Build FluentD conf file

Build trust one block at a time

Ready to build out a FluentD conf file?

 

Let’s build a FluentD conf file.  We can use the docs site for another example.  And now, let’s build a simple FluentD configuration file. Paste the XML code below, and save as <yourlogfile>.conf

Create custom log file to test

cd /etc/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/conf/omsagent.d/
# vi <yourlogfile>.conf

vi mylog.conf

# Example conf file

<source>
# Specifies input plugin. Tail is a fluentd input plugin – http://docs.fluentd.org/v0.12/articles/in_tail
type tail
# Specify the log file path. Supports wild cards.
path /var/log/mylog
# Recommended so that Fluentd will record the position it last read into this file.
pos_file /home/omsagent/fluent-logging/mylog.pos

# Used to correlate the directives.
tag scom.log.mylog

format /(?<message>.*)/
</source>

<filter scom.log.mylog>
type filter_scom_simple_match
regexp1 message 911
event_id1 911
</filter>

<match scom.log.mylog>
#Disable mutual Auth
enable_server_auth false

# Output plugin to use
type out_scom
log_level trace
num_threads 5

# Size of the buffer chunk. If the top chunk exceeds this limit or the time limit flush_interval, a new empty chunk is pushed to the top of the
queue and bottom chunk is written out.
buffer_chunk_limit 5m
flush_interval 15s
# Specifies the buffer plugin to use.
buffer_type file
# Specifies the file path for buffer. Fluentd must have write access to this directory.
buffer_path /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/state/out_scom_common*.buffer
# If queue length exceeds the specified limit, events are rejected.
buffer_queue_limit 10
# Control the buffer behavior when the queue becomes full: exception, block, drop_oldest_chunk
buffer_queue_full_action drop_oldest_chunk
# Number of times Fluentd will attempt to write the chunk if it fails.
retry_limit 10
# If the bottom chunk fails to be written out, it will remain in the queue and Fluentd will retry after waiting retry_wait seconds
retry_wait 30s
# The retry wait time doubles each time until max_retry_wait.
max_retry_wait 9m
</match>

Save (:wq!)

 

# Restart Agent

/opt/microsoft/omsagent/bin/service_control restart

# Check for errors – see blog

grep -i error /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log

# Test strings into your logfile

# Options

echo test >> /var/log/mylog

echo 911 error >> /var/log/mylog

# mimic syslog or messages syntax

echo `date +”%b %e %H:%M:%S”` MYLOG 911 test string. Call 911 >> /var/log/mylog

 

Please stay tuned for more management pack options to alert on the strings.  Refer to the part1/2 blogs for more details on unit testing for alerts.

OMSAgent FluentD debunked – Configure Linux FluentD – part2

Are you stoked and fired up to Configure Linux FluentD - part2 !?

Now to begin – OMSAgent FluentD debunked

Configure Linux FluentD – part2 –> see part one (1) here)

 

 

First, my thanks to Mike Johnston@Microsoft (CSS SEE SME) to help validate my steps and testing, to configure Linux FluentD on an Ubuntu server!  Are you ready to bust a myth – OMSAgent FluentD debunked

 

If you’re starting fresh, or just joining, start with Part 1.  And Part 1 configures packs and assumes SCOM agent is installed and working.  Because it’s time to use the feature, we need to get the agent configured and tested.

 

Part one (1) quick summary

    • Verify pre-reqs – SCOM Linux Management packs for Linux/Universal Linux (2019 @ 10.19.1082.0), UNIX/Linux Log File monitoring (2019 @ 10.19.1008.0)
    • Linux server has SCOM Agent installed, configured, and updated (sudoers configured) – GUI blog here
    • Use docs.microsoft.com article

 

Load Sample Log monitoring pack

This piece is missing in the doc, but the content development team has this covered in a subsequent docs article.  We need to load a sample log monitoring pack to the SCOM management group, so we can test functionality.

Configure FluentD part 2 - This is a picture of the SCOM console GUI showing the OMED pack installed from the Admin tab > Management Packs > Installed Management Packs > with omed in the 'look for:' bar

Grab the file here, otherwise you can copy/paste from the docs article pretty easily.

 

 

Verify OMED service running on Management Server

It’s now time to enable the OMED service on the management server, and we can start with the docs subsection

Navigation steps from SCOM console (GUI)

    1. From the Operations console, go to Monitoring>Operations Manager>Management Server>Management Servers State.
    2. Select the management server in the Management Servers state.
    3. From Tasks, select Health Service Tasks>Enable System Center OMED Server

 

Steps to set/start service PowerShell (as admin)

# Verify service startup type is automatic

get-Service OMED | select -property Name,Starttype

# Example output

PS C:\Users\admin> Get-Service OMED | select -property name,starttype
Name StartType
—- ———
OMED Automatic

# Set startup type

 

# Start OMED service on SCOM management server (MS)

start-service OMED

 

Now we’re ready to test the UNIX agent!

 

 

Configure SCOM/OMSagent on Linux server

And now it’s time to switch to the agent side.  I’m assuming that you’ve already configured the SCOM agent on the Linux server.  So it’s time to verify the SCOM and OMSAgent is configured and working.  Let’s go back to the docs subsection for our sanity check, because we need to create folders, and set ownership, etc.

 

Create files and set permissions
mkdir /etc/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/conf/omsagent.d
mkdir /etc/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/certs
mkdir /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log
mkdir /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/run
mkdir /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/state
mkdir /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/tmp
mkdir /home/omsagent/fluent-logging
# NOTE – This location is flexible for the path to use for log file position files
chown omsagent:omiusers state
chown omsagent:omiusers run
chown omsagent:omiusers log
chown omsagent:omiusers tmp
chown omsagent:omiusers /home/omsagent/fluent-logging

Verify SCOM certificate

Configuring FluentD requires the SCOM management server (MS) has signed the certificate on the UNIX server.  The docs article tells you to generate a new certificate for FluentD, which requires the management server.

Overview

Sign the certs on the agent > copy to MS > sign > copy back to agent

Step by step instructions
    1. Generate certs

/opt/microsoft/scx/bin/tools/scxsslconfig -c -g /etc/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/certs/

2. Rename certificates

cp -p omi-host-server.domain.pem to scom-cert.pem

cp -p omikey.pem to scom-key.pem

 

3. Copy certs to MS (sftp/ssh via WinSCP, or your app of choice)

 

4. Sign certs on MS via scxcertconfig -sign

 

Open PowerShell (as admin)

Go to your SCOM management server directory (hopefully d:)

cd ‘D:\Program Files\Microsoft System Center\Operations Manager\Server’

scxcertconfig -sign scom-cert.pem

scxcertconfig -sign scom-key.pem

 

5. Copy certs back to agent from MS (sftp/ssh via WinSCP, or your app of choice)

 

6. Verify the SCOM certificate shows your Management Server (MS) in the DC= line in the certificate

openssl x509 -in scom-cert.pem -noout -text

Verify SSL certificate - openssl syntax, verify the DC= portion is from the SCOM management server (MS)

 

7. Restart omsagent

As the ALLINONE server is one of my 2019 SCOM labs, I can verify that my cert is now signed by the management server (MS).  Time to load the certificate, and then restart the agent to see if we have any errors

# Restart Agent

/opt/microsoft/omsagent/bin/service_control restart

 

 

Verify omsagent.log errors

Verify any errors from the omsagent.log

Depending on where you are with your UNIX/Linux commands, this may help provide some context or use case examples.

My example –

First error after restart was ‘permission denied’.   FluentD runs under the omsagent ID, and needs to have access to whatever log – at least read (4).  For the syslog example, I made omsagent the owner, and omiusers the group.   The smarter, security hat on, choice is to leave as root and make it read capable, or add omsagent to the root group

Configure FluentD part 2 - fluentd permission denied alerts on /var/log/syslog

 

Search /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log for errors.  Commands build on another, from simpler to more complex.  Don’t worry if UNIX/Linux is new, I’m all about examples, so hope that helps bridge the gap!

 

# Tail omsagent.log for progress

# Option 1 Continual output updates from file

tail -f /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log

# Option 2 – get last 10 lines

tail /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log

 

# Option 3 – get last 100 lines

tail -100 /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log

# Option 4 – Get a little fancier – search for a string

grep string /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log

# Option 5 – Specific example = error, case insensitive (-i)

grep -i error /var/opt/microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log

 

# Option 6 – egrep strings and -v to exclude what you don’t want to see

grep -i error /var/opt/Microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log |egrep -v “Permission denied|stacktrace”

 

Verify FluentD config files

Verify FluentD conf files and omsagent.conf has INCLUDE line

The INCLUDE lines allows a directory for a ‘Gold depot’ to control what log files are monitored on destination linux servers.  The goal is a standard repository (gold depot ) to simply copy the conf file you want for logfile/app/daemon, restart agent, and you’re off to the races monitoring that log file.

 

Verify omsagent.conf includes directory

grep -i include /etc/opt/Microsoft/omsagent/scom/conf/omsagent.conf

# If there’s output, make sure that omsagent.d path exists

# Verify permissions show omsagent:omiusers

ls -al /etc/opt/Microsoft/omsagent/scom/conf | grep omsagent

 

10. Back to step 8’s problem, to fix the FluentD conf files, so we can test!  Step 9 verified that FluentD is configured via the omsagent.conf, and also for specific configuration files (.conf) in omsagent.d directory.

ls -al output list of the omsagent.d directory and oms config specific files for various log files

Next, we need to restart the agent to verify configuration, and any errors are seen on the FluentD side.

My error for ‘out_scom’ plugin was already used by some other test conf files.

grep -i error /var/opt/Microsoft/omsagent/scom/log/omsagent.log |grep “Permission denied” |tail

 

Example of omsagent.log where we have traced an event for our mylog

OMSAgent FluentD debunked - omsagent.log permission denied opening logfile errors for /var/log/syslog

Mike explained that my error was due to having multiple FluentD conf files using the same buffer path for ‘out_scom’.  I searched the conf files to see who had ‘out_scom’ and removed one of my old test files from months back when I was testing the feature.

# Example of errors in the omsagent.log

Tail of the omsagent.log where we want to look for errors

 

Don’t forget to restart the omsagent for reading in the new file changes

# Restart Agent

/opt/microsoft/omsagent/bin/service_control restart

 

 

I’ll cover building a fluentd conf file in another blog post for brevity.

 

 

Time to test for alerts!

Time to test our FluentD conf file and append entries into the log file!

Starting simple again

# Options

echo test >> /var/log/mylog

echo 911 error >> /var/log/mylog

# Echo entries into test logfile to mimic syslog or messages

echo `date +”%b %e %H:%M:%S”` MYLOG 911 test string. Call 911

# Verify

tail /var/log/mylog

Switch over to SCOM management server, and look for alerts

Navigate to the Monitoring Tab > Active alerts

OMSAgent FluentD debunked - scom console alerts for fluentd test patterns

 

 

References for more information

In case you need a refresher on all the date options… Found CyberCiti FAQ helpful

Configure FluentD part 2 - output of the date command formatting like syslog or messages

All because the goal is to make the echo statement better for testing closer test/UAT examples on string matches, etc.

echo `date +”%b %e %H:%M:%S”` MYLOG 911 test string. Call 911

And what does it look like?

OMSAgent FluentD debunked - tail of created /var/log/mylog that shows various echo options