Apache Cassandra

The Apache Cassandra integration collects request, task, and storage metrics that highlight the load on an instance. Optionally, the integration can also collect general JVM metrics related to memory and garbage collection. The integration also collects system, debug, and garbage-collection logs. These logs are parsed into a JSON payload, which includes fields for the message, Java class, and line number.

For more information about Cassandra, see http://cassandra.apache.org/.

Prerequisites

To collect and ingest Cassandra logs and metrics, you must install Ops Agent version 2.6.0 or higher.

This receiver supports Apache Cassandra versions 3.11 and 4.0.

Configure your Cassandra instance

To expose a JMX endpoint, you must set the com.sun.management.jmxremote.port system property when starting the JVM. We also recommend setting the com.sun.management.jmxremote.rmi.port system property to the same port. To expose a JMX endpoint remotely, you must also set the java.rmi.server.hostname system property.

By default, these properties are set in a Cassandra deployment's cassandra-env.sh file.

To set system properties by using command-line arguments, prepend the property name with -D when starting the JVM. For example, to set com.sun.management.jmxremote.port to port 7199, specify the following when starting the JVM:

-Dcom.sun.management.jmxremote.port=7199

Configure the Ops Agent for Cassandra

Following the guide for Configuring the Ops Agent, add the required elements to collect logs and metrics from your Cassandra instances, and restart the agent.

Example configuration

The following command creates the configuration file to collect and ingest logs and metrics for Cassandra and restarts the Ops Agent on Linux.

sudo tee /etc/google-cloud-ops-agent/config.yaml > /dev/null << EOF
logging:
  receivers:
    cassandra_system:
      type: cassandra_system
    cassandra_debug:
      type: cassandra_debug
    cassandra_gc:
      type: cassandra_gc
  service:
    pipelines:
      apache:
        receivers:
          - cassandra_system
          - cassandra_debug
          - cassandra_gc
metrics:
  receivers:
    cassandra:
      type: cassandra
      endpoint: localhost:7199
  service:
    pipelines:
      cassandra:
        receivers:
          - cassandra
EOF
sudo service google-cloud-ops-agent restart

In this example, the com.sun.management.jmxremote.port and com.sun.management.jmxremote.rmi.port system properties were set to 7199, and the java.rmi.server.hostname system property was set to 127.0.0.1. For more information, see Configure metrics collection.

Configure logs collection

To ingest logs from Cassandra, you must create receivers for the logs Cassandra produces and then create a pipeline for the new receivers.

To configure a receiver for your cassandra_system logs, specify the following fields:

Field	Default	Description
`type`		The value must be `cassandra_system`.
`include_paths`	`[/var/log/cassandra/system*.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/cassandra/system.log`.
`exclude_paths`	`[]`	A list of filesystem path patterns to exclude from the set matched by `include_paths`.
`wildcard_refresh_interval`	`60s`	The interval at which wildcard file paths in `include_paths` are refreshed. Given as a time duration, 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 cassandra_debug logs, specify the following fields:

Field	Default	Description
`type`		The value must be `cassandra_debug`.
`include_paths`	`[/var/log/cassandra/debug*.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/cassandra/system.log`.
`exclude_paths`	`[]`	A list of filesystem path patterns to exclude from the set matched by `include_paths`.
`wildcard_refresh_interval`	`60s`	The interval at which wildcard file paths in `include_paths` are refreshed. Given as a time duration, 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 cassandra_gc logs, specify the following fields:

Field	Default	Description
`type`		The value must be `cassandra_gc`.
`include_paths`	`[/var/log/cassandra/gc.log.*.current]`	A list of filesystem paths to read by tailing each file. A wild card (``) can be used in the paths; for example, `/var/log/cassandra/system.log`.
`exclude_paths`	`[]`	A list of filesystem path patterns to exclude from the set matched by `include_paths`.
`wildcard_refresh_interval`	`60s`	The interval at which wildcard file paths in `include_paths` are refreshed. Given as a time duration, 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 of the cassandra_system, cassandra_debug and cassandra_gc logs are derived from the receiver IDs specified in the configuration. Detailed fields inside the LogEntry are as follows.

cassandra_system, cassandra_debug
These logs contain the following fields in the LogEntry:

Field	Type	Description
`jsonPayload.level`	string	Log entry level
`jsonPayload.module`	string	Module of cassandra where the log originated
`jsonPayload.javaClass`	string	Java class where the log originated
`jsonPayload.lineNumber`	number	Line number of the source file where the log originated
`jsonPayload.message`	string	Log message, including detailed stacktrace where provided
`severity`	string (`LogSeverity`)	Log entry level (translated)
`timestamp`	string (`Timestamp`)	Time the request was received

Log entries don't contain any fields that are blank or missing.

cassandra_gc
These logs contain the following fields in the LogEntry:

Field	Type	Description
`jsonPayload.uptime`	number	Seconds the JVM has been active
`jsonPayload.timeStopped`	number	Seconds the JVM was stopped for garbage collection
`jsonPayload.timeStopping`	number	Seconds the JVM took to stop threads before garbage collection
`jsonPayload.message`	string	Log message
`timestamp`	string (`Timestamp`)	Time the entry was logged

Configure metrics collection

To collect metrics from a Cassandra node, you must create a receiver for Cassandra metrics and then create a pipeline for the new receiver. To configure a receiver for your Cassandra metrics, specify the following fields:

Field	Default	Description
`type`		The value must be `cassandra`.
`endpoint`	`localhost:7199`	The JMX Service URL or host and port used to construct the service URL. This value must be in the form of `service:jmx:<protocol>:<sap>` or `host:port`. Values in `host:port` form are used to create a service URL of `service:jmx:rmi:///jndi/rmi://<host>:<port>/jmxrmi`.
`collect_jvm_metrics`	`true`	Configures the receiver to also collect the supported JVM metrics.
`username`		The configured username if JMX is configured to require authentication.
`password`		The configured password if JMX is configured to require authentication.
`collection_interval`	`60s`	A time.Duration value, such as `30s` or `5m`.

What is monitored

The following table provides the list of metrics that the Ops Agent collects from the Cassandra instance.

Metric type
Kind, Type Monitored resources	Labels
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance	`operation`
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.error.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance	`status` `operation`
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.range_slice.latency.50p`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.range_slice.latency.99p`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.range_slice.latency.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.range_slice.latency.max`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.range_slice.timeout.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.range_slice.unavailable.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.read.latency.50p`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.read.latency.99p`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.read.latency.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.read.latency.max`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.read.timeout.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.read.unavailable.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.write.latency.50p`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.write.latency.99p`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.write.latency.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.write.latency.max`
`GAUGE`, `DOUBLE` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.write.timeout.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.write.unavailable.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.compaction.tasks.completed`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.compaction.tasks.pending`
`GAUGE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.storage.load.count`
`GAUGE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.storage.total_hints.count`
`CUMULATIVE`, `INT64` gce_instance
`workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.storage.total_hints.in_progress.count`
`GAUGE`, `INT64` gce_instance

Sample dashboard

You can view the metrics from this integration using a sample Cloud Monitoring dashboard. Complete the Installing sample dashboards procedures to import the Cassandra GCE Overview dashboard from the Sample library and view charts that display your Cassandra metrics.

Verify the configuration

You can use the Logs Explorer and Metrics Explorer to verify that you correctly configured the Cassandra receiver. It might take one or two minutes for the Ops Agent to begin collecting logs and metrics.

To verify the logs are ingested, go to the Logs Explorer and run the following query to view the Cassandra logs:

resource.type="gce_instance"
logName=("projects/PROJECT_ID/logs/cassandra_system" OR "projects/PROJECT_ID/logs/cassandra_debug" OR "projects/PROJECT_ID/logs/cassandra_gc")

To verify the metrics are ingested, go to Metrics Explorer and run the following query in the MQL tab.

fetch gce_instance
| metric 'workload.googleapis.com/cassandra.client.request.count'
| align rate(1m)
| 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.