Install by RPM Package (Red Hat Linux)

This article explains how to install stable versions of fluent-package rpm packages, the stable Fluentd distribution packages maintained by Fluentd Project and calyptia-fluentd which is maintained by Chronosphere after its acquisition of Calyptia.

What is fluent-package?

Fluentd is written in Ruby for flexibility, with performance-sensitive parts in C. However, some users may have difficulty installing and operating a Ruby daemon.

That is why Fluentd Project provides the stable distribution of Fluentd, called fluent-package (formerly known as td-agent). The differences between Fluentd and fluent-package can be found here.

What is calyptia-fluentd?

Fluentd is written in Ruby for flexibility, with performance-sensitive parts in C. However, some users may have difficulty installing and operating a Ruby daemon. And td-agent is still seated on Ruby 2.7 due to compatibility reasons and Ruby versioning policy, calyptia-fluentd uses Ruby 3 instead of Ruby 2.7 for now.

That is why Chronosphere (formerly Calyptia) provides the alternative stable distribution of Fluentd, called calyptia-fluentd. The differences between td-agent and calyptia-fluentd are bundled and running Ruby versions for now.

This installation guide is for fluent-package v5 and calyptia-fluentd v1. fluent-package v5 and calyptia-fluentd use fluentd v1 in the core. See fluent-package-v5-vs-td-agent or td-agent-v2-vs-v3-vs-v4 for the comparison and supported OS.

Using to install fluent-package

NOTE:

Step 0: Before Installation

Please follow the Pre-installation Guide to configure your OS properly.

Step 1: Install from rpm Repository

It is highly recommended to set up ntpd on the node to prevent invalid timestamps in the logs. See Pre-installation Guide.

NOTE: If your OS is not supported, consider gem installation instead.

Red Hat

Download and execute the install script with curl:

fluent-package 5 (LTS)

curl -fsSL https://toolbelt.treasuredata.com/sh/install-redhat-fluent-package5-lts.sh | sh

fluent-package 5

curl -fsSL https://toolbelt.treasuredata.com/sh/install-redhat-fluent-package5.sh | sh

Executing this script will automatically install fluent-package on your machine. This shell script registers a new rpm repository at /etc/yum.repos.d/fluent-package.repo (or /etc/yum.repos.d/fluent-package-lts.repo) and installs fluent-package.

We use $releasever for repository path in the script and $releasever should be the major version only like "9". If your environment uses some other format like "9.2", change it to the major version only or set up .repo file manually.

Since v5.0.4, RHEL 7 / CentOS 7 is not supported anymore because CentOS 7 has reached EOL (June, 2024). Please consider migrating to another release.

Amazon Linux

For Amazon Linux 2023:

fluent-package 5 (LTS)

curl -fsSL https://toolbelt.treasuredata.com/sh/install-amazon2023-fluent-package5-lts.sh | sh

fluent-package 5

curl -fsSL https://toolbelt.treasuredata.com/sh/install-amazon2023-fluent-package5.sh | sh

For Amazon Linux 2:

fluent-package 5 (LTS)

curl -fsSL https://toolbelt.treasuredata.com/sh/install-amazon2-fluent-package5-lts.sh | sh

fluent-package 5

curl -fsSL https://toolbelt.treasuredata.com/sh/install-amazon2-fluent-package5.sh | sh

Step 2: Launch Daemon

Use /usr/lib/systemd/system/fluentd service to start, stop, or restart the agent:

$ sudo systemctl start fluentd.service
$ sudo systemctl status fluentd.service
* fluentd.service - fluentd: All in one package of Fluentd
   Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/fluentd.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
   Active: active (running) since Wed 2023-08-02 05:35:16 UTC; 41s ago
     Docs: https://docs.fluentd.org/
  Process: 1901 ExecStart=/opt/fluent/bin/fluentd --log $FLUENT_PACKAGE_LOG_FILE --daemon /var/run/fluent/fluentd.pid $FLUENT_PACKAGE_OPTIONS (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
 Main PID: 1907 (fluentd)
   CGroup: /system.slice/fluentd.service
           |-1907 /opt/fluent/bin/ruby /opt/fluent/bin/fluentd --log /var/log/fluent/fluentd.log --daemon /var/run/fluent/fluentd.pid
           `-1910 /opt/fluent/bin/ruby -Eascii-8bit:ascii-8bit /opt/fluent/bin/fluentd --log /var/log/fluent/fluentd.log --daemon /var/ru...

To customize systemd behavior, put your fluentd.service in /etc/systemd/system.

NOTE: In fluent-package v5, the path is different i.e. /opt/fluent/bin instead of /opt/td-agent/bin.

Step 3: Post Sample Logs via HTTP

The default configuration (/etc/fluent/fluentd.conf) is to receive logs at an HTTP endpoint and route them to stdout. For fluentd logs, see /var/log/fluent/fluentd.log.

You can post sample log records with curl command:

$ curl -X POST -d 'json={"json":"message"}' http://localhost:8888/debug.test
$ tail -n 1 /var/log/fluent/fluentd.log
2023-08-02 05:37:29.185634777 +0000 debug.test: {"json":"message"}

Using to install calyptia-fluentd

Step 0: Before Installation

Please follow the Pre-installation Guide to configure your OS properly.

Step 1: Install from rpm Repository

It is highly recommended to set up ntpd on the node to prevent invalid timestamps in the logs. See Pre-installation Guide.

NOTE: If your OS is not supported, consider gem installation instead.

Red Hat / CentOS

Download and execute the install script with curl:

# calyptia-fluentd 1
$ curl -L https://calyptia-fluentd.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/calyptia-fluentd-1-redhat.sh | sh

Executing this script will automatically install calyptia-fluentd on your machine. This shell script registers a new rpm repository at /etc/yum.repos.d/Calyptia-Fluentd.repo and installs calyptia-fluentd.

We use $releasever for repository path in the script and $releasever should be the major version only like "7". If your environment uses some other format like "7.2", change it to the major version only or set up TD repository manually.

CentOS Stream

For CentOS Stream 8:

# calyptia-fluentd 1
$ curl -L https://calyptia-fluentd.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/calyptia-fluentd-1-centos-stream.sh

Amazon Linux

For Amazon Linux 2:

# calyptia-fluentd 1
$ curl -L https://calyptia-fluentd.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/calyptia-fluentd-1-amazon-2.sh | sh

Step 2: Launch Daemon

calyptia-fluentd only provides systemd's unit file:

systemd

Use /usr/lib/systemd/system/calyptia-fluentd script to start, stop, or restart the agent:

$ sudo systemctl start calyptia-fluentd.service
$ sudo systemctl status calyptia-fluentd.service
● calyptia-fluentd.service - calyptia-fluentd: Fluentd based data collector for Calyptia Services
   Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/calyptia-fluentd.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
   Active: active (running) since Mon 2021-05-31 01:37:47 UTC; 4h 38min ago
     Docs: https://docs.fluentd.org/
  Process: 694 ExecStart=/opt/calyptia-fluentd/bin/fluentd --log $CALYPTIA_FLUENTD_LOG_FILE --daemon /var/run/calyptia-fluentd/calyptia-fluentd.pid $CALYPTIA_FLUENTD_OPTIONS (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
 Main PID: 1365 (fluentd)
   CGroup: /system.slice/calyptia-fluentd.service
           ├─1365 /opt/calyptia-fluentd/bin/ruby /opt/calyptia-fluentd/bin/fluentd --log /var/log/calyptia-fluentd/calyptia-fluentd.log --daem...
           └─1368 /opt/calyptia-fluentd/bin/ruby -Eascii-8bit:ascii-8bit /opt/calyptia-fluentd/bin/fluentd --log /var/log/calyptia-fluentd/cal...

To customize systemd behavior, put your calyptia-fluentd.service in /etc/systemd/system.

Please make sure your configuration file path is:

/etc/calyptia-fluentd/calyptia-fluentd.conf

Step 3: Post Sample Logs via HTTP

The default configuration (/etc/calyptia-fluentd/calyptia-fluentd.conf) is to receive logs at an HTTP endpoint and route them to stdout. For calyptia-fluentd logs, see /var/log/calyptia-fluentd/calyptia-fluentd.log.

You can post sample log records with curl command:

$ curl -X POST -d 'json={"json":"message"}' http://localhost:8888/debug.test
$ sudo tail -n 1 /var/log/calyptia-fluentd/calyptia-fluentd.log
2021-05-31 06:19:04.415878392 +0000 debug.test: {"json":"message"}

Next Steps

You are now ready to collect real logs with Fluentd. Refer to the following tutorials on how to collect data from various sources:

For further steps, follow these:

If this article is incorrect or outdated, or omits critical information, please let us know. Fluentd is an open-source project under Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF). All components are available under the Apache 2 License.

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