Fluentd Logging¶

Overview¶

The Cloud-Native Network Functions (CNFs) Fluentd Pod is an open source data collector that can be configured to receive logging data from the BIG-IP Controller, Traffic Management Microkernel (TMM), Edge Firewall, Distributed Session State Managment (dSSM) Pods, and BGP updates from the TMM routing container. The Fluentd Pod must bind to a Kubernetes persistence volume in order to create the necessary log file directories.

This document guides you through understanding, configuring and deploying the f5-fluentd logging container.

Fluentd Service¶

When installing Fluentd, a Service object is created to receive logging data on TCP service port 54321, and forward the data to Fluentd on TCP service port 24224.

Example Fluentd Service:

Name:              f5-toda-fluentd
Namespace:         cnf-gateway
IP:                10.109.102.215
Port:              <unset>  54321/TCP
Endpoints:         10.244.1.75:24224

Example Fluentd integration:

_images/cnf-fluentd-logging.png

Log file locations¶

Fluentd collects logging data in the following log files:

Container	Log file
f5-dssm-sentinel	/var/log/f5/f5-dssm-sentinel-0/sentinel.log
f5-dssm-db	/var/log/f5/f5-dssm-db-0/dssm.log
f5ingress	/var/log/f5/helm_release-f5ingress/pod_name/f5ingress.log
f5-tmm	/var/log/f5/f5-tmm/pod_name/f5-fsm-tmm.log
f5-tmm-routing	/var/log/f5/f5-tmm/pod_name/f5-tmm-routing.log

_images/spk_info.png Note: To modify the TMM logging level, review the tmm_cli section of the Debug Sidecar overview.

Requirements¶

Prior to installing Fluentd, ensure you have:

An available persistence volume.
Installed the CNFs software.
A Linux based workstation with Helm installed.

Procedures¶

Installation¶

Use the following steps to the install the f5-fluentd container.

Change into local directory with the CNF files, and list the files in the tar directory:

In this example, the CNF files are in the cnfinstall directory:
```
cd cnfinstall
```
```
ls -1 tar
```
In this example, Fluentd Helm chart is named f5-toda-fluentd-1.8.30.tgz:
```
cnf-docker-images.tgz
f5-dssm-0.22.12.tgz
f5-toda-fluentd-1.8.30.tgz
f5ingress-6.0.13.tgz
```
Create a Helm values file named fluentd-values.yaml, and set the image.repository, persistence.storageClass, and robinNetworks parameters:
```
image:
  repository: <registry>

persistence:
  enabled: true
  storageClass: "<name>"

robinNetworks: true
```
In this example, Helm pulls the f5-fluentd image from registry.com, and the container will bind to the storageClass named managed-nfs-storage:
```
image:
  repository: registry.com

persistence:
  enabled: true
  storageClass: "managed-nfs-storage"

robinNetworks: true
```

Optional: Add the following parameters to the values file to collect logging data from the Controller, dSSM, and PCCD Pods:

# Collect logging from the Ingress Controller Pod
f5ingress_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
# Collect logging from the dSSM Pods
dssm_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
# Configuration for sentinel logs
dssm_sentinel_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
pccd_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true

Install the f5-fluentd container and save the Fluentd hostname for the Controller installation:

helm install f5-fluentd <helm chart> -f <values>

For example:

helm install f5-fluentd f5-toda-fluentd-1.8.30.tgz -f fluentd-values.yaml

_images/spk_info.png Note: In this example, the Fluentd hostname is f5-toda-fluentd.cnf-gateway.svc.cluster.local.:

FluentD hostname: f5-toda-fluentd.cnf-gateway.svc.cluster.local.
FluentD port: "54321"

The f5-fluentd container should now be successfully installed:

oc get pods

In this example, the Fluentd Pod STATUS is Running:

NAME                              READY   STATUS    
f5-toda-fluentd-8cf96967b-jxckr   1/1     Running  

Fluentd should also be bound to the persistent volume:

oc get pvc

In this example, the Fluentd Pod PVC displays STATUS as Bound:

NAME              STATUS   VOLUME                                     STORAGECLASS
f5-toda-fluentd   Bound    pvc-7d36b530-b718-466c-9b6e-895e8f1079a2   managed-nfs-storage

Viewing logs¶

After installing the BIG-IP Controller and dSSM Pods, you can use the following steps to view the logs in the f5-fluentd container:

kubectl exec -it deploy/f5-toda-fluentd -n <project> -- bash

In this example, the container is in the cnf-gateway Project:

kubectl exec -it deploy/f5-toda-fluentd -n cnf-gateway -- bash

Change to the main logging directory, and list the subdirectories:
```
cd /var/log/f5; ls
```
In this example, logging directories are present for the f5ingress, f5-tmm, f5-dssm-db, and f5-dssm-sentinel Pods:
```
f5-dssm-db-0  f5-dssm-db-1  f5-dssm-db-2  f5-dssm-sentinel-0  
f5-dssm-sentinel-1  f5-dssm-sentinel-2  f5-ingress-f5ingress  f5-tmm  
```
Change into one of the subdirectories, for example f5-dssm-db-0:
```
cd f5-dssm-db-0
```
View the logs using the more command:
```
more -d dssm.log
```

Next step¶

Continue to one of the following steps listed by installation precedence:

Optional: Install the dSSM Database to store session-state information.
Required: Install the BIG-IP Controller, TMM and AFM Pods.

Feedback¶

Provide feedback to improve this document by emailing cnfdocs@f5.com.

Supplemental¶

Previous Next