Monitor file over SSH

To collect data by using an SSH connection

1. Navigate to Administration > Data Collectors > Add Data Collector .

2. In the Name box, provide a unique name to identify this data collector.

3. From the Type list, select Monitor File over SSH.

4. Provide the following information, as appropriate:

   Field	Description
   Target/Collection Host
   Target Host	(Optional) Select from a list of hosts that you have already configured under Administration > Hosts. The target host is the computer from which you want to retrieve the data. You can choose to select the target host and inherit the host-level tags and group access permissions already added to the host, or manually enter the host name in the Server Name field.
   Collection Host (Agent)	Type or select the collection host depending on whether you want to use the Collection Station or the Collection Agent to perform data collection. The collection host is the computer on which the Collection Station or the Collection Agent is located. By default, the Collection Station is already selected. You can either retain the default selection or select the Collection Agent. Note: For this type of data collector, the target host and collection host are expected to have different values.
   Collector Inputs
   Server Name	Enter the host name of the server from which you want to retrieve the data. Note: If you selected a target host earlier, this field is automatically populated. The value of this field is necessary for generating the "HOST" field that enables effective data search.
   Credentials	(Optional) Select one of the following options: Apply security credential to automatically populate the user name and password fields. Then select the appropriate credential (profile) from the Available Credential list that you already configured under Administration > Credentials. Provide Credential to manually add user name and password credentials. Then enter the credentials in the User Name and Password fields. You can also create a credential that uses the manually entered details by clicking Add Credential  next to the Password field.
   User Name	Provide the user name for connecting with the server from which you want to retrieve the data. Note: This field is disabled if you applied a security profile earlier. The product supports only password-based authentication for connecting with the SSH server.
   Password	Provide the password for connecting with the server from which you want to retrieve the data. Click Add Credential , provide a credential name, and click OK to create a new credential (profile) from the credentials that you provided in the user name and password fields. Once this credential is created, it is displayed under Administration > Credentials. Note: This field is disabled if you applied a security credential earlier.
   Directory Path	Provide the absolute path of the data file. To retrieve data files from subdirectories, specify two asterisks (**) as the wildcard at the end of the directory path. For example, you can specify /usr/local/**/ to collect the following logs: /usr/local/stats_log /usr/local/cpanel/logs/login_log/ /usr/local/mailman/log
   Filename/Rollover Pattern	Specify the file name only, or specify the file name with a rollover pattern to identify subsequent logs. You can use the following wildcard characters: Asterisk (*)—Can be used to substitute zero or more characters in the file name. Question mark (?)—Can be used to substitute exactly one character in the file name. Specifying a rollover pattern can be useful to monitor rolling log files where the log files are saved with the same name but differentiated with some variable like the time stamp or a number. Specifying a wildcard can also be useful when you remember the file name only partially. Note: Ensure that you specify a rollover pattern for identifying log files that follow the same data format (which means they will be indexed with the same data pattern).  See examples Scenario 1 Suppose you want to collect log files saved with succeeding numbers once they reach a certain size; for example: IAS0.log IAS1.log IAS2.log Rollover pattern: In this scenario, you can specify the rollover pattern as IAS?.log. Scenario 2 Suppose you want to collect log files that roll over every hour and are saved with the same date but a different time stamp in the YYYY-MM-DD-HH format; for example: 2013-10-01-11 .log 2013-10-01-12.log 2013-10-01-13.log Rollover pattern: In this scenario, you can specify the rollover pattern as 2013-10-01-*.log or 2013-10-01-??.log. In this scenario, if you are sure that exactly two digits at the end of timestamp are likely to change, then you can specify the ?? wildcard sequence to capture exactly two changing digits. Otherwise, specifying a single asterisk is recommended.
   Time Zone	(Optional) Accept the default Use file time zone option or select a time zone from the list. With the default option, data is indexed as per the time zone available in the data file. If the data file does not contain a timezone, then the time zone of the Collection Host (Collection Station or Collection Agent server) is used. Keep in mind that the selected timezone must match the timezone of the server from which you want to collect data. If you manually specify the timezone despite the file containing a timezone, then the manually specified timezone overrides the file timezone.
   Data Pattern
   Pattern	Assign the data pattern (and optionally date format) for indexing the data file. The data pattern and date format together decide the way in which the data will be indexed. When you select a data pattern, the matching date format is automatically selected. However, you can override the date format by manually selecting another date format or by selecting the option to create a new date format. By doing this, the date format is used to index the date and time string, while rest of the data is indexed as per the data pattern selected. Instead of manually browsing through the list of available data patterns, you can click Auto-Detect to automatically find a list of matching data patterns. If no matching data patterns are found, then a list of matching date formats is displayed. By selecting the date format, the date and time string (in the data) is indexed with the selected date format, while rest of the data is indexed as free text. If you cannot find both matching data patterns and date formats, then you can choose to index the data as free text. Depending on whether the data contains a date and time string, you can choose to assign the data pattern as Free Text with Timestamp or Free Text without Timestamp. All the records processed by using the Free Text without Timestamp option are assumed to be a single line of data with a line terminator at the end of the event. To distinguish records in a custom way, you can specify a custom string or regular expression in the Event Delimiter box, which decides where the new line starts in the data. If you are collecting JSON data, then depending on whether the data contains a date and time string, you can assign the data pattern as JSON with Timestamp or JSON without Timestamp. After assigning the data pattern (and optionally date format), you can preview the sample records. For more information, see Assigning the data pattern and date format. Notes: Before filtering the relevant data patterns by clicking Auto-Detect, ensure that the correct file encoding is set. If you select both – a pattern and a date format, the product uses the date format to index the timestamp and the pattern to index rest of the event data.
   Date Format
   Date Locale	(Optional) You can use this setting to enable reading the date and time string based on the language selected. Note that this setting only applies to those portions of the date and time string that consist letters (digits are not considered). By default, this value is set to English. You can manually select a language to override the default locale. For a list of languages supported, see Language information.
   File Encoding	If your data file uses a character set encoding other than UTF-8 (default), then do one of the following: Filter the relevant character set encodings that match the file. To do this, click Filter relevant charset encoding next to this field. Manually scan through the list available and select an appropriate option. Allow IT Data Analytics to use a relevant character set encoding for your file by manually select the AUTO option.
   Poll Interval (mins)	Enter a number to specify the poll interval (in minutes) for the log collection. By default, this value is set to 1.
   Start/Stop Collection	(Optional) Select this check box if you want to start the data collection immediately.

    Advanced Options

   Ignore Data Matching Input	(Optional) If you do not want to index certain lines in your data file, then you can ignore them by providing one of the following inputs: Provide a line that consistently occurs in the event data that you want to ignore. This line will be used as the criterion to ignore data during indexing. Provide a Java regular expression that will be used as the criterion for ignoring data matching the regular expression. Example: While using the following sample data, you can provide the following input to ignore particular lines. To ignore the line containing the string, "WARN", you can specify WARN in this field. To ignore lines containing the words both "WARN" and "INFO", you can specify a regular expression .*(WARN|INFO).* in this field. Sample data Sep 25, 2014 10:26:47 AM net.sf.ehcache.config. ConfigurationFactory parseConfiguration():134 WARN: No configuration found. Configuring ehcache from ehcache-failsafe.xml found in the classpath: Sep 25, 2014 10:26:53 AM com.bmc.ola.metadataserver. MetadataServerHibernateImpl bootstrap():550 INFO: Executing Query to check init property: select * from CONFIGURATIONS where userName = 'admin' and propertyName ='init' Sep 30, 2014 07:03:06 PM org.hibernate.engine.jdbc.spi. SqlExceptionHelper logExceptions():144 ERROR: An SQLException was provoked by the following failure: java.lang.InterruptedException Sep 30, 2014 04:39:27 PM com.bmc.ola.engine.query. ElasticSearchClient indexCleanupOperations():206 INFO: IndexOptimizeTask: index: bw-2014-09-23-18-006 optimized of type: data
   Data Retention Period (in days)	Indicates the number of days for which indexed data must be retained in the system. By default, this value is set to 7. The default value is based on the maximum data retention period specified at Administration > System Settings. You can change this limit to a maximum of 14 days. To increase the limit beyond 14 days, you need to modify the value of the following property: Property name: max.data.collector.data.retention.limit Property location: %BMC_ITDA_HOME%\custom\conf\server\searchserviceCustomConfig.properties After changing the property value, you need to restart the Search component to apply the change.
   Best Effort Collection	(Optional) If you clear this check box, only those lines that match the data pattern are indexed; all other data is ignored. To index the non-matching lines in your data file, keep this check box selected. Note: Non-matching lines in the data file are indexed on the basis of the Free Text with Timestamp data pattern. Example: The following lines provide sample data that you can index by using the Hadoop data pattern. In this scenario, if you select this check box, all lines are indexed. But if you clear the check box, only the first two lines are indexed. Sample data 2014-08-08 15:15:43,777 INFO org.apache.hadoop.hdfs.server. datanode.DataNode.clienttrace: src: /10.20.35.35:35983, dest: /10.20.35.30:50010, bytes: 991612, op: HDFS_WRITE, cliID: 2014-08-08 15:15:44,053 INFO org.apache.hadoop.hdfs.server. datanode.DataNode: Receiving block blk_-6260132620401037548_ 683435 src: /10.20.35.35:35983 dest: /10.20.35.30:50010 2014-08-08 15:15:49,992 IDFSClient_-19587029, offset: 0, srvID: DS-731595843-10.20.35.30-50010-1344428145675, blockid: blk_-8867275036873170670_683436, duration: 5972783 2014-08-08 15:15:50,992 IDFSClient_-19587029, offset: 0, srvID: DS-731595843-10.20.35.30-50010-1344428145675, blockid: blk_-8867275036873170670_683436, duration: 5972783
   Host Key Fingerprint	(Optional) Provide the fingerprint of the RSA host key to connect with the server from which you want to retrieve the data. This is the host key that is configured to be used by the SSH server with which you want to connect. Example: bc:e1:44:56:bd:b1:4d:b9:6f:4c:a4:ca:07:69:5c:66 Tip: To get the RSA host key fingerprint, you might want to contact your SSH server administrator. For more information, see About the SSH host key fingerprint (BMC contributor page).
   Log File Contains Header	(Optional) Providing this value is mandatory only if you are trying collect a file that contains a constant header which must not be indexed. The value must be the actual header appearing in the data.
   Log File Contains Footer	(Optional) Providing this value is mandatory only if you are trying collect a file that contains a constant footer which must not be indexed. The value must be the actual footer appearing in the data.

    Tags

   Inherit Host Level Tags From Target Host

   (Optional) Select this check box to inherit your tag selections associated with the target host that you selected earlier. This option is not applicable if you did not select a target host. Note: After selecting this check box, you can further manually select additional user groups. When you manually select additional user groups, both the inherited permissions as well as the manually assigned permissions are applied. To remove the inherited permissions, clear this check box.

   Select Tag name and corresponding value

   (Optional) Select a tag name and specify the corresponding value by which you want to categorize the data collected. Later while searching data, you can use these tags to narrow down your search results. Example: If your are collecting data from hosts located at Houston, you can select a tag name for "Location" and in the value specify "Houston". While searching the data, you can use the tag, Location="Houston" to filter data and see results associated with the Houston location. To be able to see tag names, you need to first add them by navigating to Administration > System Settings. To specify tag names and corresponding values, in the left box select a tag name and then type the corresponding tag value in the right box. While you type the value, you might see type-ahead suggestions based on values specified in the past. If you want to use one of the suggestions, click the suggestion. Click Add to add the tag name and corresponding value to the list of added tags that follow. Click Remove Tag to remove a tag. The tags saved while creating the data collector are displayed on the Search tab, under the Filters panel, and in the Tags section. Note: At a time, you can specify only one value for a tag name. To specify multiple values for the same tag name, each time you need to select the tag name, specify the corresponding value, and click Add. For more information about tags, see Understanding fields.

    Group Access

   Inherit Host Level Access Groups From Target Host

   (Optional) Select this check box to inherit your group access configurations associated with the target host that you selected earlier. This option is not applicable if you did not select a target host. Note: After selecting this check box, you can further manually select additional user groups. When you manually select additional user groups, both the inherited permissions as well as the manually assigned permissions are applied. To remove the inherited permissions, clear this check box.

   Select All Groups

   (Optional) Select this option if you want to select all user groups. You can also manually select multiple user groups. Notes: You can access data retrieved by this data collector based on the following conditions. If user groups are not selected and data access control is enabled: Only the creator of the data collector can access data retrieved by this data collector. If user groups are not selected and if data access control is not enabled: All users can access data retrieved by this data collector. You can restrict access permissions by selecting the relevant user groups that must be given access permissions. To enable data access control, navigate to Administration > System Settings. For more information, see Managing user groups in IT Data Analytics.

5. Click Create to save your changes.

What to do if an error occurs

To understand the troubleshooting scenarios related to this data collector, see Troubleshooting common issues with the Category filter set to Data collection.