Netflow and Elasticsearch Integration
Powerful performance with an easy integration, powered by Telegraf, the open source data connector built by InfluxData.
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Table of Contents
Powerful Performance, Limitless Scale
Collect, organize, and act on massive volumes of high-velocity data. Any data is more valuable when you think of it as time series data. with InfluxDB, the #1 time series platform built to scale with Telegraf.
See Ways to Get Started
Input and output integration overview
The Netflow plugin is designed to collect traffic flow data from devices using the Netflow v5, v9 and IPFIX protocols. By capturing detailed flow information, this plugin supports network observability and analysis, enabling administrators to monitor traffic patterns and performance metrics effectively.
The Telegraf Elasticsearch Plugin seamlessly sends metrics to an Elasticsearch server. The plugin handles template creation and dynamic index management, and supports various Elasticsearch-specific features to ensure data is formatted correctly for storage and retrieval.
Integration details
Netflow
The Netflow plugin serves as a collector for flow data using protocols such as Netflow v5, Netflow v9, and IPFIX. This plugin allows users to gather important flow metrics from devices that support these protocols, including a variety of operational insights about traffic patterns, source/destination information, and protocol usage. The plugin leverages templates sent by flow devices to decode incoming data correctly, and it supports private enterprise number mappings for vendor-specific information. With features like adjustable service addresses and buffer sizes, the plugin provides flexibility in how it can be deployed within various network architectures, making it an essential tool for network monitoring and analysis.
Elasticsearch
This plugin writes metrics to Elasticsearch, a distributed, RESTful search and analytics engine capable of storing large amounts of data in near real-time. It is designed to handle Elasticsearch versions 5.x through 7.x and utilizes its dynamic template features to manage data type mapping properly. The plugin supports advanced features such as template management, dynamic index naming, and integration with OpenSearch. It also allows configurations for authentication and health monitoring of the Elasticsearch nodes.
Configuration
Netflow
[[inputs.netflow]]
## Address to listen for netflow,ipfix or sflow packets.
## example: service_address = "udp://:2055"
## service_address = "udp4://:2055"
## service_address = "udp6://:2055"
service_address = "udp://:2055"
## Set the size of the operating system's receive buffer.
## example: read_buffer_size = "64KiB"
## Uses the system's default if not set.
# read_buffer_size = ""
## Protocol version to use for decoding.
## Available options are
## "ipfix" -- IPFIX / Netflow v10 protocol (also works for Netflow v9)
## "netflow v5" -- Netflow v5 protocol
## "netflow v9" -- Netflow v9 protocol (also works for IPFIX)
## "sflow v5" -- sFlow v5 protocol
# protocol = "ipfix"
## Private Enterprise Numbers (PEN) mappings for decoding
## This option allows to specify vendor-specific mapping files to use during
## decoding.
# private_enterprise_number_files = []
## Log incoming packets for tracing issues
# log_level = "trace"
Elasticsearch
[[outputs.elasticsearch]]
## The full HTTP endpoint URL for your Elasticsearch instance
## Multiple urls can be specified as part of the same cluster,
## this means that only ONE of the urls will be written to each interval
urls = [ "http://node1.es.example.com:9200" ] # required.
## Elasticsearch client timeout, defaults to "5s" if not set.
timeout = "5s"
## Set to true to ask Elasticsearch a list of all cluster nodes,
## thus it is not necessary to list all nodes in the urls config option
enable_sniffer = false
## Set to true to enable gzip compression
enable_gzip = false
## Set the interval to check if the Elasticsearch nodes are available
## Setting to "0s" will disable the health check (not recommended in production)
health_check_interval = "10s"
## Set the timeout for periodic health checks.
# health_check_timeout = "1s"
## HTTP basic authentication details.
## HTTP basic authentication details
# username = "telegraf"
# password = "mypassword"
## HTTP bearer token authentication details
# auth_bearer_token = "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9"
## Index Config
## The target index for metrics (Elasticsearch will create if it not exists).
## You can use the date specifiers below to create indexes per time frame.
## The metric timestamp will be used to decide the destination index name
# %Y - year (2016)
# %y - last two digits of year (00..99)
# %m - month (01..12)
# %d - day of month (e.g., 01)
# %H - hour (00..23)
# %V - week of the year (ISO week) (01..53)
## Additionally, you can specify a tag name using the notation {{tag_name}}
## which will be used as part of the index name. If the tag does not exist,
## the default tag value will be used.
# index_name = "telegraf-{{host}}-%Y.%m.%d"
# default_tag_value = "none"
index_name = "telegraf-%Y.%m.%d" # required.
## Optional Index Config
## Set to true if Telegraf should use the "create" OpType while indexing
# use_optype_create = false
## Optional TLS Config
# tls_ca = "/etc/telegraf/ca.pem"
# tls_cert = "/etc/telegraf/cert.pem"
# tls_key = "/etc/telegraf/key.pem"
## Use TLS but skip chain & host verification
# insecure_skip_verify = false
## Template Config
## Set to true if you want telegraf to manage its index template.
## If enabled it will create a recommended index template for telegraf indexes
manage_template = true
## The template name used for telegraf indexes
template_name = "telegraf"
## Set to true if you want telegraf to overwrite an existing template
overwrite_template = false
## If set to true a unique ID hash will be sent as sha256(concat(timestamp,measurement,series-hash)) string
## it will enable data resend and update metric points avoiding duplicated metrics with different id's
force_document_id = false
## Specifies the handling of NaN and Inf values.
## This option can have the following values:
## none -- do not modify field-values (default); will produce an error if NaNs or infs are encountered
## drop -- drop fields containing NaNs or infs
## replace -- replace with the value in "float_replacement_value" (default: 0.0)
## NaNs and inf will be replaced with the given number, -inf with the negative of that number
# float_handling = "none"
# float_replacement_value = 0.0
## Pipeline Config
## To use a ingest pipeline, set this to the name of the pipeline you want to use.
# use_pipeline = "my_pipeline"
## Additionally, you can specify a tag name using the notation {{tag_name}}
## which will be used as part of the pipeline name. If the tag does not exist,
## the default pipeline will be used as the pipeline. If no default pipeline is set,
## no pipeline is used for the metric.
# use_pipeline = "{{es_pipeline}}"
# default_pipeline = "my_pipeline"
#
# Custom HTTP headers
# To pass custom HTTP headers please define it in a given below section
# [outputs.elasticsearch.headers]
# "X-Custom-Header" = "custom-value"
## Template Index Settings
## Overrides the template settings.index section with any provided options.
## Defaults provided here in the config
# template_index_settings = {
# refresh_interval = "10s",
# mapping.total_fields.limit = 5000,
# auto_expand_replicas = "0-1",
# codec = "best_compression"
# }
Input and output integration examples
Netflow
-
Traffic Analysis and Visualization: Use the Netflow plugin to collect traffic flow data and visualize it in real-time using an analytics platform. Administrators can create dashboards that display traffic patterns and anomalies, helping them understand bandwidth usage and user behavior.
-
Network Performance Optimization: Integrate the Netflow plugin with performance monitoring tools to identify bottlenecks and optimize the network. Analyze collected metrics to pinpoint areas where network resources can be improved, enhancing overall system performance.
-
Anomaly Detection for Security: Leverage the Netflow data for security analysis by feeding it into an anomaly detection system. This can help identify unusual traffic patterns that may indicate potential security threats, enabling quicker responses to prevent breaches.
-
Customized Alerts for Network Events: Configure threshold-based alerts using the Netflow plugin metrics to notify network administrators of unusual spikes or drops in traffic. This proactive monitoring can help in quickly addressing potential issues before they escalate.
Elasticsearch
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Time-based Indexing: Use this plugin to store metrics in Elasticsearch to index each metric based on the time collected. For example, CPU metrics can be stored in a daily index named
telegraf-2023.01.01
, allowing easy time-based queries and retention policies. -
Dynamic Templates Management: Utilize the template management feature to automatically create a custom template tailored to your metrics. This allows you to define how different fields are indexed and analyzed without manually configuring Elasticsearch, ensuring an optimal data structure for querying.
-
OpenSearch Compatibility: If you are using AWS OpenSearch, you can configure this plugin to work seamlessly by activating compatibility mode, ensuring your existing Elasticsearch clients remain functional and compatible with newer cluster setups.
Feedback
Thank you for being part of our community! If you have any general feedback or found any bugs on these pages, we welcome and encourage your input. Please submit your feedback in the InfluxDB community Slack.
Powerful Performance, Limitless Scale
Collect, organize, and act on massive volumes of high-velocity data. Any data is more valuable when you think of it as time series data. with InfluxDB, the #1 time series platform built to scale with Telegraf.
See Ways to Get Started
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