How to Install and Use the Nginx Add-on?

Keeping an eye on your system is essential when you implement it. NGINX is a popular server that balances loads and hosting applications. It works well, but like any other software, it’s good to keep an eye on it to catch and fix problems early.

That’s why the NGINX team made Amplify a tool to watch over your server. It collects data on how your server is doing, alerts you if something’s not right, shows you graphs of the data, and even gives you recommendations based on what it sees. All of this is in one dashboard.

Amplify is now available for AccuWeb.Cloud users with just one click. With Amplify, you can go beyond the basic stats like RAM and CPU that AccuWeb.Cloud shows you. You can see more detailed information about connections, requests, errors, and traffic. You can also set it up to let you know if your server is available and how busy it is, all with automatic email notifications.

The best part is that NGINX Amplify is free for up to 5 hosts. This makes it an excellent choice for small companies and startups. So set up your NGINX Amplify add-on quickly, and start monitoring your server!

Create NGINX Amplify Account

To get started, make your own NGINX Amplify account to use the monitoring dashboard.

Step 1: Visit the Amplify website, click “Create account,” fill in the needed information, and agree to the Terms of Service.

Step 2: Click Create and verify your registration by clicking on a link to your email.

Step 3: On the “Install NGINX Amplify Agent” page that pops up, copy and save an API key shown in the third step.

Important Note: Keep this tab open to have the Amplify dashboard ready; we’ll need it in a few minutes.

Step 4: Now, you can move on to the next part (Setting up NGINX Amplify Add-On) and install the NGINX Amplify add-on using the API key you just saved.

Setting up NGINX Amplify Add-On

You can put the NGINX Amplify add-on on any node in your NGINX server environment, like a load balancer or a PHP/Ruby application server. If you don’t have one, make a new environment with the correct container and p these steps.

Step 1: Log in to the AccuWeb.Cloud Dashboard and click on Marketplace.

Step 2: Go to the Add-ons tab, find NGINX Amplify, and when you see it, hover over it and click Install.

Important Note: You can find the NGINX Amplify add-on source on GitHub in the AccuWeb.Cloud JPS Collection. There are other functional prepackaged solutions there, too, and you can install them by importing a p.jps link from the required repository.

Step 3: In the installation dialog box, give the following details:

API key: This is the identifier you saved from the NGINX Amplify website (if you missed it, you can find it in your account settings).

Environment name: This is the environment where the add-on should be installed.

Nodes: Choose the target environment layer (with either an NGINX-based web server or load balancer) where the add-on should be installed; all the appropriate nodes will be adjusted.

Step 4: After you’re done, click “Install” and wait a minute for the process to finish. Close the successful installation dialog box and move on to the next section to launch and use your monitoring dashboard.

Start NGINX Amplify Monitoring

To begin using NGINX Amplify’s monitoring tools, follow these easy steps.

Step 1: Return to the Install NGINX Amplify Agent page where you saved your API key and click Continue.

Step 2: Wait a minute for Amplify to collect data on your NGINX instance(s) parameters from your environment. You’ll see a dialog box with suggestions on NGINX configurations for visualizing metrics when it’s done. However, the Amplify Agent will detect it automatically since you already did this during add-on installation. Just skip this step by clicking Continue.

Step 3: After collecting metrics, you’ll see a dialogue box suggesting setting up additional NGINX metrics for a more detailed analysis of app performance. Following the documentation, you can enable optional metrics, like Request time or Cache hits. To finish, click Finish.

That’s it! Now, check detailed information about your servers using the tabs at the top:

• Overview: General info on the instance (health score, total requests, etc.).
• Graphs: Visualizes various metrics (connections, requests, errors, protocol preferences, etc.).
• Dashboards: Allows creating a custom dashboard showing only required information.
• Analyzer: Gathers data on servers and sorts it across tabs (Build, Static analysis, Virtual servers, Security advisories, and SSL).
• Alerts: Configures alerts based on specific metric monitoring (email notifications will be sent to specified subscribers).

This way, you can monitor your installation and fix issues with running and scaling NGINX-based applications. Refer to the detailed NGINX Amplify documentation for advanced monitoring configurations if needed.

Conclusion

In conclusion, utilizing the NGINX Amplify Add-On for comprehensive monitoring of the NGINX Load Balancer and Application Server is a simple yet powerful way to keep track of your system’s health. With easy installation and a user-friendly dashboard, this tool allows you to detect issues proactively and fine-tune performance. For further details and advanced configurations, refer to the NGINX Amplify documentation. Enhance your NGINX-based applications by staying informed and taking control with NGINX Amplify.