The Apache Web Server integration collects traffic-related metrics, such as the number of open connections or incoming requests. The integration also collects access and error logs. Access logs are parsed into a JSON payload focused on request details, and error logs are parsed for their error code and message.
For more information about Apache Web Server, see the Apache Web Server (httpd) documentation.
Prerequisites
To collect Apache Web Server telemetry, you must install the Ops Agent:
- For metrics, install version 2.7.0 or higher.
- For logs, install version 2.4.0 or higher.
This integration supports Apache Web Server version 2.4.
Configure your Apache Web Server instance
To collect telemetry from your Apache Web Server, you must configure the
server's httpd.conf
file to enable the
mod_status
plugin.
Many Apache installations enable this plugin by default. To see if the plugin is enabled on your VM instance, run:
curl localhost:80/server-status?auto
If the plugin is enabled, then the output includes lines similar to the following:
Total Accesses: 2 Total kBytes: 1 BusyWorkers: 1 IdleWorkers: 4
If you get a 404 Not Found
page instead, then the mod_status
plugin is not
enabled.
Configure the Ops Agent for Apache Web Server
Following the guide for Configuring the Ops Agent, add the required elements to collect telemetry from Apache Web Server instances, and restart the agent.
Example configuration
The following commands create the configuration to collect and ingest telemetry for Apache Web Server and restarts the Ops Agent.
Configure logs collection
To ingest logs from Apache Web Server, you must create receivers for the logs that Apache Web Server produces and then create a pipeline for the new receivers.
To configure a receiver for your apache_access
logs, specify the following
fields:
Field | Default | Description |
---|---|---|
exclude_paths |
A list of filesystem path patterns to exclude from the set matched by include_paths . |
|
include_paths |
[/var/log/apache2/access.log,/var/log/apache2/access_log,/var/log/httpd/access_log] |
A list of filesystem paths to read by tailing each file. A wild card (* ) can be used in the paths; for example, /var/log/apache*/*.log . |
record_log_file_path |
false |
If set to true , then the path to the specific file from which the log record was obtained appears in the output log entry as the value of the agent.googleapis.com/log_file_path label. When using a wildcard, only the path of the file from which the record was obtained is recorded. |
type |
This value must be apache_access . |
|
wildcard_refresh_interval |
60s |
The interval at which wildcard file paths in include_paths are refreshed. Given as a time duration parsable by time.ParseDuration , for example 30s or 2m . This property might be useful under high logging throughputs where log files are rotated faster than the default interval. |
To configure a receiver for your apache_error
logs, specify the following
fields:
Field | Default | Description |
---|---|---|
exclude_paths |
A list of filesystem path patterns to exclude from the set matched by include_paths . |
|
include_paths |
[/var/log/apache2/error.log,/var/log/apache2/error_log,/var/log/httpd/error_log] |
A list of filesystem paths to read by tailing each file. A wild card (* ) can be used in the paths; for example, /var/log/apache*/*.log . |
record_log_file_path |
false |
If set to true , then the path to the specific file from which the log record was obtained appears in the output log entry as the value of the agent.googleapis.com/log_file_path label. When using a wildcard, only the path of the file from which the record was obtained is recorded. |
type |
This value must be apache_error . |
|
wildcard_refresh_interval |
60s |
The interval at which wildcard file paths in include_paths are refreshed. Given as a time duration parsable by time.ParseDuration , for example 30s or 2m . This property might be useful under high logging throughputs where log files are rotated faster than the default interval. |
What is logged
The logName
is derived from
the receiver IDs specified in the configuration. Detailed fields inside the
LogEntry
are as follows.
The apache_access
logs contain the following fields in the LogEntry
:
Field | Type | Description |
---|---|---|
httpRequest |
object | See HttpRequest |
jsonPayload.host |
string | Contents of the Host header |
jsonPayload.user |
string | Authenticated username for the request |
severity |
string (LogSeverity ) |
Log entry level (translated) |
The apache_error
logs contain the following fields in the LogEntry
:
Field | Type | Description |
---|---|---|
jsonPayload.client |
string | Client IP address (optional) |
jsonPayload.errorCode |
string | Apache error code |
jsonPayload.level |
string | Log entry level |
jsonPayload.message |
string | Log message |
jsonPayload.module |
string | apache module where the log originated |
jsonPayload.pid |
string | Process ID |
jsonPayload.tid |
string | Thread ID |
severity |
string (LogSeverity ) |
Log entry level (translated) |
Configure metrics collection
To ingest metrics from Apache Web Server, you must create receivers for the metrics that Apache Web Server produces and then create a pipeline for the new receivers.
To configure a receiver for your apache
metrics, specify the following
fields:
Field | Default | Description |
---|---|---|
collection_interval |
60s |
A time duration value, such as 30s or 5m . |
server_status_url |
http://localhost:80/server-status?auto |
The URL exposed by the mod_status module. |
type |
This value must be apache . |
What is monitored
The following table provides the list of metrics that the Ops Agent collects from the Apache Web Server instance.
Metric type | |
---|---|
Kind, Type Monitored resources |
Labels |
workload.googleapis.com/apache.current_connections
|
|
GAUGE , INT64 gce_instance |
server_name
|
workload.googleapis.com/apache.requests
|
|
CUMULATIVE , INT64 gce_instance |
server_name
|
workload.googleapis.com/apache.scoreboard
|
|
GAUGE , INT64 gce_instance |
server_name state
|
workload.googleapis.com/apache.traffic
|
|
CUMULATIVE , INT64 gce_instance |
server_name
|
workload.googleapis.com/apache.workers
|
|
GAUGE , INT64 gce_instance |
server_name state
|
Sample dashboard
To view your Apache Web Server metrics, you must have a chart or dashboard configured. Cloud Monitoring provides a library of sample dashboards for integrations, which contain preconfigured charts. For information about installing these dashboards, see Installing sample dashboards.
Verify the configuration
This section describes how to verify that you correctly configured the Apache Web Server receiver. It might take one or two minutes for the Ops Agent to begin collecting telemetry.
To verify that the logs are ingested, go to the Logs Explorer and run the following query to view the Apache Web Server logs:
resource.type="gce_instance"
(log_id("apache_access") OR log_id("apache_error"))
To verify that the metrics are ingested, go to Metrics Explorer and run the following query in the MQL tab:
fetch gce_instance
| metric 'workload.googleapis.com/apache.current_connections'
| every 1m
What's next
For a walkthrough on how to use Ansible to install the Ops Agent, configure a third-party application, and install a sample dashboard, see the Install the Ops Agent to troubleshoot third-party applications video.