NATS and Datadog Integration

Input and output integration overview

The NATS Consumer Input Plugin enables real-time data consumption from NATS messaging subjects, integrating seamlessly into the Telegraf data pipeline for monitoring and metrics gathering.

This plugin writes to the Datadog Metrics API and requires an apikey which can be obtained for the account. This plugin supports the v1 API.

Integration details

NATS

The NATS Consumer Plugin allows Telegraf to read metrics from specified NATS subjects and create metrics based on supported input data formats. Utilizing a Queue Group allows multiple instances of Telegraf to read from a NATS cluster in parallel, enhancing throughput and reliability. This plugin also supports various authentication methods, including username/password, NATS credentials files, and nkey seed files, ensuring secure communication with the NATS servers. It is particularly useful in environments where data persistence and message reliability are critical, thanks to features such as JetStream that facilitate the consumption of historical messages. Additionally, the ability to configure various operational parameters makes this plugin suitable for high-throughput scenarios while maintaining performance integrity.

Datadog

Datadog metric names are formed by joining the Telegraf metric name and the field key with a . character.

Field values are converted to floating point numbers. Strings and floats that cannot be sent over JSON, namely NaN and Inf, are ignored.

Setting rate_interval to non-zero will convert count metrics to rate and divide its value by this interval before submitting to Datadog. This allows Telegraf to submit metrics alongside Datadog agents when their rate intervals are the same (Datadog defaults to 10s). Note that this only supports metrics ingested via inputs.statsd given the dependency on the metric_type tag it creates. There is only support for counter metrics, and count values from timing and histogram metrics.

Configuration

NATS

[[inputs.nats_consumer]]
  ## urls of NATS servers
  servers = ["nats://localhost:4222"]

  ## subject(s) to consume
  ## If you use jetstream you need to set the subjects
  ## in jetstream_subjects
  subjects = ["telegraf"]

  ## jetstream subjects
  ## jetstream is a streaming technology inside of nats.
  ## With jetstream the nats-server persists messages and
  ## a consumer can consume historical messages. This is
  ## useful when telegraf needs to restart it don't miss a
  ## message. You need to configure the nats-server.
  ## https://docs.nats.io/nats-concepts/jetstream.
  jetstream_subjects = ["js_telegraf"]

  ## name a queue group
  queue_group = "telegraf_consumers"

  ## Optional authentication with username and password credentials
  # username = ""
  # password = ""

  ## Optional authentication with NATS credentials file (NATS 2.0)
  # credentials = "/etc/telegraf/nats.creds"

  ## Optional authentication with nkey seed file (NATS 2.0)
  # nkey_seed = "/etc/telegraf/seed.txt"

  ## Use Transport Layer Security
  # secure = false

  ## Optional TLS Config
  # tls_ca = "/etc/telegraf/ca.pem"
  # tls_cert = "/etc/telegraf/cert.pem"
  # tls_key = "/etc/telegraf/key.pem"
  ## Use TLS but skip chain & host verification
  # insecure_skip_verify = false

  ## Sets the limits for pending msgs and bytes for each subscription
  ## These shouldn't need to be adjusted except in very high throughput scenarios
  # pending_message_limit = 65536
  # pending_bytes_limit = 67108864

  ## Max undelivered messages
  ## This plugin uses tracking metrics, which ensure messages are read to
  ## outputs before acknowledging them to the original broker to ensure data
  ## is not lost. This option sets the maximum messages to read from the
  ## broker that have not been written by an output.
  ##
  ## This value needs to be picked with awareness of the agent's
  ## metric_batch_size value as well. Setting max undelivered messages too high
  ## can result in a constant stream of data batches to the output. While
  ## setting it too low may never flush the broker's messages.
  # max_undelivered_messages = 1000

  ## Data format to consume.
  ## Each data format has its own unique set of configuration options, read
  ## more about them here:
  ## https://github.com/influxdata/telegraf/blob/master/docs/DATA_FORMATS_INPUT.md
  data_format = "influx"

Datadog

[[outputs.datadog]]
  ## Datadog API key
  apikey = "my-secret-key"

  ## Connection timeout.
  # timeout = "5s"

  ## Write URL override; useful for debugging.
  ## This plugin only supports the v1 API currently due to the authentication
  ## method used.
  # url = "https://app.datadoghq.com/api/v1/series"

  ## Set http_proxy
  # use_system_proxy = false
  # http_proxy_url = "http://localhost:8888"

  ## Override the default (none) compression used to send data.
  ## Supports: "zlib", "none"
  # compression = "none"

  ## When non-zero, converts count metrics submitted by inputs.statsd
  ## into rate, while dividing the metric value by this number.
  ## Note that in order for metrics to be submitted simultaenously alongside
  ## a Datadog agent, rate_interval has to match the interval used by the
  ## agent - which defaults to 10s
  # rate_interval = 0s

Input and output integration examples

NATS

1. Real-Time Analytics Dashboard: Utilize the NATS plugin to gather metrics from various NATS subjects in real time and feed them into a centralized analytics dashboard. This setup allows for immediate visibility into live application performance, enabling teams to react swiftly to operational issues or performance degradation.

2. Distributed System Monitoring: Deploy multiple instances of Telegraf configured with the NATS plugin across a distributed architecture. This approach allows teams to aggregate metrics from various microservices efficiently, providing a holistic view of system health and performance while ensuring no messages are dropped during transmission.

3. Historical Message Recovery: Leverage the capabilities of NATS JetStream along with this plugin to recover and process historical messages after Telegraf has been restarted. This feature is particularly beneficial for applications that require high reliability, ensuring that no critical metrics are lost even in case of service disruptions.

4. Dynamic Load Balancing: Implement a dynamic load balancing scenario where Telegraf instances consume messages from a NATS cluster based on load. Adjust the queue group settings to control the number of active consumers, allowing for better resource utilization and performance scaling as demand fluctuations occur.

Datadog

1. Basic Metric Submission: Utilize the Datadog Output Plugin to transmit metrics from your Telegraf instance to Datadog. By configuring the apikey and enabling necessary metrics, you can easily monitor application performance over time.
2. Debugging Write URL: In cases where you need to troubleshoot your metric submissions, you can override the default write URL with a custom endpoint to debug the metrics being sent, ensuring that they are reaching the correct destination.
3. Proxy Configuration: If your network setup requires routing through a proxy for outgoing requests, use the http_proxy_url option to set the appropriate proxy. This allows for seamless integration in restrictive network environments.

Feedback

Thank you for being part of our community! If you have any general feedback or found any bugs on these pages, we welcome and encourage your input. Please submit your feedback in the InfluxDB community Slack.