Usage

The beaver binary contains a number of options:

usage:

beaver [-h] [-c CONFIG] [-C CONFD_PATH] [-d] [-D] [-f FILES [FILES ...]]
       [-F {json,msgpack,raw,rawjson,string}] [-H HOSTNAME] [-m {bind,connect}]
       [-l OUTPUT] [-p PATH] [-P PID]
       [-t {kafka,mqtt,rabbitmq,redis,sns,sqs,kinesis,stdout,tcp,udp,zmq,stomp}] [-v] [--fqdn]

optional arguments:

-h, --help            show this help message and exit
-c CONFIG, --configfile CONFIG
                      main beaver ini config file path
-C CONFD_PATH         ini config directory path
-d, --debug           enable debug mode
-D, --daemonize       daemonize in the background
-f FILES [FILES ...], --files FILES [FILES ...]
                      space-separated filelist to watch, can include globs
                      (*.log). Overrides --path argument
-F {json,msgpack,raw,rawjson,string,gelf}, --format {json,msgpack,raw,rawjson,string,gelf}
                      format to use when sending to transport
-H HOSTNAME, --hostname HOSTNAME
                      manual hostname override for source_host
-m {bind,connect}, --mode {bind,connect}
                      bind or connect mode
-l OUTPUT, --logfile OUTPUT, -o OUTPUT, --output OUTPUT
                      file to pipe output to (in addition to stdout)
-p PATH, --path PATH  path to log files
-P PID, --pid PID     path to pid file
-t {kafka,mqtt,rabbitmq,redis,sns,sqs,kinesis,stdout,tcp,udp,zmq,stomp}, --transport {kafka,mqtt,rabbitmq,redis,sns,sqs,kinesis,stdout,tcp,udp,zmq,stomp}
                      log transport method
-v, --version         output version and quit
--fqdn                use the machine's FQDN for source_host

Configuration File Options

Beaver can optionally get data from a configfile using the -c flag. This file is in ini format. Global configuration will be under the beaver stanza. The following are global beaver configuration keys with their respective meanings:

• kafka_client_id: Default beaver-kafka. Kafka client id
• kafka_hosts: Default localhost:9092. Seed list of hosts (host:port)separated by commas for kafka cluster
• kafka_async: Default True.
• kafka_topic: Default logstash-topic
• kafka_key: Optional. Defaults None. Target specific partition
• kafka_codec: Optional. Defaults None. GZIP supported with 0x01. SNAPPY requires to install python-snappy anbd use codec = 0x02
• kafka_ack_timeout: Default 2000. Acknowledge timeout
• kafka_batch_n: Default 10. Batch log message size
• kafka_batch_t: Default 10. Batch log message timeout
• mqtt_host: Default localhost. Host for mosquitto
• mqtt_port: Default 1883. Port for mosquitto
• mqtt_clientid: Default paho. Paho client id
• mqtt_keepalive: Default 60. mqtt keepalive ping
• mqtt_topic: Default /logstash. Topic to publish to
• number_of_consumer_processes: Default 1. Number of parallel consumer processes that read and process messages from the beaver queue.
• rabbitmq_arguments: Defaults {}. RabbitMQ arguments comma separated, colon separated key value pairs. i.e rabbitmq_arguments: x-max-length:750000,x-max-length-bytes:1073741824
• rabbitmq_host: Defaults localhost. Host for RabbitMQ
• rabbitmq_port: Defaults 5672. Port for RabbitMQ
• rabbitmq_ssl: Defaults 0. Connect using SSL/TLS
• rabbitmq_ssl_key: Optional. Defaults None. Path to client private key for SSL/TLS
• rabbitmq_ssl_cert: Optional. Defaults None. Path to client certificate for SSL/TLS
• rabbitmq_ssl_cacert: Optional. Defaults None. Path to CA certificate for SSL/TLS
• rabbitmq_vhost: Default /
• rabbitmq_username: Default guest
• rabbitmq_password: Default guest
• rabbitmq_queue: Default logstash-queue.
• rabbitmq_queue_durable: Default 0.
• rabbitmq_exchange_type: Default direct.
• rabbitmq_exchange_durable: Default 0.
• rabbitmq_key: Default logstash-key.
• rabbitmq_exchange: Default logstash-exchange.
• rabbitmq_timeout: Default 1. The timeout in seconds for the connection to the RabbitMQ broker
• rabbitmq_delivery_mode: Default 1. Message deliveryMode. 1: non persistent 2: persistent
• redis_url: Default redis://localhost:6379/0. Comma separated redis URLs
• redis_namespace: Default logstash:beaver. Redis key namespace
• redis_data_type: Default list, but can also be channel. Redis data type used for transporting log messages
• sns_aws_access_key: Can be left blank to use IAM Roles or AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID environment variable (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• sns_aws_secret_key: Can be left blank to use IAM Roles or AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variable (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• sns_aws_profile_name: Can be left blank to use IAM Roles AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variable, or fixed keypair (above) (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• sns_aws_region: Default us-east-1. AWS Region
• sns_aws_topic_arn: Topic ARN (must exist)
• sqs_aws_access_key: Can be left blank to use IAM Roles or AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID environment variable (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• sqs_aws_secret_key: Can be left blank to use IAM Roles or AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variable (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• sqs_aws_profile_name: Can be left blank to use IAM Roles AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variable, or fixed keypair (above) (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• sqs_aws_region: Default us-east-1. AWS Region
• sqs_aws_queue: SQS queue, or comma delimited list of queues (must exist)
• sqs_aws_queue_owner_acct_id: Optional. Defaults None. Account ID or Principal allowed to write to queue
• sqs_bulk_lines: Optional. Send multiple log entries in a single SQS message (cost saving benefit on larger environments)
• kinesis_aws_access_key: Can be left blank to use IAM roles or AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID environment variable (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• kinesis_aws_secret_key: Can be left blank to use IAM Roles or AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variable (see: https://github.com/boto/boto#getting-started-with-boto)
• kinesis_aws_region: Default us-east-1. AWS Region
• kinesis_aws_stream: Optional. Defaults None. Name of the Kinesis stream to ship logs to
• kinesis_aws_batch_size_max: Default 512000. Arbitrary flush size to limit size of logs in transit.
• tcp_host: Default 127.0.0.1. TCP Host
• tcp_port: Default 9999. TCP Port
• tcp_ssl_enabled: Defaults 0. Connect using SSL/TLS
• tcp_ssl_key Optional. Defaults None. Path to client private key for SSL/TLS
• tcp_ssl_cert Optional. Defaults None. Path to client certificate for SSL/TLS
• tcp_ssl_cacert Optional. Defaults None. Path to CA certificate for SSL/TLS
• udp_host: Default 127.0.0.1. UDP Host
• udp_port: Default 9999. UDP Port
• zeromq_address: Default tcp://localhost:2120. Zeromq URL
• zeromq_hwm: Default None. Zeromq HighWaterMark socket option
• zeromq_bind: Default bind. Whether to bind to zeromq host or simply connect
• http_url: Default None http://someserver.com/path
• stomp_host: Default localhost
• stomp_port: Default 61613
• stomp_user: Default None
• stomp_password: Default None
• stomp_queue: Default queue/logstash

The following are used for instances when a TransportException is thrown - Transport dependent

• respawn_delay: Default 3. Initial respawn delay for exponential backoff
• max_failure: Default 7. Max failures before exponential backoff terminates
• max_queue_size: Default 100. Max log entries Beaver can store in it’s queue before backing off until they have been transmitted

The following configuration keys are for SinceDB support. Specifying these will enable saving the current line number in an sqlite database. This is useful for cases where you may be restarting the Beaver process, such as during a logrotate.

• sincedb_path: Default None. Full path to an sqlite3 database. Will be created at this path if it does not exist. Beaver process must have read and write access

Logstash 1.2 introduced a JSON schema change. The logstash_version needs to be set or Beaver will fail to start

• logstash_version: No default. Set to 0 for older versions, 1 for Logstash v1.2 and above

The following configuration keys are for building an SSH Tunnel that can be used to proxy from the current host to a desired server. This proxy is torn down when Beaver halts in all cases.

• ssh_key_file: Default None. Full path to id_rsa key file
• ssh_tunnel: Default None. SSH Tunnel in the format user@host:port
• ssh_tunnel_port: Default None. Local port for SSH Tunnel
• ssh_remote_host: Default None. Remote host to connect to within SSH Tunnel
• ssh_remote_port: Default None. Remote port to connect to within SSH Tunnel
• ssh_options: Default None. Comma separated list of SSH options to Pass through to the SSH Tunnel. See ssh_config(5) for more options

The following configuration keys are for multi-line events support and are per file.

• multiline_regex_after: Default None. If a line match this regular expression, it will be merged with next line(s).
• multiline_regex_before: Default None. If a line match this regular expression, it will be merged with previous line(s).

The following can also be passed via argparse. Argparse will override all options in the configfile, when specified.

• format: Default json. Options [ json, msgpack, string, raw, rawjson, gelf ]. Format to use when sending to transport
• files: Default files. Space-separated list of files to tail. (Comma separated if specified in the config file)
• path: Default /var/log. Path glob to tail.
• transport: Default stdout. Transport to use when log changes are detected
• fqdn: Default False. Whether to use the machine’s FQDN in transport output
• hostname: Default None. Manually specified hostname

The following configuration key allows cleaning up the worker and transport sub-processes on an interval respawning

• refresh_worker_process: Default None. Interval between sub-process cleanup

The following configuration key allows the importing of OS environment data into the event.

• add_field_env: Default None. Format is fieldname1,ENVVARIABLE1[,fieldname2,ENVVARIABLE2, …]

The following configuration key allows to set a redis_namespace per files stanza. It will override the global [beaver] setting fo the same key.

• redis_namespace: Defaults to Null string. Redis key namespace

Examples

As you can see, beaver is pretty flexible as to how you can use/abuse it in production:

Default Usage

Listen to all files in the default path of /var/log on standard out as json:

beaver

Alternative output formats

Listen to all files in the default path of /var/log on standard out with json:

# adds data to a json object before shipping
beaver --format json

Listen to all files in the default path of /var/log on standard out with msgpack:

beaver --format msgpack

Listen to all files in the default path of /var/log on standard out as a raw:

# ships with no formatting
beaver --format raw

Listen to all files in the default path of /var/log on standard out as a raw:

# ships with no formatting
beaver --format raw

Listen to all files in the default path of /var/log on standard out as a [Raw Json Support](http://blog.pkhamre.com/2012/08/23/logging-to-logstash-json-format-in-nginx/):

# also adds any extra data specified in config
beaver --format raw

Listen to all files in the default path of /var/log on standard out as a string:

# Useful for stdout debugging
# Output format is:
#
#   '[{host}] [{timestamp}] {message}'
beaver --format string

Configuration files

Read config from config.ini and put to stdout:

# /etc/beaver/conf:
; follow a single file, add a type, some tags and fields
[/tmp/somefile]
type: mytype
tags: tag1,tag2
add_field: fieldname1,fieldvalue1[,fieldname2,fieldvalue2, ...]

; follow all logs in /var/log except those with `messages` or `secure` in the name.
; The exclude tag must be a valid python regular expression.
[/var/log/*log]
type: syslog
tags: sys
exclude: (messages|secure)

; follow /var/log/messages.log and /var/log/secure.log using file globbing
[/var/log/{messages,secure}.log]
type: syslog
tags: sys

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t stdout

Loading stanzas from /etc/beaver/conf.d/* support:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
format: json

# /etc/beaver/conf.d/syslog
[/var/log/syslog]
type: syslog
tags: sys,main

# /etc/beaver/conf.d/nginx
[/var/log/nginx]
format: rawjson
type: nginx
tags: nginx,server

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -C /etc/beaver/conf.d

Shipping to a broker

Sending logs from /var/log files to a redis list:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
redis_url: redis://localhost:6379/0

# From the commandline
beaver  -c /etc/beaver/conf -t redis

Sending logs from /var/log files to multiple redis servers using round robin strategy:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
redis_url: redis://broker01:6379/0,redis://broker02:6379/0,redis://broker03:6379/0

# From the commandline
beaver  -c /etc/beaver/conf -t redis

Sending logs from /tmp/somefile files to a redis list, with custom namespace:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
redis_url: redis://localhost:6379/0

[/tmp/somefile]
type: mytype
tags: tag1,tag2
redis_namespace: some:space

# From the commandline
beaver  -c /etc/beaver/conf -t redis

Zeromq listening on port 5556 (all interfaces):

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
zeromq_address: tcp://*:5556

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  zeromq {
    type => 'shipper-input'
    mode => 'client'
    topology => 'pushpull'
    address => 'tcp://shipperhost:5556'
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver  -c /etc/beaver/conf -m bind -t zmq

Zeromq connecting to remote port 5556 on indexer:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
zeromq_address: tcp://indexer:5556

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  zeromq {
    type => 'shipper-input'
    mode => 'server'
    topology => 'pushpull'
    address => 'tcp://*:5556'
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# on the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -m connect -t zmq

Real-world usage of Redis as a transport:

# in /etc/hosts
192.168.0.10 redis-internal01
192.168.0.11 redis-internal02

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
redis_url: redis://redis-internal01:6379/0,redis://redis-internal02:6379/0
redis_namespace: app:unmappable

# logstash indexer01 config:
input {
  redis {
    host => 'redis-internal01'
    data_type => 'list'
    key => 'app:unmappable'
    type => 'app:unmappable'
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# logstash indexer02 config:
input {
  redis {
    host => 'redis-internal02'
    data_type => 'list'
    key => 'app:unmappable'
    type => 'app:unmappable'
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -f /var/log/unmappable.log -t redis

RabbitMQ connecting to defaults on remote broker:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
rabbitmq_host: 10.0.0.1

# logstash indexer config:
input { amqp {
    name => 'logstash-queue'
    type => 'direct'
    host => '10.0.0.1'
    exchange => 'logstash-exchange'
    key => 'logstash-key'
    exclusive => false
    durable => false
    auto_delete => false
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t rabbitmq

Kafka transport:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
kafka_client_id: beaver-kafka-1
kafka_hosts: kafkahost1:9092,kafkahost2:9092
kafka_key: logstash
kafka_topic: mylogs-topic
kafka_batch_n: 10
kafka_batch_t: 10

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  kafka {
    zk_connect => 'zk1:2181' # string (optional), default: "localhost:2181"
    group_id => 'logstash' # string (optional), default: "logstash"
    topic_id => 'mylogs-topic' # string (optional), default: "test"
    reset_beginning => false # boolean (optional), default: false
    consumer_threads => 25 # number (optional), default: 1
    queue_size => 20 # number (optional), default: 20
    rebalance_max_retries => 4 # number (optional), default: 4
    rebalance_backoff_ms => 2000 # number (optional), default:  2000
    consumer_timeout_ms => -1 # number (optional), default: -1
    consumer_restart_on_error => true # boolean (optional), default: true
    consumer_restart_sleep_ms => 0 # number (optional), default: 0
    decorate_events => false # boolean (optional), default: false
    consumer_id => 'logstash-kafka-1' # string (optional) default: nil
    fetch_message_max_bytes => 1048576 # number (optional) default: 1048576
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t kafka

TCP transport:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
tcp_host: 127.0.0.1
tcp_port: 9999
format: raw

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  tcp {
    host => '127.0.0.1'
    port => '9999'
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t tcp

UDP transport:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
udp_host: 127.0.0.1
udp_port: 9999

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  udp {
    type => 'shipper-input'
    host => '127.0.0.1'
    port => '9999'
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t udp

SNS Transport:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
sns_aws_region: us-east-1
sns_aws_topic_arn: arn:aws:sns:us-east-1:123456789123:logstash-topic
sns_aws_access_key: <access_key>
sns_aws_secret_key: <secret_key>
sns_aws_profile_name: <proflie_name>

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  sqs {
    queue => "sns-subscriber"
    type => "shipper-input"
    format => "json_event"
    access_key => "<access_key>"
    secret_key => "<secret_key>"
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t sns

SQS Transport:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
sqs_aws_region: us-east-1
sqs_aws_queue: logstash-input1,logstash-input2
sqs_aws_access_key: <access_key>
sqs_aws_secret_key: <secret_key>

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  sqs {
    queue => "logstash-input"
    type => "shipper-input"
    format => "json_event"
    access_key => "<access_key>"
    secret_key => "<secret_key>"
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t sqs

Kinesis Transport:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
kinesis_aws_region: us-east-1
kinesis_aws_stream: logstash-stream
kinesis_aws_access_key: <access_key>
kinesis_aws_secret_key: <secret_key>

# ingest process (not via Logstash): https://github.com/awslabs/amazon-kinesis-connectors

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -t kinesis

Mqtt transport using Paho:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
mqtt_client_id: 'beaver_client'
mqtt_topic: '/logstash'
mqtt_host: '127.0.0.1'
mqtt_port: '1318'
mqtt_keepalive: '60'

# logstash indexer config:
input {
  mqtt {
    host => '127.0.0.1'
    data_type => 'list'
    key => 'app:unmappable'
    type => 'app:unmappable'
  }
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -f /var/log/unmappable.log -t mqtt

HTTP transport

The HTTP transport simply posts the payload data for a log event to the url specified here. You can use this to post directly to elastic search, for example by creating an index and posting json to the index URL:

# Assuming an elastic search instance running on your localhost,
# create a 'logs' index:
curl -XPUT 'http://localhost:9200/logs/'

# A beaver config to post directly to elastic search:
# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
format: json
logstash_version: 1
http_url: http://localhost:9200/logs/log

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -F json -f /var/log/somefile -t http

GELF using HTTP transport

To ship logs directly to a Graylog server, start with this configuration:

# /etc/beaver/conf, GELF HTTP input on port 12200
[beaver]
http_url: 'http://graylog.example.com:12200/gelf'

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -f /var/log/somefile -t http -F gelf

Stomp transport using Stomp.py:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
stomp_host: 'localhost'
stomp_port: '61613'
stomp_user: 'producer-user'
stomp_password : 'password'
stomp_queue : 'queue/logstash'

# logstash indexer config:
stomp {
    user => "consumer-user"
    password => "consumer-password"
    destination => "logstash"
    host => "localhost"
    port => "61613"
}
output { stdout { debug => true } }

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf -f /var/log/somefile.log -t stomp

Sincedb support using Sqlite3

Note that this will require R/W permissions on the file at sincedb path, as Beaver will store the current line for a given filename/file id.:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
sincedb_path: /etc/beaver/since.db

[/var/log/syslog]
type: syslog
tags: sys,main
sincedb_write_interval: 3 ; time in seconds

# From the commandline
beaver -c /etc/beaver/conf

Multi-line Parsing

Simple multi-line event: if line is indented it is the continuation of an event:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[/tmp/somefile]
multiline_regex_before = ^\s+

Multi-line event for Python traceback:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[/tmp/python.log]
multiline_regex_after = (^\s+File.*, line \d+, in)
multiline_regex_before = (^Traceback \(most recent call last\):)|(^\s+File.*, line \d+, in)|(^\w+Error: )

# /tmp/python.log
DEBUG:root:Calling faulty_function
WARNING:root:An error occured
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "doerr.py", line 12, in <module>
    faulty_function()
  File "doerr.py", line 7, in faulty_function
    0 / 0
ZeroDivisionError: integer division or modulo by zero

SSH Tunneling Support

Use SSH options for redis transport through SSH Tunnel:

# /etc/beaver/conf
[beaver]
transport: redis
redis_url: redis://localhost:6379/0
redis_namespace: logstash:beaver
ssh_options: StrictHostKeyChecking=no, Compression=yes, CompressionLevel=9
ssh_key_file: /etc/beaver/remote_key
ssh_tunnel: remote-logger@logs.example.net
ssh_tunnel_port: 6379
ssh_remote_host: 127.0.0.1
ssh_remote_port: 6379

Environment Import Support

Using add_field_env allows you to add additional fields based upon OS environment data. For example if you want the instance ID from an AWS host (and you’ve imported that data into the environment before launch), you could add the following:

add_field_env: instanceID,INSTANCE_ID

If you’re using Asgard to manage your auto scaling groups, you can extract the information that it sets as well.

add_field_env: asgEnvironment,CLOUD_DEV_PHASE,launchConfig,CLOUD_LAUNCH_CONFIG,asgName,CLOUD_CLUSTER

Assuming the following items in the environment:

# printenv | egrep '(CLOUD_LAUNCH_CONFIG|CLOUD_CLUSTER|INSTANCE_ID)'
CLOUD_CLUSTER=always-cms-services-ext-d0prod
CLOUD_LAUNCH_CONFIG=always-cms-services-ext-d0prod-20131030104814
INSTANCE_ID=i-3cf70c0b

And the following beaver.conf file:

[beaver]
tcp_host: 10.21.52.249
tcp_port: 9999
format: json

[/mnt/logs/jetty/access.log]
type: cms-serv-ext
tags: beaver-src
add_field_env: launchConfig, CLOUD_LAUNCH_CONFIG, cloudCluster, CLOUD_CLUSTER, instanceID, INSTANCE_ID

You would get the following event in your logstash input (using tcp for an input with an oldlogstashjson codec):

{
         "message" => "10.21.56.244 - - [07/11/2013:22:44:15 +0000] \"GET / HTTP/1.1\" 200 14108 \"-\" \"NING/1.0\"",
     "source_host" => "ip-10-21-56-68",
     "source_path" => "/mnt/logs/jetty/access.log",
          "source" => "file://ip-10-21-56-68/mnt/logs/jetty/access.log",
            "tags" => [
        [0] "beaver-src"
    ],
            "type" => "cms-serv-ext",
      "@timestamp" => "2013-11-07T22:44:15.068Z",
      "instanceID" => "i-3cf70c0b",
    "cloudCluster" => "always-cms-services-ext-d0prod",
    "launchConfig" => "always-cms-services-ext-d0prod-20131030104814",
        "@version" => "1",
            "host" => "10.21.56.68:36952"
}

This is functionally equivalent to the logstash environment filter. The information format with add_field_env is slightly different than add_field. The add_field keyword will add the values to an array within logstash, whereas add_field_env passes it as a string. You end up with a key => value pair, just as you would in the source system’s environment.

Sample of data from add_field::

myKey => [

[0] “myValue”

],

Sample of data from add_field_env::

myKey => “myValue”