Collection Agent setup

1. In Gateway Setup Editor, click Dynamic entities > Collection agent parameters, and then click New Collection agent parameters.

2. Select Managed in the Collection Agent dropdown list.

3. Choose your preferred YAML type in the Yaml dropdown list and configure your Collection Agent parameters.

   

    

   YAML type	Configure your Collection Agent in
   Bundled YAML	the collection_agent/collection-agent.yml packaged with the Netprobe binary.
   Custom YAML	the specified YAML file that can have any name. The file can be in any folder but if you are using a relative path, then it should be relative to the working directory.
   Managed YAML	the Gateway Setup Editor. For more information, see Managed Collection Agent in Dynamic Entities.

   Note: If you are starting the Collection Agent using the Netprobe, all the ports configured in the Gateway Setup Editor will automatically apply to the running Collection Agent.

4. Configure your plugins.

   YAML type	Configure your plugins by
   Bundled YAML	adding the parameters of the desired plugins in the collection_agent/collection-agent.yml packaged with the Netprobe binary.
   Custom YAML	adding the parameters of the desired plugins in the specified YAML file in Step 3.
   Managed YAML	adding the parameters in the Dynamic Entities > Collectors section in the Gateway Setup Editor. For more configuration information, see Collectors in Dynamic Entities.

   Note: If you need to set up a new plugin that is not yet included in the package, you can download it from the Resources page and add it to the collection_agent directory.

1. Download the Collection Agent jar file, collection-agent-<version>-exec.jar, from the Resources page.
2. Create a configuration file in YAML format, for example, collection-agent.yml.

   Ensure the following:

   • The TCP reporter fields are configured:

     • hostname: - host where the Netprobe is running.
     • port: - a unique port number.

   • The environment variables in the collection-agent.yml are defined on your host.

   plugin-directory: ${env:CA_PLUGIN_DIR}
   monitoring:
     health-check:
       listen-port: ${env:HEALTH_CHECK_PORT}
     metrics:
       dimensions:
         app_name: collection-agent
   reporters:
     - type: tcp
       name: tcp
       hostname: localhost
       port: ${env:TCP_REPORTER_PORT}
   collectors:
     - name: statsd
       type: plugin
       class-name: StatsdServer
   workflow:
     store-directory: .
     metrics:
       reporter: tcp
     events:
       reporter: tcp

   For more information on configuring the Collection Agent, see Collection Agent configuration reference.

3. In Gateway Setup Editor, click Dynamic entities > Collection agent parameters, and then click New Collection agent parameters.

4. Select Unmanaged in the Collection Agent dropdown list.

5. Input the port value from your YAML file in the Reporter port field.

   

6. If you need to set up a new plugin, download it from the Resources page and put it in the same directory as collection-agent-<version>-exec.jar.

7. Run the Collection Agent using the following command:

   java -jar collection-agent-<version>-exec.jar collection-agent.yml

8. To stop the Collection Agent, stop the Java process you started in Step 7.

   Note: The only way to start or to stop the Collection Agent as a stand-alone Java process is to run the Java command in Step 8 and to stop the Java process in the terminal, respectively.

Netprobes receive datapoints from Collection Agents. Each datapoint can have a different set of dimensions, attributes, and properties. You should create mappings to construct a Geneos hierarchy from datapoints. This Geneos hierarchy determines how data is displayed in your Active Console. You should also create a mapping type, which allows you to easily deploy the same configuration on multiple probes.

1. Open Gateway Setup Editor.

2. Click Dynamic entities > Mapping, and then click New Mapping.

3. Enter a mapping name in the Name field.

4. In Options, choose custom or builtin. For more information, see Options in Dynamic Entities.

   Note: A built-in Collection Agent V3 mapping is packaged with the Netprobe, which automatically sets up the default mappings needed to display the Collection Agent self-monitoring metrics.

   

5. Click Dynamic entities > Mapping types, and then click New Mapping type.

6. If you configured a managed Collection Agent with a managed YAML type in the previous steps, then in the Collectors field, click Add new to add the name of the collectors you created in Run Collection Agent via Netprobe.

7. In the Mappings field, click Add new to add the name of the mapping created in Step 4.

   

8. To monitor the logs collected by the Collection Agent plugin, you can add an FKM plugin sampler in the Samplers field. The FKM plugin consumes these logs as streams. To configure your FKM plugin to monitor these streams, see files > file > source > stream in File Keyword Monitor configuration.

1. Open Gateway Setup Editor.

2. In Probes, select your Netprobe and go to the Dynamic Entities tab.

3. Choose a mapping type in the Mapping type dropdown list.

4. Choose a collection agent parameter in the Collection agent parameters dropdown list.

   

   Note: If mappings are defined in both the Mapping type and in the Collector, then the Netprobe will apply the mappings defined in the Mapping type first then the mappings defined in the Collectors.

Health checks

The Netprobe periodically pings the managed Collection Agent through the defined health check port.

The health checks are governed by the following variables: