New !! The top 5 highlights of Zabbix v5 LTS

I  wanted to give you a quick glance at Zabbix v5 highlights.

So we know for software vendor new releases are big news. but for customers, new releases bring new solutions to problems.

So as Zabbix version 5 LTS was released Tuesday May 12^th, I’m happy to bring you an overview of what we think are the top 5 features of v5.0 😊

What’s an LTS?

Yes I know its another acronym so let me remind you what an LTS version is.
First it is a major version that carries long-term support with it for three years guaranteed, and this is why it’s the version we recommend you use for production purposes.

Second, it’s a version that rolls up all the bug fixes and new features from previous non LTS versions.
The last LTS was version 4.0. As a consequence support for that version ends October 31^st 2021.
After Zabbix version 4.0 released versions 4.2 and 4.4 in ly experience they have some very useful features which in some cases are vital.

Version 4.2 brought features such as

• pre-processing of monitored data executed on distributed monitoring proxies,
• high frequency monitoring with throttling and tag management.
  and others

Version 4.4 brought

• a new agent written using GO, it now includes trap mgmt.,scheduling and a plugin framework,
• Timescale DB support and
• web hooks for integrations
  and others

All these are now part of Zabbix v5 LTS, and I think this is already great news.
So let me go over the top 5 new features .

The top 5 highlights of Zabbix v5 LTS

Now I  could spend a lot of time going through all  the features, so I’ll list the highlights of this new version, those that I believe will have the most impact in implementations.

Out of the box integrations

Did you know that there are hundreds of existing integrations? If you are interested see here the complete list that Zabbix version 5.0 LTS supports.
Let me add that the newer web hooks in Zabbix are great because now they are  more secure and use better methods to build them, and that’s important for your security.

ITSM Integration

You will find that the actual capabilities of these integrations differ across each product.
In some cases ticket and event handling is bi-directional. As a result this conserves the integrity of problem management between operations and help desk staff.

Alerting integrations

One aspect I really think gives you flexibility is that these integrations support both on-premise and cloud-based connectivity.

Another that I like is now email notifications are multi-threaded across integrations . Consequently the communicate more effectively.

Please noet that web hook guidelines are made available to facilitate creation of other integration types.

With Zabbix version 5.0 LTS there is now a formalised 3^rd party contribution process very useful because this allows custom developments to be submitted for consideration as standard in future versions.
I think these ar egreta examples of the openness and power of open source.

If I have got you interested then see here for the complete catalogue of integrations that Zabbix version 5 LTS supports

 

Single sign on

I like timesavers because we’ve all come to expect them in modern applications.

So I’m delighted that Zabbix v5 LTS adds new out of the box SAML Authentication to  supports many environments.

You wil lbe thinking this lowers risks with your credentials staying within your firewall. Consequently SSO facilitates a single source of identity to ease and standardise configurations.

Security

This has been a big focus, necessarily I’m sure you’ll agree.
Highlights are;

1. Support for http proxies in web hooks. – This removes the previous requirement to have direct connectivity between the Zabbix server and your other tools so it is now unnecessary to open ports in firewalls.
2. Blacklist/Whitelist metrics – the agent can now switch off monitoring for selected metrics and prevent execution of scripts.
3. Secret fields – configuring templates sometimes requires entering passwords or tokens. These can now be rendered more secure when choosing the secret option
4. Strong cryptography – multiple ciphers are supported for strong encryption
5. SHA256 –older MD5 encryption of passwords is now replaced with the more secure SHA256 based encryption.

All these security measures improve compliance especially needed in certain industries.  Consequently they also reduce the risk of hacking, and creating more bulletproof and  standardised configurations.

Automated Discovery enhancements

Zabbix has great automatic discovery capabilities called LLD.
Zabbix version 5.0 LTS now includes discovery of

• Windows performance counters
• JMX counters
• IPMI sensors

Mass execution of configuration items automatically applies to user macros, and ODBC configuration, greatly accelerating deployment and removing human errors.

 

Scale and performance

Please don’t think scalability is important for large scale implementations only.
Even small implementations can generate a LOT of data, consequently storage requirements are multiplied.
And that’s expensive.

You never quite know which piece of data can help to identify and solve issues, as a result we all tend to keep a lot of data.

Timescale DB  support was added in version 4.4 however is now included in this LTS release.
This DB provides automatic partitioning and compression for data stored after a configurable time.

Above all this is cost reduction at its best using this open source proven extension to PostgreSQL.

I know of some customers who are managing well over 65 000 hosts.
That can mean millions of devices.
Managing them becomes easier with dashboards that allow operators to filter across tags and objects types very quickly from the dashboard.

This has become a lot easier in this version.

Furthermore, the user interface is changed to optimise dashboards. For example the menu bar has been switched to the LHS of the screen.
It and can be completely collapsed to maximize views of the monitored data, for instance for projector screening on walls.

Ease of use and graphical rendering improve operator ease of use Their productivity is improved through faster triage and better use of monitored data consequently solving issues faster.

 

Zabbix v5 highlights – Nobius takes you beyond

This is just a selection to wet your appetite
There’s lots more new enhancements and features in this version.

As it’s a free download, Zabbix represents a very serious way for you to reduce your IT Costs.
After that I think you’d agree that its time to take a serious look at transforming your IT Monitoring.
If you look at these case studies, you’ll see that very large and small implementations alike are using it as part of the 300 000+ implementations that exist today. And that’s growing.

At Nobius we channel our 80+ years’ experience on IT architectures and monitoring solutions help customer manage those transformations.

See our blog to learn who Nobius is and what we offer.

Our website also gives you an overview of the services we offer. It allows you to engage with us either via email or chat directly from those web pages.

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