5 Graphing

BWM Tools supports graphing of traffic flows which have been specified with the report-timeout="".

Generating a graph can be achieved using bwm_graph or by using the RRD files generated by bwm_graph.

These two methods are discussed below...

• Generating RRD files
  
  The following section will explain how to have bwm_graph generate only RRD files and not graphs. This can be done quickly and simply using the following 3 commandline options...
  
  
  1. The -f and --flows mandatory option
     
     This option is used to specify the flows to include when generating the RRD files.
     An example of this option can be found below...
     

                    bwm_firewall --flows="flow_name_1,flow_name2,flow_name3" ...
               

     
     There is an optional parameter to specify which counter will be used when outputting the RRD file. For this there are 3 possibilities, all 3 are the totals per report-timeout="..." seconds specified in the relevant flow tag.
     

     `pkt'

     `Number of packets processed'
     
     

     `size_bit'

     `Bits transferred in above period'
     
     

     `size_byte'

     `Bytes transferred'
     
     

     `dropped'

     `Packets dropped'
     
     

     `bursted'

     `Packets bursted'

     
     The counter to use is specified in the following manner...
     

                    bwm_firewall --flows="flow_name_1(size_bit),flow_name_2(size_byte)" ...
               

     
     

  2. The -s and --start mandatory option
     
     This option is used to specify the date and/or time which to start our report from.
     The format for date and/or time specification is yyyy/mm/dd hh:mm:ss.
     An example of this option is as follows...

                    bwm_firewall ... --start="2003/01/20 01:20" ...
               

  3. The -e and --end mandatory option
     
     This option is used to specify the date and/or time which our report will end.
     The format for this option is the same as the -s and --start options.
  
  
  An example of how to use all 3 above options to specify both the flows to work on and the reporting period can be done something like this...

            bwm_firewall --flows="flow_name_1(size_bit),flow_name_2(size_bit)" --start="2003/01/20" --end="2003/01/21"
       

  
  

• Creating a pretty graph using bwm_graph
  
  bwm_graph has a builtin interface to rrdtool. Using this interface one can easily have bwm_graph generate pretty looking graphs itself.
  
  The graphing capability of bwm_graph is in addition to the generation of RRD files, meaning that you are required to use all 3 mandatory options discussed in "Generating RRD files" above.
  
  The following graphing options can be used...
  
  
  • --graph-filename=<filename>
    This parameter is used to specify an output filename for the generated .png image.
    
    
  • --graph-avg
    Write counter averages on the graph
    
    
  • --graph-date
    Write the start datetime and end datetime of the reporting period on the graph
    
    
  • --graph-title=<graph_title>
    Specify a title for your graph
    
    
  • --graph-total
    Write out counter totals on the graph
    
    
  • --graph-vert-title=<graph_title>
    Specify a vertical title for the graph