APM agent ECS reformatting with Filebeatedit
Elastic APM agents can automatically reformat application logs to Elastic Common Schema (ECS) format without needing to add an ECS logger dependency or modify the application.
Requirements
- The Elastic APM agent for your programming language
- Filebeat configured to monitor and capture application logs
Pros
All the benefits of using ECS logging, without having to modify the application or its configuration:
- Simplicity: no manual parsing with Filebeat, and a configuration can be reused across applications
- Decently human-readable JSON structure
- APM log correlation
Cons
- Requires an Elastic APM agent
- Not all APM agents support this feature
Supported APM agents/languages
- Ruby
- Java
Step 1: Enable APM agent reformattingedit
Enable APM agent ECS reformatting in the supported APM agent:
See the Ruby or Java agent docs.
Step 2: Set up Filebeatedit
- Follow the Filebeat quick start to learn how to install Filebeat and connect to the Elastic Stack.
-
Add the following configuration to your
filebeat.yamlfile to start collecting log data.filebeat.yaml.
filebeat.inputs: - type: filestream paths: /path/to/logs.json parsers: - ndjson: overwrite_keys: true add_error_key: true expand_keys: true fields: service.name: your_service_name processors: - add_host_metadata: ~ - add_cloud_metadata: ~ - add_docker_metadata: ~ - add_kubernetes_metadata: ~
Use the filestream input to read lines from active log files.
Values from the decoded JSON object overwrite the fields that Filebeat normally adds (type, source, offset, etc.) in case of conflicts.
Filebeat adds an "error.message" and "error.type: json" key in case of JSON unmarshalling errors.
Filebeat will recursively de-dot keys in the decoded JSON, and expand them into a hierarchical object structure.
The
service.nameof the service you’re collecting logs from. This is required for Log correlation.Processors enhance your data. See processors to learn more.
- Make sure your application logs to stdout/stderr.
- Follow the Run Filebeat on Kubernetes guide.
-
Enable hints-based autodiscover (uncomment the corresponding section in
filebeat-kubernetes.yaml). -
Add these annotations to your pods that log using ECS-compatible JSON. This will make sure the logs are parsed appropriately.
annotations: co.elastic.logs/json.overwrite_keys: true co.elastic.logs/json.add_error_key: true co.elastic.logs/json.expand_keys: true
Values from the decoded JSON object overwrite the fields that Filebeat normally adds (type, source, offset, etc.) in case of conflicts.
Filebeat adds an "error.message" and "error.type: json" key in case of JSON unmarshalling errors.
Filebeat will recursively de-dot keys in the decoded JSON, and expand them into a hierarchical object structure.
- Make sure your application logs to stdout/stderr.
- Follow the Run Filebeat on Docker guide.
- Enable hints-based autodiscover.
-
Add these labels to your containers that log using ECS-compatible JSON. This will make sure the logs are parsed appropriately.
docker-compose.yml.
labels: co.elastic.logs/json.overwrite_keys: true co.elastic.logs/json.add_error_key: true co.elastic.logs/json.expand_keys: true
Values from the decoded JSON object overwrite the fields that Filebeat normally adds (type, source, offset, etc.) in case of conflicts.
Filebeat adds an "error.message" and "error.type: json" key in case of JSON unmarshalling errors.
Filebeat will recursively de-dot keys in the decoded JSON, and expand them into a hierarchical object structure.
Step 3: View your logs in Kibanaedit
Use the APM or Logs UI to search, filter, and visualize your logs.