This book assumes a good level of experience with Linux operating systems and an intermediate knowledge of the Bash shell, and since there will be some chapters dealing with Nagios monitoring and Slack messaging, basic understanding of networking concepts is required.

A simple Linux installation is required with really low specifications, as even the Nagios plugin can be tested without requiring the actual installation of the monitoring system. So, this is the minimum configuration required:

• CPU: single-core
• Memory: 2 GB
• Disk space: 20 GB

For this book, you will need the following software:

• Linux operating system: Debian 8
• Nagios Core 3.5.1
• OpenSSH 6.7p1
• rssh 2.3.4

Internet connectivity is required to install the necessary service packages and to try out some of the examples.