Access point monitoring with Netdata

The ap collector visualizes data related to access points.

Example Netdata charts

How it works

It does the following:

1. Runs iw dev searching for interfaces that have type AP.

   From the same output it collects the SSIDs each AP supports by looking for lines ssid NAME.

   Example:

# iw dev
phy#0
        Interface wlan0
                ifindex 3
                wdev 0x1
                addr 7c:dd:90:77:34:2a
                ssid TSAOUSIS
                type AP
                channel 7 (2442 MHz), width: 20 MHz, center1: 2442 MHz

2. For each interface found, it runs iw INTERFACE station dump.

   From the output is collects:

   • rx/tx bytes
   • rx/tx packets
   • tx retries
   • tx failed
   • signal strength
   • rx/tx bitrate
   • expected throughput

   Example:

# iw wlan0 station dump
Station 40:b8:37:5a:ed:5e (on wlan0)
        inactive time:  910 ms
        rx bytes:       15588897
        rx packets:     127772
        tx bytes:       52257763
        tx packets:     95802
        tx retries:     2162
        tx failed:      28
        signal:         -43 dBm
        signal avg:     -43 dBm
        tx bitrate:     65.0 MBit/s MCS 7
        rx bitrate:     1.0 MBit/s
        expected throughput:    32.125Mbps
        authorized:     yes
        authenticated:  yes
        preamble:       long
        WMM/WME:        yes
        MFP:            no
        TDLS peer:      no

3. For each interface found, it creates 6 charts:

   • Number of Connected clients
   • Bandwidth for all clients
   • Packets for all clients
   • Transmit Issues for all clients
   • Average Signal among all clients
   • Average Bitrate (including average expected throughput) among all clients

Configuration

Edit the charts.d/ap.conf configuration file using edit-config from the Netdata config directory, which is typically at /etc/netdata.

cd /etc/netdata   # Replace this path with your Netdata config directory, if different
sudo ./edit-config charts.d/ap.conf

You can only set ap_update_every=NUMBER to change the data collection frequency.

Auto-detection

The plugin is able to auto-detect if you are running access points on your linux box.