The article introduces a series on server monitoring, focusing on best practices for monitoring in a Unix-like environment. It emphasizes the importance of understanding server behavior and resource usage, especially when anticipating issues in test or production settings. Historically, server monitoring was a manual task, but advancements in tools have streamlined the process, requiring users to define the specific data they need. Key areas to monitor include CPU, memory, disk usage, page faults, uptime, network activity, and swap usage, with a variety of command-line tools available to assist in these tasks. The article underscores the need to adapt monitoring practices to changing application requirements and introduces several command-line tools such as top, htop, tcpdump, and nmon for comprehensive server analysis. The piece concludes by hinting at future topics in the series, including server security considerations.