The Life of a Sysadmin

• This Nagios check looks for extra Wordpress admins.$ARG1$ should look include "-w min:max -c min:max", giving the acceptable ranges; in my case, I know I should have 3 and only 3 admins, so I have "-w 3:3 -c 3:3".

  define command{
  command_name check_wp_admins
  command_line $USER1$/check_mysql_query -q 'SELECT COUNT(wp_users.user_login) AS "Admins"
                         FROM wp_users, wp_usermeta
                         WHERE wp_usermeta.meta_value LIKE "%administrator%" AND
                         wp_usermeta.user_id=wp_users.ID' -H $HOSTADDRESS$ $ARG1$
  }
  

• This one looks for nasty Wordpress posts. Note the dependency on MySQL's regex command. In my case, I know that I do not have any posts with these words, so in $ARG1$ I have "-w 0:0 -c 0:0".

  define command{
  command_name check_wp_nasty_posts
  command_line $USER1$/check_mysql_query -q 'SELECT COUNT(*)
                         FROM wp_posts
                         WHERE post_content REGEXP "iframe|noscript|display"' -H $HOSTADDRESS$ $ARG1$
  }
  

• And a Python script that picks out a random client, job and file from Bacula's database and tries to retrieve it. It's not ideal -- checking for sanity is left as a DARPA Grand Challenge -- but at least it's one way of exercising backups. I anticipate running this often. If anyone's interested, let me know.

The more I work with Python, the more I don't just like it but admire it.

Ugh...not much more right now. I've got a blocked eustachian tube that I'm self-medicating with a Python script^W^Wcold medicine, and the acetominiphen in it is making me hazy.