Troubleshooting Filebeat
This section contains some guidelines for handling errors you may encounter when running Filebeat (version 7 or older).
Problem: Path is locked
You have an error saying another beat locks the data path:
2022-01-01T10:10:10.711Z ERROR instance/beat.go:956 Exiting: data path already locked by another beat. Please make sure that multiple beats are not sharing the same data path (path.data).
Possible cause
This error means that your data path (/var/lib/filebeats) is locked by a different Filebeat instance.
Suggested remedy
You need to kill the process. To do so, run:
ps aux | grep filebeat
kill -9 <pid>
Problem: Old logs are not visible
You can view logs that are 3 hours old (or older).
Possible cause
Your ignore_older setting is enabled, and set to 3 hours. When enabled, this option ignores any file that has not been updated since the selected time.
Suggested remedy
Disable or clean the ignore_older setting.
To disable it, set the ignore_older to 0:
ignore_older: 0
For existing logs, you can run clean_* to clean up state entries in the registry file, or clean_inactive to remove the state of previously harvested files from the registry file.
Note that running one of the clean commands might result in data loss.
Problem: Invalid yaml
There's an invalid config in your yaml file. For example:
ERROR instance/beat.go:802 Exiting: 1 error: error loading config file: invalid config: yaml: line 9: could not find expected ':'
Possible cause
Filebeat configuration yaml files require a particular syntax to run, and your file doesn't match the requirements.
Suggested remedy
Test your configuration file and verify its structure. You can use a yaml validator, such as YAML Lint.
Problem: Elasticsearch.output issue
You're encountering an issue when configuring the Elasticsearch output.
output.elasticsearch:
hosts: ["https://myEShost:9200"]
Possible cause
You have elasticsearch.output configured in addition to the Logz.io output.
Suggested remedy
Filebeat doesn't know how to send data to 2 different outputs. To solve this, you'll have to re-configure your settings to have Logz.io as your default output.
Problem: Not outputs defined
You see a no outputs are defined error:
2022/01/01 11:11:00.404226 publish.go:269: INFO No outputs are defined. Please define one under the output section.
Possible cause
Your output is not configured correctly.
Suggested remedy
You need to ensure that you're using output.logstash, and that it's appropriately configured. In some cases, you'll need to indent your code.
Instead of this:
output.logstash:
hosts: ["listenerlogz.io:5015"]
ssl:
certificate_authorities: ['/etc/pki/tls/certs/COMODORSADomainValidationSecureServerCA.crt']
The code should look like this:
output:
logstash:
hosts: ["listener.logz.io:5015"]
ssl:
certificate_authorities: ['/etc/pki/tls/certs/COMODORSADomainValidationSecureServerCA.crt']
Problem: Connection error
When you're trying to connect to Filebeat, you get the following error:
Permanent error: Post \"https://<<LISTENER-HOST>>:8053\": context deadline exceeded
meaning that the post request timeout.
Possible cause - Connectivity issue
This error can occur due to a connectivity issue, an issue with your TLS, or the server's inability to access Logz.io's listener.
Suggested remedy
Check connection and ports
First, check your shipper's connectivity as follows:
For MacOS and Linux, use telnet to ensure your log shipper can connect to Logz.io listeners.
As of MacOS High Sierra (10.13),
telnet is not installed by default.
You can install telnet with Homebrew
by running brew install telnet.
Run this command from the environment you're shipping from, after adding the appropriate port number:
telnet listener.logz.io 5015
For Windows servers running Windows 8/Server 2012 and later, run the following command in PowerShell:
Test-NetConnection listener.logz.io -Port 5015
The port number is 5015.
Verify TLS encryption
Confirm that you have downloaded and placed the correct certificate in the correct location.
- To find the location of the certificate, open the filebeat.yml file and search for the field
certificate_authorities. In our example configuration, we recommend the following location: certificate_authorities: ['/etc/pki/tls/certs/COMODORSADomainValidationSecureServerCA.crt']
Check if your server has access to the Logz.io listener
From the actual server on which you are running Filebeat, run the following command to verify that you have proper connectivity:
telnet listener.logz.io 5015
For Windows servers running Windows 8/Server 2012 and later, run the following command in PowerShell:
Test-NetConnection listener.logz.io -Port 5015
| Good response | Bad response |
|---|---|
| Connected to listener-group.logz.io Escape character is '^]' | trying xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx.... |
To exit the screen, type Ctrl+: and type in quit.
If you cannot telnet to listener.logz.io on port 5015, please adjust your network settings to allow this communication. For a complete list of IPs used by the Logz.io listener, click here.
Example for validating connection established
$ sudo netstat -taupn | grep filebeat
tcp 0 0 172.17.0.2:44912 52.21.71.179:5015 ESTABLISHED 39/filebeat
If no output has been sent, something is wrong. Check your network connectivity again.
Manually put something in the shipped log file to see if it is sent:
echo hello >> /var/log/my_log_file.log
Problem: Operation not permitted
You get the following error message when trying to access or change your yml file:
filebeat.yml: Operation not permitted
Possible cause - insufficient permissions
This error occurs when the user doesn't have the proper permission to access or edit the file.
Suggested remedy
You need to update the write permissions to the file. To do so, run the following command:
chmod go-w /etc/filebeat/filebeat.yml
Zero metrics in the last 30 seconds
Your logs show a Non-zero metrics in the last 30s INFO message:
2022-05-13T07:16:27.805Z INFO [monitoring] log/log.go:184 Non-zero metrics in the last 30s
{"monitoring": {"metrics": {"beat":{"cpu":{"system":{"ticks":300,"time":{"ms":304}},"total":{"ticks":480,"time":{"ms":489},"value":0},"user":{"ticks":180,"time":{"ms":185}}},"handles":{"limit":{"hard":1048576,"soft":1024},"open":11},"info":{"ephemeral_id":"e778ccbc-94e5-467e-8e34-b1443402c50e","uptime":{"ms":30085},"version":"7.17.3"},"memstats":{"gc_next":19787632,"memory_alloc":11823552,"memory_sys":37831688,"memory_total":58462392,"rss":125288448},"runtime":{"goroutines":38}},"filebeat":{"events":{"added":105,"done":105},"harvester":{"open_files":1,"running":1,"started":1}},"libbeat":{"config":{"module":{"running":0}},"output":{"events":{"acked":103,"active":0,"batches":1,"total":103},"read":{"bytes":6268},"type":"logstash","write":{"bytes":8781}},"pipeline":{"clients":1,"events":{"active":0,"filtered":2,"published":103,"retry":103,"total":105},"queue":{"acked":103,"max_events":4096}}},"registrar":{"states":{"current":1,"update":105},"writes":{"success":2,"total":2}},"system":{"cpu":{"cores":6},"load":{"1":0.01,"15":0,"5":0,"norm":{"1":0.0017,"15":0,"5":0}}}}}}
Possible cause
Filebeat couldn't find any files or events.
You can view and manage your logging output by opening the filebeat.yml config file and navigating to the logging section inside it:
logging.level: debug
logging.to_files: true
logging.files:
path: /var/log/filebeat
For example, you can use the -e command line flag to redirect the output to standard error instead:
filebeat -e
Change the default configuration file from filebeat.yml to a custom file of your choice. To use a different configuration file, use the -c flag:
filebeat -e -c customfilebeatconfig.yml
Filebeat's default log level is INFO. To get all debugging output you can use *:
filebeat -e -d "*"
To verify that Filebeat was unable to find any files or events:
Check if any files are monitored
For each log that Filebeat locates, it starts a harvester. A harvester is a key inside the JSON.
Locate the relevant harvester.open_files key. Inside it you should be able to see how many files are being monitored in the chosen path.
If the result is 0, Filebeat was unable to find the specific file or failed to find any files in the specific folder.
Check how many files are being monitored
Locate the output.events key, also located inside the JSON. If it shows 0, the output didn't recognize any new data.
If it contains any objects, you'll be able to see write > success and the total number of files sent. However, if the success total number is 0, Filebeat could not send any data.
Suggested remedy
Re-configure your Filebeat to make sure files are sent properly.