Introduction to Sensu

Introduction to Sensu

Sensu is a monitoring framework.

Sensu Server

The Sensu server schedules and publishes check execution requests to client subscriptions (via a Publish/Subscribe model), and provides a scalable event processing platform for processing check results and monitoring events.

Sensu Clients 

Sensu clients are monitoring agents, which are installed and run on every system (e.g. server, container, etc) that needs to be monitored. The client is responsible for registering the system with Sensu.

Sensu check

Sensu checks are commands executed by the Sensu client which monitor a condition (e.g. is Nginx running?) or collect measurements (e.g. how much disk space do I have left?).

Sensu named aggregate

Sensu named aggregates are collections of check results.

Sensu events

A Sensu Event is created every time a check result is processed by the Sensu server.

Sensu Silencing

Silencing is used to prevent handlers from being triggered based on the check name present in a check result.

Sensu Filters

Sensu Filters (also called Event Filters) allows you to filter events destined for one or more event Handlers

Sensu Mutator

Sensu mutators are executable scripts or other programs that modify event data for Sensu event handlers

Sensu Handler

Sensu event handlers are actions executed by the Sensu server on events, such as sending an email alert, creating or resolving an incident.

Sensu Plugins

Sensu plugins provide executable scripts or other programs that can be used as Sensu checks (i.e. to monitor server resources, services, and application health, or collect & analyze metrics), Sensu handlers (i.e. to send notifications or perform other actions based on Sensu events), or Sensu mutators (i.e. to modify event data prior to handling)

Sensu Data Store

Sensu services use a data store (Redis) to persist in monitoring data, including the Sensu client registry, check results, check execution history, and current event data.

Sensu Transport

Sensu services use a message bus (e.g. RabbitMQ) for communication. This message bus communication is provided by the Sensu Transport

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