View source for Roadmap

== Description ==

Life goes on. Which features are planned in future releases? This page is more a list of ideas than a fixed plan for the future, but it may give you an idea where the journey is going. If you want to contribute but don't know what is to be done, simply [[Mailing list|drop us a short mail]] and we'll get you started.

This file is not automatically generated and may thus be out of date from time to time. To give you an idea how fresh this information is please take a look at its history.

== Implemented features ==

The following features have been implemented and will be released with the next minor version. You can check out our [[Git repository]] to test these features. They can be found in {{GitBranch|master}}. Any feedback and bug reports are welcome! 

=== {{Plugin|Varnish}} ===

''Jérôme Renard'' has implemented a plugin which reads statistics from ''Varnish'', a caching proxy server for web applications. His code is available from {{Github | user=jeromer}}. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 11:17, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|Redis}} ===

A new ''Redis'' plugin has been written by ''Andrés J. Díaz''. It connects to one or more ''Redis'' databases and queries statistics such as commands received, memory allocated and connected clients. The code was merged into {{GitBranch|master}} on August&nbsp;17.

==== {{Plugin|Write Redis}} ====

A plugin for writing ''collectd'' data to a Redis database was written by ''[[User:Octo|Florian Forster]]''. It was merged into {{GitBranch|master}} on August&nbsp;17.

=== Thresholds ===

''Andrés J. Díaz'' has written a patch that introduces a global <code>timeout_g</code> variable rather than the hard-coded default (two). The patch has been sent to the mailing list on ''December 17, 2009''.
* Available in {{GitBranch|master}} since August&nbsp;25. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 00:11, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|AMQP}} ===
:→ {{Github | user=spahl | repository=collectd | branch=amqp}}, http://github.com/spahl/collectd/commits/amqp

''Sebastien Pahl'' has written a write plugin which sends values via the [http://www.amqp.org/ ''Advanced Message Queuing Protocol''] (AMQP). It is using ''librabbitmq'' to do so. The code is available from the [http://github.com/spahl/collectd/commits/amqp amqp branch] on ''github''.

* I've rebase the code to the ''master'' branch and contacted ''Sebastien'' for some feedback. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 13:26, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
* Sending and receiving data via AMQP is now possible. Possible future todos:
** Use the ''parsetree'' interface of ''YAJL'' to parse received ''JSON'' data. Currently, the parsetree code has not yet been merged into YAJL's master branch.
** Possibly rename the ''AMQP plugin'' to ''Write AMQP''. For consistency's sake it might be best to rename the {{Plugin|CSV}}, {{Plugin|RRDtool}} and {{Plugin|RRDCacheD}}, too. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 06:55, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
*** No, since the AMQP plugin can send ''and'' receive values, renaming the plugin is not appropriate. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 20:43, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
* Merged to {{GitBranch|master}}. Parsing JSON still not possible, though. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 08:42, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|LPAR}} ===

''Aurélien Reynaud'' has sent a patch for an ''Logical Partitions'' ''(LPAR)'' plugin to the mailing list on ''August&nbsp;10''. It collects information about the (a?) virtualization infrastructure of AIX. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 07:23, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
* Merged to {{GitBranch|master}}. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 08:44, 6 November 2010 (UTC)


=== Per-plugin interval configuration ===

[[User:Tokkee|Sebastian 'tokkee' Harl]] implemented per-plugin interval support. It is included in the core since [[Version_5.2|version 5.2]].

 # foobar is updated every 42 seconds.
 <LoadPlugin "foobar">
   Interval 42
 </LoadPlugin>
 # qux is updated with the global default interval.
 LoadPlugin "qux"

----

== Planned features ==

The following features are actively being worked upon. They are in various stages of completion and may or may not make it into the next release. They should have a contact (name) associated with them, so people who are interested can contact the person working on a feature. Please don't add email addresses of other people without their permission. If you want to contact a person below, please look for the email address using the mailing list archives.

=== [[Plans for 5.0]] ===

Backwards incompatible changes have been collected on the ''[[Version 5.0/Plans]]'' page. Make sure every point raised there has either been addressed or has actively been dismissed (i.e. not forgotten about).

=== perfmon output ===

<em>Dave McLellan</em> is looking into a text output plugin which creates <em>perfmon</em> compatible output (last contact: April 15<sup>th</sup>, 2009). See also: [[#output_text_plugin]]

=== Library for binary network protocol ===

Write a library for the binary network protocol, so that external applications have an easier job interfacing with <em>collectd</em>. The new ''authentication and encryption feature'' (added in [[version 4.7]]) makes this even more desirable. [[User:Octo|Octo]] is working on it.
* Sending plain and signed network packets is now possible. The code is available from {{GitBranch|ff/netlib}}. --[[User:Octo|octo]] 06:51, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
* Sending encrypted packages is now possible, too. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 13:37, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

=== [[Plugin:FreeSWITCH|FreeSWITCH]] plugin ===
:''See also:'' {{Github|user=ldr|repository=collectd-freeswitch}}

Plugin which connects to FreeSWITCH, a free IP-telephony software, issues commands periodically and parses the returned output. The plugin was originally written by ''Leon de Rooij'' and is currently available from {{GitBranch|ldr/freeswitch}}.

=== Match and target for meta data ===

It'd be nice to match values by the meta data attached to it and to attach or re-set meta data for values. At least something simple (see the <code>MARK</code> match and target in ''ip_tables'') would be nice.

=== Event infrastructure ===

Add an <code>EVENT</code> command to the [[Plugin:UnixSock|UnixSock plugin]]. This command can be used to count events, such as page loads and the like. The goal is to make it possible for applications to implement statistics collection with the minimum of overhead. [[User:powdahound|powdahound]] is looking into it.

=== [[Plugin:NetCmd|NetCmd plugin]] ===

The [[Plugin:UnixSock|UnixSock plugin]] is limited to UNIX domain sockets. It'd be great if it was possible to access this infrastructure from remote hosts, for example for receiving values. Some initial code lives in {{GitBranch|ff/netcmd}} but isn't ready yet. The idea is basically to take the [[Plugin:UnixSock|UnixSock plugin]] and make it possible to use network sockets, too. Several people have expressed interest in picking that up, but so far no progress has been made. It's safest to keep development cycles short and provide many small patches as soon as possible.

=== [[Plugin:Erlang|Erlang plugin]] ===

[[User:Octo|octo]] is working on an Erlang plugin. The plugin implements a ''C-node'' which can communicate with Erlang processes using message-passing. The code is available in {{GitBranch|ff/erlang}}.

=== InnoDB addon to {{Plugin|MySQL}} ===

''Morten Hanshaugen'' is working on adding InnoDB statistics to the {{Plugin|MySQL}}. Last contact was on ''January&nbsp;27<sup>th</sup>'' via email.

=== {{Plugin|SNORT}} ===

''Benjamin Petrin'' is working on a plugin that will gather statistics from [http://www.snort.org/ ''SNORT''], an open source network intrusion prevention and detection system.

=== {{Plugin|WPAR}} ===

''Manuel Luis Sanmartín Rozada'' has sent patches for a ''workload partitioning'' (WPAR) plugin for AIX to the [[mailing list]] on ''July 20th''. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 13:40, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

The patches are now available from the {{Github|user=octo|repository=collectd|branch=ms/wpar}} branch on ''Github''. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 14:02, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|MongoDB}} ===

There's a ''MongoDB plugin'' by ''Ryan Cox'' available from {{Github|user=ryancox|repository=collectd}}. The changes have since been rebased to the {{Github | user=octo | repository=collectd | branch=rc/mongodb}} branch on ''Github''. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 00:07, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|Write MongoDB}} ===

A write plugin for ''MongoDB'' has been developed by ''Akkarit Sangpetch''. The current version is available from the {{Github | user=octo | branch=as/mongodb}} branch on ''Gibhub''. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 00:07, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|ZeroMQ}} ===

''Julien Ammous'' is working on a communication plugin which uses ''ØMQ'' (aka. ''ZeroMQ'') as transport mechanism. Apparently it works, but it'd be great if it was merged with the {{GitBranch|ff/netlib}} (see: [[#Library for binary network protocol]]) before including it in ''master''. The code lives in the [https://github.com/schmurfy/collectd/tree/zeromq zeromq] branch on ''Github''. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 08:12, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|Lua}} ===

''Julien Ammous'' started writing a plugin which will eventually allow users to write plugins in the scripting language ''Lua''. The code is available from {{GitBranch|ja/lua}} and {{Github| user=schmurfy | repository=collectd | branch=lua}}. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 08:02, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|Modbus}} ===

''Ivo De Decker'' has implemented a grouping feature for the <code>&lt;Data&nbsp;/&gt;</code> blocks of the ''Modbus plugin''. The code is available from {{GitBranch|id/modbus}}. Last contact in a private email on January&nbsp;12th, 2011. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 10:25, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

=== [[Gearman]] ===

Find out what this does and expand the page. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 22:32, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Gearman allows to distribute work-loads to multiple workers. A (Gearman) client dispatches jobs to the Gearman job server which then distributes them to Gearman workers. The worker executes the requested task and sends back the result to the client (thru the Gearman job server). I'm not sure how collectd might benefit from that. -- [[User:Tokkee|tokkee]] 11:58, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

It might make (some) sense to implement a gearman worker plugin which receives Nagios perfdata sent by the Nagios mod-gearman add-on and dispatches that data to collectd. I think the one challenging question is how to do the data mapping. The following approaches come to my mind:
* Use the same approach as in most generic plugins, i.e. let the user specify each and every data set (check command and/or service description, perfdata label) plus how to convert that info collectd types.
* Use a similar approach to [http://pnp4nagios.org PNP4Nagios], i.e. use default values (e.g. host = Nagios hostname, plugin = mod_gearman, plugin instance = check command or service description, type = gauge, type instance = perfdata label) and let the user overwrite (some of those) information, c.f. [http://docs.pnp4nagios.org/pnp-0.6/tpl_custom PNP's custom templates].
* Combine the two approaches by defining a default data-mapping and (maybe) let other mappings "inherit" from that.
[[User:Tokkee|tokkee]] 10:40, 9 January 2013 (UTC)

=== {{Plugin|LXC}} ===

''François-Xavier Bourlet'' is working on a [http://lxc.sourceforge.net/ ''LXC''] plugin. LXC is a linux-specific containers implementation (à la OpenVZ) based on kernel cgroups and namespaces. The code is available from {{Github | user=dotcloud | repository=collectd}} on ''Github''.

----

== Wishlist / Ideas ==

The following is a list of ideas we had but so far nobody has stepped up to implement them. Feel free to add your own “cool stuff”&nbsp;:)

=== [[Plugin:RRDtool|RRDtool]] plugin: Type-specific configuration ===

This would allow to keep interesting data longer and less interesting data only for a short time. Also seasonal data could be added. It's not reasonable to add seasonal data to all RRD files, because it operates on unconsolidated primary datapoints (thus taking up a lot of disk space) and you can't specify one seasonal period that fits all kinds of data. [http://mailman.verplant.org/pipermail/collectd/2007-June/001051.html A discussion of this feature] can be found in the mailinglist's archive.

Maybe an option that can be passed to <em>write</em> functions by the [[Chains]] mechanism would be a good idea for implementing this.

=== Distributed setups ===

Make it possible to have several "servers" with shared storage. When one server dies another one takes its place, so that you don't have gaps in your statistics. This is probably best implemented as a <em>match</em> that matches only those values the host is responsible for. A really simple first step is available in form of the [[Match:Hashed|Hashed match]] as of [[version 4.9]]. Adding automatic fail-over would be a nice second step.

A solution for non-shared storage is probably even harder to implement and likely not worth the effort.

This can be done with [http://www.drbd.org DRBD] together with [http://www.linux-ha.org/ Linux HA]. A lot of solutions based on this thechnologies works very reliable in production environments.

=== Embed more scripting languages ===

; ECMA Common Language Infrastructure
: ''Work in progress'', for information contact [[User:Octo|octo]].
: Best known implementation is likely ''Microsoft .NET''; for UNIX there's a free implementation called ''Mono''.
: Target language of a variety of programming languages, for example ''C#''.
: http://mono-project.com/
: http://mono-project.com/Embedding_Mono
; JavaScript
: It looks like ''SpiderMonkey'' is relatively easy to embed. Using ''JavaScript'' may especially interesting for implementing [[match]]es and [[target]]s, though it's likely to compete with ''Lua'' in this respect.
: https://developer.mozilla.org/en/How_to_embed_the_JavaScript_engine
; Lua
: ''Work in progress'', see [[#Lua plugin]] above.
: http://www.lua.org/
; Parrot
: It is now (November 2010) at version 2.10 and provides a stable API. Whether the interpreter has become thread- and reentrant-safe has to be determined again.
: http://www.parrot.org/
; Ruby
: http://www.ruby-lang.org/

=== Store to RDBMS ===

Being able to [[Store To RDBMS|store values in an RDBMS]] would be nice. ''Bob Cotton'' has put together some SQL for PostgreSQL and a Perl based plugin to store values into it. This could serve as a starting point as a C&nbsp;based plugin with the same SQL backend.

:''See also: http://github.com/bcotton/collectd_dbstore/tree/master''

Starting with [[Version_5.2|version 5.2]], the [[Plugin:PostgreSQL|PostgreSQL plugin]] supports storing data in PostgreSQL. This has been done using a generic approach by letting the user specify the query that is used for storing a value-list and, thus, allowing arbitrary database layouts. See the manpage for details.

=== Query wprobe ===
''wprobe'' is a interface to query/manage wireless links, written by the guys over at [http://openwrt.org/ OpenWrt].
:''See also:'' https://dev.openwrt.org/browser/trunk/package/wprobe

=== <em>output_text</em> plugin ===

[[User:Tokkee|Sebastian]] has suggested a <em>output_text</em> plugin that can write values to arbitrarily formatted (text-)files. See also: [[#perfmon_output]]

=== [[Plugin:Apache|Apache]] plugin: Per virtualhost stats ===
mod_watch gives access to stats like:
 domain.com 8190 539056 20965428 4813 4813 0 14.520 0 4286618408
 domain2.com 8190 539056 20965428 4813 4813 0 14.520 0 4286618408
Why not to use it?

:Couldn't find a hopepage for this project. Where does it live? Is it still alive? --&nbsp;[[User:Octo|octo]] 21:16, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

=== pf (packetfilter) plugin ===

pf is a firewall available on OpenBSD and FreeBSD.
There are quite a lot of counters which should be available (packets/seconds, octets/seconds, by states, tables, ...).
Some munin plugins for reference : [http://muninexchange.projects.linpro.no/?search=&cid=0&pid=148 pf_bytes], [http://muninexchange.projects.linpro.no/?search=&cid=0&pid=129 pf]

=== Drop privileges ===

A couple of plugins [[:Category:Plugins requiring privileges|require special privileges]]. It'd be great if we could find a way to allow these plugins to do their job without requiring ''collectd'' to run with privileges.

Under Linux, a solution might be to use ''capabilities(7)'' to deal with this problem: Assign the ''collectd'' binary the permission to a certain capability, for example to open a raw socket. The plugin can then active this capability if needed. For example:
 setcap cap_net_raw=p $prefix/bin/collectd

For other UNIXes, this solution is not applicable. In order to drop privileges in the traditional UNIX way, plugins such as the {{Plugin|Ping}} would need to live in a separate process space, since it needs to open new sockets whenever the address of a pinged hostname changes.

Also see the discussion in [http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=680660 Debian bug #680660].

=== Summarize CPU information ===

Implement a configuration option in the {{Plugin|CPU}}, which allows to dispatch the ''sum'' of all CPUs, rather than information about individual CPUs. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 06:31, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
Please see patch http://mailman.verplant.org/pipermail/collectd/2011-March/004415.html

Also see the generic approach provided by the [[Plugin:Aggregation|Aggregation plugin]].

=== CPU percent usage ===

It will be nice in FreeBSD (may be other unixes) divide values by stathz and multiply by 100 to get usage more like percent usage (munin does like this, see sysctl -n kern.clockrate).
In linux it can be achieved dividing to HZ value.
Please see patch http://mailman.verplant.org/pipermail/collectd/2011-March/004415.html

=== apcupsd ===

In many cases on one server runned many apcupsd on different tcp ports. Plugin should be able to poll many apcupsd.

=== {{Plugin|Swap}} ===

==== Linux ====

The ''ReportByDevice'' option has been added to the ''Solaris'' code of the ''Swap plugin'' in [[version 5.0]]. Similar information can be read from <code>/proc/swaps</code> under Linux. Make this option available there, too. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 07:55, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

==== FreeBSD and OpenBSD ====

The prototype of the ''swapctl(2)'' function on BSD systems differs from the same function on SunOS. Its prototype is:
<source lang="c">
 int swapctl(int cmd, const void *arg, int misc);
</source>

The ''configure'' script can already check for this second version, but the ''Swap plugin'' can not yet handle it. Implement this.

More information is available from [http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=swapctl&sektion=2 swapctl(2)]. —[[User:Octo|octo]] 13:31, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

=== collectd-nagios ===

Support querying multiple data-sets; apply consolidation to selected data-sets. --[[User:Tokkee|tokkee]] 14:46, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Also see the ideas / discussion on [[Collectd-nagios]].

=== [[Plugin:NTPd|NTPd]] ===
It'd be great to be able to see only the declared peer instead of all peer (declared and candidate). 
Actually we can't see which server is declared as peer.

=== Reverse DNS Check ===
XANi suggested to ignore values if the reverse DNS of the hostname submitted over the network does not match the sending IP. This could be implemented by adding the remote IP as meta-data to received value-lists in the network plugin and then add some match plugin to check that kind of information. --[[User:Tokkee|tokkee]] 06:44, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

[[Category:Development]]