Installing Icinga Notifications from Source¶

Although the provided packages are highly recommended and are the only officially supported installation, it may be necessary to build the software manually, e.g., if there are no packages available for the target platform.

Please follow the build instructions in the development section for more information about requirements and the Makefile-based build.

Setting up the Database¶

A MySQL (≥8.0), MariaDB (≥10.5.0), or PostgreSQL (≥9.6) database is required to run Icinga Notifications. Please follow the steps listed for your target database, which guide you through setting up the database and user. The schema can either be imported manually as described below or automatically by Icinga Notifications.

Setting up a MySQL or MariaDB Database¶

Set up a MySQL database for Icinga Notifications:

# mysql -u root -p

CREATE DATABASE notifications;
CREATE USER 'notifications'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'CHANGEME';
GRANT ALL ON notifications.* TO 'notifications'@'localhost';

After creating the database, import the Icinga Notifications schema using the following command, or skip this step to let Icinga Notifications import the schema itself:

mysql -u root -p notifications < /usr/share/icinga-notifications/schema/mysql/schema.sql

Setting up a PostgreSQL Database¶

Set up a PostgreSQL database for Icinga Notifications:

# su -l postgres

createuser -P notifications
createdb -E UTF8 --locale en_US.UTF-8 -T template0 -O notifications notifications
echo 'CREATE EXTENSION IF NOT EXISTS citext;' | psql notifications

The CREATE EXTENSION command requires the postgresql-contrib package.

Edit pg_hba.conf, insert the following before everything else:

local all notifications           md5
host  all notifications 0.0.0.0/0 md5
host  all notifications      ::/0 md5

To apply these changes, run systemctl reload postgresql.

After creating the database, import the Icinga Notifications schema using the following command, or skip this step to let Icinga Notifications import the schema itself:

psql -v ON_ERROR_STOP=1 -U notifications notifications < /usr/share/icinga-notifications/schema/pgsql/schema.sql

Configuring Icinga Notifications¶

Icinga Notifications installs its configuration file to /etc/icinga-notifications/config.yml, pre-populating most of the settings for a local setup. Before running Icinga Notifications, adjust the database credentials and the Icinga Web 2 URL. The configuration file explains general settings. All available settings can be found under Configuration.

Importing the Database Schema¶

If you have not imported the schema manually while setting up the database, Icinga Notifications can import it for you. After configuring the database connection, run the following command once. It imports the schema and exits without starting the daemon:

icinga-notifications --database-auto-import --database-schema-only

If the database already contains the schema, the command only verifies its version, so it is safe to run it either way.

The schema is imported with the database user from the configuration. On PostgreSQL, this user then owns all tables, which later schema upgrades require. The citext extension must still be created as described in Setting up a PostgreSQL Database, as creating it may require superuser privileges.

Info

--database-auto-import only imports the initial schema into an empty database. Schema upgrades must still be applied as described in Upgrading.

Running Icinga Notifications¶

The icinga-notifications package automatically installs the necessary systemd unit files to run Icinga Notifications. Please run the following command to enable and start its service:

systemctl enable --now icinga-notifications

Installing Icinga Notifications Web¶

With Icinga Notifications and the database fully set up, it is now time to install Icinga Notifications Web, which connects to the database and allows configuring Icinga Notifications.

Please follow the Icinga Notifications Web documentation.

Further configuration is managed from Icinga Notifications Web. This includes adding sources and rules, check the corresponding documentation for more details.