Monitor an Apache Web Server using Ops Agent

GSP1108 — Monitor an Apache Web Server using Ops Agent

Estimated time: 15 minutes

# 📊 Monitor Apache Web Server with Cloud Monitoring > ⚠️ **Disclaimer:** This is an independent, community-made walkthrough created to help you understand why each step works. Attempt the lab yourself first and use this guide as a learning aid rather than as a shortcut to skip the underlying concepts. This guide is intended for educational purposes, hands-on practice, and Google Cloud certification preparation. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or officially supported by Google, Google C

# ==============================================================================
# Color Variables & Branding
# ==============================================================================
GREEN='\e[1;32m'
CYAN='\e[1;36m'
YELLOW='\e[1;33m'
MAGENTA='\e[1;35m'
RED='\e[1;31m'
RESET='\e[0m'
BOLD='\e[1m'

clear
echo -e "${CYAN}${BOLD}"
cat << "EOF"
  ____       _     _ _            __    ___            
 / __ \     | |   (_) |          / _|  / _ \           
| |  | |_ __| |__  _| |_   ___  | |_  | | | |_ __  ___ 
| |  | | '__| '_ \| | __| / _ \ |  _| | | | | '_ \/ __|
| |__| | |  | |_) | | |_ | (_) || |   | |_| | |_) \__ \
 \____/|_|  |_.__/|_|\__| \___/ |_|    \___/| .__/|___/
                                            | |        
                                            |_|        
EOF
echo -e "${RESET}"
echo -e "${MAGENTA}${BOLD}>>> ORBIT OF OPS: GSP1108 PART 1 INITIALIZED <<<${RESET}\n"

echo -e "${YELLOW}${BOLD}[Orbit of Ops] Auto-fetching Project and Zone...${RESET}"
export PROJECT_ID=$(gcloud config get-value project 2>/dev/null)
if [[ -z "$PROJECT_ID" ]]; then
    export PROJECT_ID=$DEVSHELL_PROJECT_ID
fi

export ZONE=$(gcloud compute project-info describe \
    --format="value(commonInstanceMetadata.items[google-compute-default-zone])" 2>/dev/null | tail -n 1)

if [[ -z "$ZONE" ]]; then
    read -p "⚠️ Could not auto-detect Zone. Please enter the lab Zone (e.g., us-east1-b): " ZONE
    export ZONE
fi
gcloud config set compute/zone $ZONE 2>/dev/null

echo -e "✅ Project ID: ${GREEN}$PROJECT_ID${RESET}"
echo -e "✅ Zone:       ${GREEN}$ZONE${RESET}\n"

echo -e "${CYAN}${BOLD}⚠️  ATTENTION: USER EMAIL REQUIRED FOR ALERTING ⚠️${RESET}"
read -p "Enter your personal email address: " USER_EMAIL
export USER_EMAIL
echo ""

echo -e "${CYAN}${BOLD}[Orbit of Ops] Task 1: Creating 'quickstart-vm' instance & Firewalls...${RESET}"
gcloud compute instances create quickstart-vm \
    --zone=$ZONE \
    --machine-type=e2-small \
    --image-family=debian-11 \
    --image-project=debian-cloud \
    --tags=http-server,https-server || true

gcloud compute firewall-rules create allow-http-from-internet --target-tags=http-server --allow tcp:80 --source-ranges 0.0.0.0/0 || true
gcloud compute firewall-rules create allow-https-from-internet --target-tags=https-server --allow tcp:443 --source-ranges 0.0.0.0/0 || true

echo -e "${YELLOW}${BOLD}[Orbit of Ops] Waiting 45 seconds for VM to fully boot...${RESET}"
sleep 45

echo -e "${MAGENTA}${BOLD}[Orbit of Ops] Tasks 2 & 3: Installing Apache & Configuring Ops Agent via SSH...${RESET}"
cat << 'EOF_END' > install.sh
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install apache2 php -y

curl -sSO https://dl.google.com/cloudagents/add-google-cloud-ops-agent-repo.sh
sudo bash add-google-cloud-ops-agent-repo.sh --also-install

set -e
sudo cp /etc/google-cloud-ops-agent/config.yaml /etc/google-cloud-ops-agent/config.yaml.bak

sudo tee /etc/google-cloud-ops-agent/config.yaml > /dev/null << INNEREF
metrics:
  receivers:
    apache:
      type: apache
  service:
    pipelines:
      apache:
        receivers:
          - apache
logging:
  receivers:
    apache_access:
      type: apache_access
    apache_error:
      type: apache_error
  service:
    pipelines:
      apache:
        receivers:
          - apache_access
          - apache_error
INNEREF

sudo service google-cloud-ops-agent restart

# Task 4: Run the traffic generator in the background
nohup timeout 120 bash -c -- 'while true; do curl localhost; sleep $((RANDOM % 4)) ; done' > /dev/null 2>&1 &
EOF_END

gcloud compute scp install.sh quickstart-vm:/tmp --zone=$ZONE --quiet
gcloud compute ssh quickstart-vm --zone=$ZONE --quiet --command="bash /tmp/install.sh"

echo -e "\n${GREEN}${BOLD}✅ Part 1 Complete. Check Tasks 1, 2, 3, and 4 progress in the lab window!${RESET}"

echo -e "\n${MAGENTA}${BOLD}>>> ORBIT OF OPS: GSP1108 PART 2 INITIALIZED <<<${RESET}\n"

echo -e "${YELLOW}${BOLD}[Orbit of Ops] Task 5: Creating Notification Channel...${RESET}"
cat > email-channel.json <<EOF
{
  "type": "email",
  "displayName": "orbitofops",
  "description": "Alerting Channel",
  "labels": {
    "email_address": "$USER_EMAIL"
  }
}
EOF
gcloud beta monitoring channels create --channel-content-from-file="email-channel.json" > /dev/null 2>&1 || true

echo -e "${YELLOW}${BOLD}[Orbit of Ops] Fetching Notification Channel ID...${RESET}"
export CHANNEL_ID=$(gcloud beta monitoring channels list --format="value(name)" --filter='displayName="orbitofops"' | head -n 1)
echo -e "✅ Notification Channel ID: ${GREEN}$CHANNEL_ID${RESET}"

echo -e "${CYAN}${BOLD}[Orbit of Ops] Creating Alerting Policy for Apache Traffic...${RESET}"
cat > vm-alert-policy.json <<EOF
{
  "displayName": "Apache traffic above threshold",
  "userLabels": {},
  "conditions": [
    {
      "displayName": "VM Instance - workload/apache.traffic",
      "conditionThreshold": {
        "filter": "resource.type = \"gce_instance\" AND metric.type = \"workload.googleapis.com/apache.traffic\"",
        "aggregations": [
          {
            "alignmentPeriod": "60s",
            "crossSeriesReducer": "REDUCE_NONE",
            "perSeriesAligner": "ALIGN_RATE"
          }
        ],
        "comparison": "COMPARISON_GT",
        "duration": "0s",
        "trigger": {
          "count": 1
        },
        "thresholdValue": 4000
      }
    }
  ],
  "alertStrategy": {
    "autoClose": "1800s"
  },
  "combiner": "OR",
  "enabled": true,
  "notificationChannels": [
    "$CHANNEL_ID"
  ],
  "severity": "SEVERITY_UNSPECIFIED"
}
EOF

gcloud alpha monitoring policies create --policy-from-file="vm-alert-policy.json" > /dev/null 2>&1 || true

echo -e "\n${GREEN}${BOLD}🎉 All blocks executed successfully! The Alert Policy is created. Click 'Check my progress' on Task 5!${RESET}"