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.
Installed the CNFs Cert Manager.
A Linux based workstation with Helm installed.

Procedures¶

Installation¶

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

Change into the directory containing the latest CNFs Software, and obtain the f5-toda-fluentd Helm chart version:

In this example, the CNF files are in the cnfinstall directory:
```
cd cnfinstall
```
```
ls -1 tar | grep f5-toda-fluentd
```
The example output should appear similar to the following:
```
f5-toda-fluentd-1.23.36.tgz
```
Create a new namespace for the CNFs Pods using the following command syntax:
```
kubectl create ns <namespace>
```
For example:
```
kubectl create ns cnf-gateway
```
Create a Helm values file named fluentd-values.yaml, and set the image.repository and persistence.storageClass parameters:
```
image:
  repository: <registry>

persistence:
  enabled: true
  storageClass: "<name>"
```
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"
```
In fluentd-values.yaml file set the serviceAccount.create parameter:

Note: The serviceAccount will not be created by default.
```
serviceAccount:
  create: false
  name: default
```

Required: Add the following parameters to the values file to collect logging data from each of the enabled CNFs Pods:

_images/spk_warn.png Important: The Fluentdbit and Fluentd configurations are mandatory for proper log file recovery in the event of pod or container restarts; without this configuration, the users will not able to receover their log files.

f5ingress_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
dssm_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
dssm_sentinel_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
pccd_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
ipsd_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
downloader_logs:
  enabled: true
  stdout: true
cm_logs:
  # Enable Cert Manager logging
  enabled: true
  stdout: true

Refer the imagePullSecret in fluentd-values.yaml to pull the Fluentd image from private repository.
```
imageCredentials:
   name: <imagepullsecret name>
```

Install the Fluentd Pod using the following command syntax:_

Note: Be certain to save the Fluentd hostname from the command output for the Controller installation.

helm install <release> tar/<helm-chart>.tgz \
-f <values>.yaml -n <namespace>

For example:

helm install f5-fluentd tar/f5-toda-fluentd-1.23.36.tgz \
-f fluentd-values.yaml -n cnf-gateway

In the example output, 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 Fluentd Pod should now be successfully installed:

kubectl get pods -n cnf-gateway

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:

kubectl get pvc -n cnf-gateway

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 <namespace> -- bash

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

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¶

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