb
       # dpkg -i zabbix-release_4.0-3+focal_all.deb
       # apt update

• For Ubuntu 18.04, substitute 'focal' with 'bionic' in the commands.
• For Ubuntu 16.04, substitute 'focal' with 'xenial' in the commands.
• For Ubuntu 14.04, substitute 'focal' with 'trusty' in the commands.

For Raspbian, run the following commands:

# wget https://repo.zabbix.com/zabbix/4.0/raspbian/pool/main/z/zabbix-release/zabbix-release_4.0-2+buster_all.deb
       # dpkg -i zabbix-release_4.0-2+buster_all.deb
       # apt update

Server/proxy/frontend installation

To install Zabbix server with MySQL support:

# apt install zabbix-server-mysql

To install Zabbix proxy with MySQL support:

# apt install zabbix-proxy-mysql

To install Zabbix frontend:

# apt install zabbix-frontend-php

Substitute 'mysql' in the commands with 'pgsql' to use PostgreSQL, or with 'sqlite3' to use SQLite3 (proxy only).

Creating database

For Zabbix server and proxy daemons a database is required. It is not needed to run Zabbix agent.

Create the database using the provided instructions for MySQL or PostgreSQL.

Importing data

Now import initial schema and data for the server with MySQL:

# zcat /usr/share/doc/zabbix-server-mysql/create.sql.gz | mysql -uzabbix -p zabbix

You will be prompted to enter your newly created database password.

With PostgreSQL:

# zcat /usr/share/doc/zabbix-server-pgsql/create.sql.gz | sudo -u zabbix psql zabbix

For proxy, import initial schema:

# zcat /usr/share/doc/zabbix-proxy-mysql/schema.sql.gz | mysql -uzabbix -p zabbix

For proxy with PostgreSQL (or SQLite):

# zcat /usr/share/doc/zabbix-proxy-pgsql/schema.sql.gz | sudo -u zabbix psql zabbix
       # zcat /usr/share/doc/zabbix-proxy-sqlite3/schema.sql.gz | sqlite3 zabbix.db

Configure database for Zabbix server/proxy

Edit zabbix_server.conf (and zabbix_proxy.conf) to use their respective databases. For example:

# vi /etc/zabbix/zabbix_server.conf
       DBHost=localhost
       DBName=zabbix
       DBUser=zabbix
       DBPassword=<password>

In DBPassword use Zabbix database password for MySQL; PosgreSQL user password for PosgreSQL.

Use DBHost= with PostgreSQL. You might want to keep the default setting DBHost=localhost (or an IP address), but this would make PostgreSQL use a network socket for connecting to Zabbix. Refer to the respective section for RHEL/CentOS for instructions.

Starting Zabbix server process

It's time to start Zabbix server process and make it start at system boot:

# service zabbix-server start
       # update-rc.d zabbix-server enable

Substitute 'zabbix-server' with 'zabbix-proxy' to start Zabbix proxy process.

SELinux configuration

Refer to the respective section for RHEL/CentOS.

As frontend and SELinux configuration is done, you need to restart Apache web server:

# service apache2 restart

Frontend configuration

Apache configuration file for Zabbix frontend is located in /etc/apache2/conf-enabled/zabbix.conf. Some PHP settings are already configured. But it's necessary to uncomment the "date.timezone" setting and set the right timezone for you.

php_value max_execution_time 300
       php_value memory_limit 128M
       php_value post_max_size 16M
       php_value upload_max_filesize 2M
       php_value max_input_time 300
       php_value max_input_vars 10000
       php_value always_populate_raw_post_data -1
       # php_value date.timezone Europe/Riga

Now you are ready to proceed with frontend installation steps which will allow you to access your newly installed Zabbix.

Note that a Zabbix proxy does not have a frontend; it communicates with Zabbix server only.

Agent installation

To install the agent, run

# apt install zabbix-agent

To start the agent, run:

# service zabbix-agent start

If you want to run Zabbix agent as root, see here.

Java gateway installation

It is required to install Java gateway only if you want to monitor JMX applications. Java gateway is lightweight and does not require a database.

Once the required repository is added, you can install Zabbix Java gateway by running:

# apt install zabbix-java-gateway

Proceed to setup for more details on configuring and running Java gateway.