Cacti is a popular open-source network monitoring tool that allows you to collect data from multiple sources and create graphs to visually represent that data. In this tutorial, we will walk you through the steps to install Cacti on POP! OS Latest.
Before you begin, make sure you have the following:
A POP! OS Latest installation
Root or sudo access on your system
Update your system by running the following command:
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade
Cacti requires some packages to be installed on your system before you can successfully install it. Use the following command to install PHP, Apache2, MySQL, and some required PHP modules:
sudo apt install apache2 php7.4 libapache2-mod-php7.4 mysql-server php7.4-mysql php7.4-snmp php7.4-gd php7.4-cli php7.4-json php7.4-ldap php7.4-mbstring php7.4-net-socket rrdtool snmp snmpd
During the installation, you will be prompted to set up a root password for your MySQL server.
Use the following command to download the latest version of Cacti:
wget https://www.cacti.net/downloads/cacti-latest.tar.gz
Once the download is complete, extract the contents to the Apache webroot directory:
sudo tar xvzf cacti-latest.tar.gz -C /var/www/html/
Rename the extracted directory to "cacti":
sudo mv /var/www/html/cacti* /var/www/html/cacti
From the terminal, log in to MySQL as the root user:
sudo mysql -u root -p
Enter your root password, then create a new database for Cacti:
CREATE DATABASE cacti;
Create a new MySQL user and grant the user permission to access the Cacti database:
GRANT ALL ON cacti.* TO cactiuser@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'your_password_here';
Exit the MySQL prompt:
exit
Next, we need to configure some settings for Cacti to work properly.
Copy the Cacti configuration file:
sudo cp /var/www/html/cacti/include/config.php.dist /var/www/html/cacti/include/config.php
Open the configuration file with your editor of choice and update the following settings:
$database_type = 'mysql';
$database_default = 'cacti';
$database_hostname = 'localhost';
$database_username = 'cactiuser';
$database_password = 'your_password_here';
Create a new Apache configuration file for Cacti:
sudo nano /etc/apache2/conf-available/cacti.conf
Add the following lines to the file:
<Directory /var/www/html/cacti/>
AllowOverride all
</Directory>
Enable the new configuration:
sudo a2enconf cacti.conf
Restart Apache2:
sudo systemctl restart apache2
Navigate to the Cacti installation directory:
cd /var/www/html/cacti/
Run the installation script:
sudo php install.php
Follow the prompts to complete the installation process.
Now we need to make some final configuration changes to get Cacti up and running.
Create a new crontab entry for Cacti:
sudo crontab -e
Add the following line to the file:
*/5 * * * * www-data /usr/bin/php /var/www/html/cacti/poller.php > /dev/null 2>&1
Save and close the file.
Restart SNMP daemon:
sudo systemctl restart snmpd
Open your web browser and enter the IP address of your POP! OS Latest machine followed by /cacti in the URL bar:
http://your_server_ip/cacti
You should now see the Cacti login page.
Congratulations, you have successfully installed Cacti on POP! OS Latest. You can now use Cacti to monitor your network and create graphs representing your network data.
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