Home CentOS How to install and configure Prometheus on CentOS 7

How to install and configure Prometheus on CentOS 7

by Darshana
prometheus installation

Prometheus is an open-source toolkit initially built at SoundCloud for monitoring and alerting. The toolkit is now a standalone open source project and maintained independently of any company.

The toolkit collects metrics from monitored targets by scrapping HTTP endpoints on those targets. Most Prometheus components are in Go. Some written in Java, Python, and Ruby.

Prometheus works well to record any numerical time series. It fits both machine-centric monitoring and high-dynamic service-oriented architecture monitoring. In addition to making it easier to run and integrate into your environment, Prometheus offers a rich data model and query language.

The following tutorial shows steps to install Prometheus on CentOS.

Install and Configure Prometheus on CentOS 7

Login to Terminal as root, and start firing the commands below.

Step 1 – Update System

yum update -y

Step 2 –  Disable SELinux

Open SELinux configuration and edit the file:

vim /etc/sysconfig/selinux

Change “SELINUX=enforcing” to “SELINUX=disabled”.

Save and exit the file. Then reboot the system.

reboot

Step 3 –  Download Prometheus package

Go to official Prometheus downloads page, and copy the URL of Linux “tar” file.

Prometheus Download Page

Prometheus Download Page

Run the following command to download package. Paste the copied URL after wget in the below command:

wget https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/download/v2.8.1/prometheus-2.8.1.linux-amd64.tar.gz

Step 4 – Configure Prometheus

Add a Prometheus user.

useradd --no-create-home --shell /bin/false prometheus

Create needed directories.

mkdir /etc/prometheus
mkdir /var/lib/prometheus

Change the owner of the above directories.

chown prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus
chown prometheus:prometheus /var/lib/prometheus

Now go to Prometheus downloaded location and extract it.

tar -xvzf prometheus-2.8.1.linux-amd64.tar.gz

Rename it as per your preference.

mv prometheus-2.8.1.linux-amd64 prometheuspackage

Copy “prometheus” and “promtool” binary from the “prometheuspackage” folder to “/usr/local/bin”.

cp prometheuspackage/prometheus /usr/local/bin/
cp prometheuspackage/promtool /usr/local/bin/

Change the ownership to Prometheus user.

chown prometheus:prometheus /usr/local/bin/prometheus
chown prometheus:prometheus /usr/local/bin/promtool

Copy “consoles” and “console_libraries” directories from the “prometheuspackage” to “/etc/prometheus folder”

cp -r prometheuspackage/consoles /etc/prometheus
cp -r prometheuspackage/console_libraries /etc/prometheus

Change the ownership to Prometheus user

chown -R prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus/consoles
chown -R prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus/console_libraries

Add and modify Prometheus configuration file.

Configurations should be added to the  “/etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml”

Now we will create the prometheus.yml file.

vim /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml

Add the following configuration to the file.

global:
  scrape_interval: 10s

scrape_configs:
  - job_name: 'prometheus_master'
    scrape_interval: 5s
    static_configs:
      - targets: ['localhost:9090']

save and exit the file

Change the ownership of the file.

chown prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml

Configure the Prometheus Service File.

vim /etc/systemd/system/prometheus.service

Copy the following content to the file.

[Unit]
Description=Prometheus
Wants=network-online.target
After=network-online.target

[Service]
User=prometheus
Group=prometheus
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/prometheus \
--config.file /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml \
--storage.tsdb.path /var/lib/prometheus/ \
--web.console.templates=/etc/prometheus/consoles \
--web.console.libraries=/etc/prometheus/console_libraries

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Save and the exit file.

Reload the systemd service.

systemctl daemon-reload

Start the Prometheus service.

systemctl start prometheus

Check service status.

systemctl status prometheus
Status

Status

Add firewall rules.

firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-port=9090/tcp --permanent

Reload firewall service.

systemctl reload firewalld

Step 5 – Access Prometheus Web Interface

Use the following Url to access UI.

http://Server-IP:9090/graph

Then you can see the following interface.

UI

UI

Step 6 – Monitor Linux Server Using Prometheus

First, you need to configure Prometheus node exporter on a Linux server.

Copy URL of the Node Exporter form the official download page.

Node Exporter Download

Node Exporter Download

Paste the copied URL after wget in the following command:

wget https://github.com/prometheus/node_exporter/releases/download/v0.17.0/node_exporter-0.17.0.linux-amd64.tar.gz
Node Exporter

Node Exporter

Extract the downloaded package.

tar -xvzf node_exporter-0.17.0.linux-amd64.tar.gz

Create a user for the node exporter.

useradd -rs /bin/false nodeusr

Move binary to “/usr/local/bin” from the downloaded extracted package.

mv node_exporter-0.17.0.linux-amd64/node_exporter /usr/local/bin/

Create a service file for the node exporter.

vim /etc/systemd/system/node_exporter.service

Add the following content to the file.

[Unit]
Description=Node Exporter
After=network.target

[Service]
User=nodeusr
Group=nodeusr
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/node_exporter

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Save and exit the file.

Reload the system daemon.

systemctl daemon-reload

Start node exporter service.

systemctl start node_exporter

Add a firewall rule to allow node exporter.

 firewall-cmd --zone=public --add-port=9100/tcp --permanent

Reload firewall service.

systemctl restart firewalld

Enable node exporter on system boot.

systemctl enable node_exporter

View the metrics browsing node exporter URL.

http://IP-Address:9100/metrics
Node Exporter Metrics

Node Exporter Metrics

Add configured node exporter Target On Prometheus Server.

Login to Prometheus server and modify the prometheus.yml file

Edit the file:

vim /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml

Add the following configurations under the scrape config.

 - job_name: 'node_exporter_centos'
    scrape_interval: 5s
    static_configs:
      - targets: ['10.94.10.209:9100']

The file should look like as follows.

Modified File

Modified File

Restart Prometheus service.

systemctl restart prometheus

Login to Prometheus server web interface, and check targets.

http://Prometheus-Server-IP:9090/targets
Added Target

Added Target

You can click the graph and query any server metrics and click execute to show output. It will show the console output.

Query Browser:

Select Query

Select Query

Console output:

Memory Console Output

Memory Console Output

Click Graph to view.

Memory Graph

Memory Graph

Step 7 – Monitor MySQL Server Using Prometheus

Login to MySQL and execute the following queries.

CREATE USER 'mysqlexporter'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 's56fsg#4W2126&dfk' WITH max_user_connections 2;
GRANT PROCESS, REPLICATION CLIENT, SELECT ON *.* TO 'mysqlexporter'@'localhost';
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;

Download mysqld_exporter from the official download page.

Mysqld Exporter

Mysqld Exporter

wget https://github.com/prometheus/mysqld_exporter/releases/download/v0.11.0/mysqld_exporter-0.11.0.linux-amd64.tar.gz

Extract the Downloaded file.

tar -xvzf mysqld_exporter-0.11.0.linux-amd64.tar.gz

Add a user for mysqld_exporter.

useradd -rs /bin/false mysqld_exporter

Copy mysqld_exporter file to /usr/bin.

 mv mysqld_exporter-0.11.0.linux-amd64/mysqld_exporter /usr/bin

Change ownership of the file.

chown mysqld_exporter:mysqld_exporter /usr/bin/mysqld_exporter

Create needed folders.

mkdir -p /etc/mysql_exporter

Create a MySQL password file for mysqld_exporter.

vim /etc/mysql_exporter/.my.cnf

Add the following configurations to the file.

[client]
user=mysqlexporter
password=sdfsg#4W2126&gh

Save and exit the file.

Change ownership.

chown -R mysqld_exporter:mysqld_exporter /etc/mysql_exporter

Grant needed permission.

chmod 600 /etc/mysql_exporter/.my.cnf

Create a service file.

vim /etc/systemd/system/mysql_exporter.service

Add the following content to the file.

[Unit]
Description=MySQL Server fosslinux
After=network.target

[Service]
User=mysqld_exporter
Group=mysqld_exporter
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/bin/mysqld_exporter \
--config.my-cnf="/etc/mysql_exporter/.my.cnf"
Restart=always

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Reload the system daemon.

 systemctl daemon-reload

Enable mysql_exporter on system boot.

systemctl enable mysql_exporter

Start service.

systemctl start mysql_exporter

View the metrics using the following URL.

http://Server_IP:9104/metrics
View Metrics

View Metrics

Now go to Prometheus server and modify the prometheus.yml file.

 vim /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml

Add the following content to the file.

- job_name: 'mysql_exporter_fosslinux'
    scrape_interval: 5s
    static_configs:
      - targets: ['10.94.10.204:9104']
Edited File

Edited File

Restart Prometheus.

 systemctl restart prometheus

You can see added targets by clicking targets under the status.

http://IP:9090/targets
All Targets

All Targets

Now you can select query using query browser and get the result of MySQL server.

That’s all about the installation and configuration of Prometheus server on CentOS 7. Hope you enjoyed this tutorial. Let us know your feedback in the comments below.

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22 comments

Thisara August 15, 2019 - 6:14 AM

Great Article.
Thanks Darshana.
Hope you’ll more articles like this in the future.

Reply
John Weller September 5, 2019 - 6:28 AM

Absolutely brilliant article Darshana,
Saved me a lot of time and effort just following this through and worked like a charm.
Thanks for taking the time to publish.

Reply
C October 15, 2019 - 10:37 AM

I have two errors when trying to follow this tutorial.
1. When I added your version of the prometheus.yml Prometheus would not start. Using the default included in the Prometheus-2.13.0.linux-amd64 tar did work however.
2. When it came time to add the node_exporter ( I have version 0.18.1.linux-amd64) adding the portion outlined above the prometheus service fails there as well. I did change the configured IP to both mine as well as localhost, neither of which worked. The error message from systemctl status prometheus is as follows:
prometheus.service – Prometheus
Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/prometheus.service; disabled; vendor preset: disabled)
Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Tue 2019-10-15 16:28:56 CEST; 7s ago
Process: 2756 ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/prometheus –config.file /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml –storage.tsdb.path /var/lib/prometheus/ –web.console.templates=/etc/prometheus/consoles –web.console.libraries=/etc/prometheus/console_libraries (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
Main PID: 2756 (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)

Reply
moumita das November 11, 2019 - 3:26 PM

Can u share ur prometheus.yml file? Seems it has the issue

Reply
Bhuvaneswaran November 8, 2019 - 3:39 AM

Thanks, really helped me lot.

Reply
Musa November 27, 2019 - 6:28 AM

Hi, I am getting this error when i am starting Prometheus :

prometheus: level=error caller=main.go:717 err=”opening storage failed: lock DB directory: open /data/lock: permission denied”

I get this one when i am starting node_exporter:
Failed at step USER spawning /usr/local/bin/node_exporter: No such process

Reply
Nehru Saini December 15, 2019 - 9:58 AM

Hi Guys,

Here is the correct service file as “=” is missing:

[Unit]
Description=Prometheus
Wants=network-online.target
After=network-online.target

[Service]
User=prometheus
Group=prometheus
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/prometheus
–config.file=/etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml
–storage.tsdb.path=/var/lib/prometheus/
–web.console.templates=/etc/prometheus/consoles
–web.console.libraries=/etc/prometheus/console_libraries

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Reply
manish December 20, 2019 - 7:25 AM

Hi,
Can anyone suggest on below error

prometheus.service: main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT

Reply
hadi February 7, 2022 - 2:16 AM

I had same issue, just put one more space before “- job_name: ‘node_exporter_centos'” in prometheus.service
it should have two space, not TAB, just space

Reply
Hend December 20, 2019 - 11:17 AM

it worked for me when I corrected the config “file /etc/systemd/system/prometheus.service” as follows:

[Unit]
Description=Prometheus Monitoring
Wants=network-online.target
After=network-online.target

[Service]
User=prometheus
Group=prometheus
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/prometheus \
–config.file /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml \
–storage.tsdb.path /var/lib/prometheus/ \
–web.console.templates=/etc/prometheus/consoles \
–web.console.libraries=/etc/prometheus/console_libraries
ExecReload=/bin/kill -HUP $MAINPID

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Reply
Hend December 22, 2019 - 3:20 AM

I mean I have added “\” (for back to line) at the end of the fourth until seventh lines in the file “/etc/systemd/system/prometheus.service”

Reply
Alex January 9, 2020 - 8:59 AM

Hmm, I run LSI megaRAID controllers on all of my remote linux nodes. How would I get it to alert me of any LSI errors or if the controller goes from “optimal” to “degraded”

Reply
Miguel Armas January 29, 2020 - 2:06 PM

Hi guys, the tutorial helped me but when I add the node_exporter I get the following error

Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since mié 2020-01-29 14:40:52 -04; 20min ago
Process: 9715 ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/prometheus –config.file /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml –storage.tsdb.path /var/lib/prometheus/ –web.console.templates=/etc/prometheus/consoles –web.console.libraries=/etc/prometheus/console_libraries (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
Main PID: 9715 (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)

This is my prometheus.yml
global:
scrape_interval: 10s

scrape_configs:
– job_name: ‘prometheus’
scrape_interval: 5s
static_configs:
– targets: [‘localhost:9090’]
– job_name: ‘node_exporter’
scrape_interval: 5s
static_configs:
– targets: [‘172.16.2.10:9100’]

Any suggestions to solve?

Reply
Pierre January 3, 2021 - 12:27 PM

Hello, right alignement in text solve the issue from my side.

global:
scrape_interval: 10s

scrape_configs:
– job_name: prometheus_master
scrape_interval: 5s
static_configs:
– targets: [‘localhost:9090’]
– job_name: node_exporter_centos
scrape_interval: 5s
static_configs:
– targets: [‘localhost:9100’]

Reply
Fat Hamster April 25, 2020 - 3:24 PM

It’s RIGHT and full!

# mysql -u root -p

> CREATE USER ‘mysqld_exporter’@’localhost’ IDENTIFIED BY ‘password’ WITH MAX_USER_CONNECTIONS 3;

> GRANT PROCESS, REPLICATION CLIENT, SELECT ON *.* TO ‘mysqld_exporter’@’localhost’;

> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;

> exit

————————————–

[client]
user=mysqld_exporter
password=password
————————————-

[Unit]
Description=MySQL Exporter Service
Wants=network.target
After=network.target

[Service]
User=mysqld_exporter
Group=mysqld_exporter
Type=simple
Environment=”DATA_SOURCE_NAME=mysqld_exporter:password@tcp(127.0.0.1:3306)/”
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/mysqld_exporter \
–config.my-cnf /etc/mysql_exporter/.my.cnf
–collect.global_status \
–collect.info_schema.innodb_metrics \
–collect.auto_increment.columns \
–collect.info_schema_processlist \
–collect.binlog_size \
–collect.global_variables \
–collect.info_schema.tablestats \
–collect.global_variables \
–collect.info_schema.query_response_time \
–collect.info_schema.userstats \
–collect.info_schema.tables \
–collect.perf_schema.tablelocks \
–collect.perf_schema.file_events \
–collect.perf_schema.eventswaits \
–collect.perf_schema.indexiowaits \
–collect.perf_schema.tableiowaits \
–collect.slave_status \
Restart=always

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Reply
Justin June 4, 2020 - 4:33 AM

cant seem to save the prometheus.service file in systemd? is there some permissions missing?

Reply
Thanh Tuan August 4, 2020 - 12:48 AM

Hello guys,
Help, Error Windows Server: parse “http://%E2%80%9810.10.24.11:9182%E2%80%99/metrics”: invalid port “:9182%E2%80%99” after host.
Open port 9182 Windows Server, check telnet connect.

Reply
Abhishek October 27, 2021 - 2:15 AM

Perfect content for PROMETHEUS Installation and Configuration.
Detailed information and easy to understand.

Reply
Irava shyam prudhvi November 3, 2021 - 8:53 AM

Hello Guys,

We have the application logs in an aws ec2 machine where the application would generate the logs in a folder

/home/ec2-user/ApplicationLogs/archive/.gz files ( Archived Application logs – 1)

and the current logs would be /home/ec2-user/ApplicationLogs/application_app.log where our team would be monitoring the logs every hour if in case we have any errors for every 1 hour so that we take the actions accordingly on the things.

We have come up with an idea where the prometheus setup can be made so that it shows in the graphs about the errors that we see in the logs .

How good is that solution so that we can have a UI to track the things very easily as look at the logs would be a harder things

Reply
Ssekwe Julius February 3, 2022 - 10:06 PM

Thanks for your help, my PROMETHEUS and GRAFANA dashboards are up and running!

Reply
thomas March 15, 2022 - 4:45 AM

How about to add postgresql Database

Reply
some1 January 15, 2023 - 8:44 AM

Thanks for the article, but you should know better than disabling SELINUX ! That’s reckless !

Reply

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