So, I decided to deploy zabbix last week.  I have a few comments:

1.  Somebody here said it was difficult to configure your triggers well enough. 
 Perhaps that was true in a previous release or something, but in the present 
release 2.0, after you add a host to be monitored, you just click on that host, 
and triggers, and templates, and select an appropriate template.  For example, 
"OS Linux with Agent" is a predefined template that includes a whole bunch of 
stuff like disk usage, cpu usage, and ping monitor.  (Where "ping" in this case 
is TCP connectivity to the agent.)

2.  Gosh, it sure is nice that the whole zabbix solution is available via the 
package repository in redhat, centos, fedora, and ubuntu.  Literally "yum 
install" and "pkg-get install" a few things, configure a few files, and be on 
your way.

3.  It lacks the ability to send alerts via SMTP with TLS.  I worked around 
this by configuring the local postfix to send mail, but then I had to add this 
server IP address to my SPF record, and for various other reasons, I would 
prefer to actually have TLS support in the mail alert sending page.

4.  When I get an alert about a problem ... and then the problem goes away all 
by itself ... I don't get an "alert cleared" message.  I think there's some way 
to make that happen, but I didn't quickly figure it out.  This isn't a show 
stopper, but it sure is a useful nice-to-have.

5.  The agent opens a TCP listening port.  You need to configure the agent to 
listen for your server, and you need to configure the monitored-system firewall 
to permit the inbound traffic from the server IP.

5a.  Unfortunately, on one of my most important systems to monitor, I cannot 
listen on a new port.  (Long story.)  Which means I can't get the agent to run 
there, which unfortunately tanks my whole zabbix deployment.  I need something 
else, where the agent doesn't need a listening port.  The agent needs to make 
an *outbound* connection to report info to the server.  Can anybody confirm or 
deny the pull/push nature of the agent on these other solutions?  I'm looking 
at nagios next, unless I hear otherwise...

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