Monit is a utility for managing and monitoring processes, files, directories and filesystems on a Unix system. Monit conducts automatic maintenance and repair and can execute meaningful causal actions in error situations. For example, Monit can start a process if it does not run, restart a process if it does not respond and stop a process if it uses too much resources. Monit can also monitor files, directories and filesystems for changes, such as timestamps changes, checksum changes or size changes.
Monit is controlled via an easy to configure control file based on a free-format, token-oriented syntax. Monit logs to syslog or to its own log file and notifies you about error conditions via customizable alert messages. Monit can perform various TCP/IP network checks, protocol checks and can utilize SSL for such checks. Monit provides a http(s) interface and you may use a browser to access the Monit program.
Monit is particular useful for monitoring daemon processes, such as those started at system boot time from /etc/init.d/. For instance mail servers, print servers, database servers, application servers, http servers and sshd.
Key Features
- Monitoring processes.
- Monitoring files.
- Monitoring directories.
- Monitoring devices.
- Remote host monitoring – first and foremost monit is an utility for monitoring and mending services on localhost, but if a service depends on a remote service, e.g. a database server or an application server, it can be useful to test the remote host as well.
- Protocol testing.
- Web interface.
Website: mmonit.com/monit
Support: Documentation
Developer: Tildeslash Ltd
License: GNU General Public License v3.0

Monit is written in C. Learn C with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
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Read our verdict in the software roundup.
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