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syslog

The syslog plugin pushes request and response logs as JSON objects to syslog servers in batches and supports the customization of log formats.

Examples

The examples below demonstrate how you can configure syslog plugin for different scenarios.

To follow along the examples, you should have your syslog server running, or start an example rsyslog server in Docker:

docker run -d -p 514:514 --name example-rsyslog-server rsyslog/syslog_appliance_alpine

Push Log to Syslog Server

The following example demonstrates how you can enable the syslog plugin on a route, which logs client requests to the route and pushes logs to syslog server.

Create a route with syslog as follows:

curl "http://127.0.0.1:9180/apisix/admin/routes" -X PUT \
-H "X-API-KEY: ${ADMIN_API_KEY}" \
-d '{
"id": "syslog-route",
"uri": "/anything",
"plugins": {
"syslog": {
"host" : "172.0.0.1",
"port" : 514,
"flush_limit" : 1
}
},
"upstream": {
"nodes": {
"httpbin.org:80": 1
},
"type": "roundrobin"
}
}'

host: replace with the address of your syslog server.

port: replace with the port of your syslog server.

flush_limit: set to 1 to push log to the syslog server immediately.

Send a request to the route:

curl -i "http://127.0.0.1:9080/anything"

You should receive an HTTP/1.1 200 OK response.

In the syslog server, you should see a log entry similar to the following:

{
"response": {
"status": 200,
"headers": {
"access-control-allow-credentials": "true",
"connection": "close",
"date": "Sat, 02 Mar 2024 00:14:19 GMT",
"access-control-allow-origin": "*",
"server": "APISIX/3.8.0",
"content-type": "application/json",
"content-length": "387"
},
"size": 614
},
"service_id": "",
"client_ip": "172.19.0.1",
"server": {
"hostname": "eff61bf7be4d",
"version": "3.8.0"
},
"upstream": "35.171.123.176:80",
"apisix_latency": 13.999900817871,
"request": {
"method": "GET",
"url": "http://127.0.0.1:9080/anything",
"querystring": {},
"size": 86,
"uri": "/anything",
"headers": {
"host": "127.0.0.1:9080",
"accept": "*/*",
"user-agent": "curl/7.29.0"
}
},
"route_id": "syslog-route",
"upstream_latency": 165,
"latency": 178.99990081787,
"start_time": 1709334859598
}

Customize Log Format With Plugin Metadata

The following example demonstrates how you can customize log format using plugin metadata. The log format configured in plugin metadata will apply to all syslog plugin instances.

Create a route with the syslog plugin:

curl "http://127.0.0.1:9180/apisix/admin/routes" -X PUT \
-H "X-API-KEY: ${ADMIN_API_KEY}" \
-d '{
"id": "syslog-route",
"uri": "/anything",
"plugins": {
"syslog": {
"host" : "172.0.0.1",
"port" : 514,
"flush_limit" : 1
}
},
"upstream": {
"nodes": {
"httpbin.org:80": 1
},
"type": "roundrobin"
}
}'

Configure plugin metadata for syslog:

curl "http://127.0.0.1:9180/apisix/admin/plugin_metadata/syslog" -X PUT \
-H "X-API-KEY: ${ADMIN_API_KEY}" \
-d '{
"log_format": {
"host": "$host",
"@timestamp": "$time_iso8601",
"route_id": "$service_id",
"client_ip": "$remote_addr",
"resp_content_type": "$sent_http_Content_Type"
}
}'

Send a request to the route:

curl -i "http://127.0.0.1:9080/anything"

In the syslog server, you should see a log entry similar to the following:

{
"@timestamp": "2024-03-02T00:00:31+00:00",
"resp_content_type": "application/json",
"host": "127.0.0.1",
"route_id": "syslog-route",
"client_ip": "172.19.0.1"
}

Log Request Bodies Conditionally

The following example demonstrates how you can conditionally log request body.

Create a route with the syslog plugin as follows:

curl "http://127.0.0.1:9180/apisix/admin/routes" -X PUT \
-H "X-API-KEY: ${ADMIN_API_KEY}" \
-d '{
"id": "syslog-route",
"uri": "/anything",
"plugins": {
"syslog": {
"host" : "172.0.0.1",
"port" : 514,
"flush_limit" : 1,
"include_req_body": true,
"include_req_body_expr": [["arg_log_body", "==", "yes"]]
}
},
"upstream": {
"nodes": {
"httpbin.org:80": 1
},
"type": "roundrobin"
}
}'

include_req_body: set to true to include request body.

include_req_body_expr: only include request body if the URL query string log_body is true.

Send a request to the route with a URL query string satisfying the condition:

curl -i "http://127.0.0.1:9080/anything?log_body=yes" -X POST -d '{"env": "dev"}'

You should see the request body logged:

{
"response": {
"status": 200,
"headers": {
"connection": "close",
"server": "APISIX/3.8.0",
"date": "Sat, 02 Mar 2024 00:46:04 GMT",
"access-control-allow-origin": "*",
"access-control-allow-credentials": "true",
"content-type": "application/json",
"content-length": "545"
},
"size": 772
},
"service_id": "",
"client_ip": "172.19.0.1",
"server": {
"hostname": "eff61bf7be4d",
"version": "3.8.0"
},
"upstream": "35.171.123.176:80",
"apisix_latency": 0,
"request": {
"method": "POST",
"url": "http://127.0.0.1:9080/anything?log_body=yes",
"querystring": {
"log_body": "yes"
},
"size": 183,
"body": "{\"env\": \"dev\"}",
"uri": "/anything?log_body=yes",
"headers": {
"accept": "*/*",
"user-agent": "curl/7.29.0",
"host": "127.0.0.1:9080",
"content-type": "application/x-www-form-urlencoded",
"content-length": "14"
}
},
"route_id": "syslog-route",
"upstream_latency": 165,
"latency": 164.99996185303,
"start_time": 1709340364390
}

Send a request to the route without any URL query string:

curl -i "http://127.0.0.1:9080/post" -X POST -d '{"env": "dev"}'

You should not observe the request body in the log.

info

If you have customized the log_format in addition to setting include_req_body or include_resp_body to true, the plugin would not include the bodies in the logs.

As a workaround, you may be able to use the NGINX variable $request_body in the log format, such as:

{
"kafka-logger": {
...,
"log_format": {"body": "$request_body"}
}
}

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