Install Observe Agent on Linux

Install the Observe Agent

Debian-based distributions

Install the observe-agent package. You’ll need to first add the Observe debian repository to your trusted depositories in your sources.list.d file.

echo 'deb [trusted=yes] https://repo.observeinc.com/apt/ /' | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/observeinc.list
sudo apt update
sudo apt install observe-agent

To validate that the agent is installed correctly, you can run the version command.

observe-agent version

RedHat-based distributions

Install the observe-agent package. You’ll need to first add the Observe yum repository to your trusted repositories in your yum.repos.d folder.

echo '[fury]
name=Gemfury Private Repo
baseurl=https://yum.fury.io/observeinc/
enabled=1
gpgcheck=0' | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/fury.repo

sudo yum install observe-agent

To validate that the agent is installed correctly, you can run the version command.

observe-agent version

Configure the Observe Agent

Automatic configuration

The easiest way to initialize the agent configuration is to use the observe-agent init-config command as follows:

Replace the contents of the agent configuration file with the config file below. Replace ${OBSERVE_TOKEN} (your instance’s token) and ${OBSERVE_COLLECTION_ENDPOINT} (your instance’s collection endpoint) on each host. For more information on configuring the agent, see Configuration.

sudo observe-agent init-config \
--token ${OBSERVE_TOKEN} \
--observe_url https://${OBSERVE_CUSTOMER_ID}.collect.observeinc.com/
--self_monitoring::enabled=true \
--host_monitoring::enabled=true \
--host_monitoring::logs::enabled=true \
--host_monitoring::metrics::host::enabled=true \
--host_monitoring::metrics::process::enabled=false

This is only recommended for initial configuration. For subsequent changes, see below.

Manual configuration

For initial configuration, we suggest using observe-agent init-config. For changes to the defaults, see below.

Debian-based distributions

Open the agent config file /etc/observe-agent/observe-agent.yaml with superuser permissions which will allow you to edit and save changes to the file.

sudo vim /etc/observe-agent/observe-agent.yaml

Replace the contents of the agent configuration file with the config file below. Replace ${OBSERVE_TOKEN} (your instance’s token) and ${OBSERVE_COLLECTION_ENDPOINT} (your instance’s collection endpoint) on each host. For more information on configuring the agent, see Configuration.

Note

The ${OBSERVE_COLLECTION_ENDPOINT} is composed from https://${OBSERVE_CUSTOMER_ID}.collect.${OBSERVE_INSTANCE}. For example, if you typically login to https://123456789012.observeinc.com, your ${OBSERVE_COLLECTION_ENDPOINT} is https://123456789012.collect.observeinc.com.

Note

Some Observe instances may optionally use a name instead of Customer ID; if this is the case for your instance, contact your Observe Data Engineer to discuss implementation. A stem name will work as is, but a DNS redirect name may require client configuration.

# Observe data token (ex: a1b2c3d4e5f6g7h8i9k0:l1m2n3o4p5q6r7s8t9u0v1w2x3y4z5a6)
token: "${OBSERVE_TOKEN}"

# Target Observe collection url (ex: https://123456789012.collect.observeinc.com/)
observe_url: "${OBSERVE_COLLECTION_ENDPOINT}"

# Debug mode - Sets agent log level to debug
debug: false

self_monitoring:
  enabled: true

host_monitoring:
  enabled: true
  logs: 
    enabled: true
    include:
      - /var/log/**/*.log
      - /var/log/syslog
  metrics:
    host: 
      enabled: true
    process:
      enabled: false

# otel_config_overrides:
#   exporters:
#     # This is a net new exporter
#     debug:
#       verbosity: detailed
#       sampling_initial: 5
#       sampling_thereafter: 200
#   service:
#     pipelines:
#       # This will override the existing metrics/host_monitoring pipeline and output to stdout debug instead
#       metrics/host_monitoring_host:
#         receivers: [hostmetrics/host-monitoring-host]
#         processors: [memory_limiter]
#         exporters: [debug]
#       # This is a net new pipeline
#       logs/new-pipeline:
#         receivers: [filelog/host_monitoring]
#         processors: [memory_limiter]
#         exporters: [debug]

RedHat-based distributions

Open the agent config file /etc/observe-agent/observe-agent.yaml with superuser permissions which will allow you to edit and save changes to the file.

sudo vi /etc/observe-agent/observe-agent.yaml

Replace the contents of the agent configuration file with the config file below. Replace ${OBSERVE_TOKEN} (your instance’s token) and ${OBSERVE_COLLECTION_ENDPOINT} (your instance’s collection endpoint) on each host. For more information on configuring the agent, see Configuration.

# Observe data token (ex: a1b2c3d4e5f6g7h8i9k0:l1m2n3o4p5q6r7s8t9u0v1w2x3y4z5a6)
token: "${OBSERVE_TOKEN}"

# Target Observe collection url (ex: https://123456789012.collect.observeinc.com/)
observe_url: "${OBSERVE_COLLECTION_ENDPOINT}"

# Debug mode - Sets agent log level to debug
debug: false

self_monitoring:
  enabled: true

host_monitoring:
  enabled: true
  logs: 
    enabled: true
    include:
      - /var/log/**/*.log
      - /var/log/syslog
  metrics:
    host: 
      enabled: true
    process:
      enabled: false

# otel_config_overrides:
#   exporters:
#     # This is a net new exporter
#     debug:
#       verbosity: detailed
#       sampling_initial: 5
#       sampling_thereafter: 200
#   service:
#     pipelines:
#       # This will override the existing metrics/host_monitoring pipeline and output to stdout debug instead
#       metrics/host_monitoring_host:
#         receivers: [hostmetrics/host-monitoring-host]
#         processors: [memory_limiter]
#         exporters: [debug]
#       # This is a net new pipeline
#       logs/new-pipeline:
#         receivers: [filelog/host_monitoring]
#         processors: [memory_limiter]
#         exporters: [debug]

Start the Observe Agent

Now that the configuration is in place, you can start the agent with the following command

sudo systemctl enable --now observe-agent

You can then run the status command to see statistics and information about the agent.

observe-agent status

Configure application instrumentation

Once the Observe Agent is up and running on a Linux host, you can configure your application running on the same Linux host to send telemetry data to the Observe Agent using one of the following addresses:

• OTLP/HTTP endpoint: http://localhost:4318

• OTLP/grpc endpoint: http://localhost:4317

Uninstall the Observe Agent

Debian-based distributions

You can uninstall the agent via apt after stopping the service.

sudo systemctl stop observe-agent
sudo apt-get purge observe-agent

RedHat-based distributions

You can uninstall the agent via yum after stopping the service.

sudo systemctl stop observe-agent
sudo yum erase observe-agent -y

Upgrade the Observe Agent

Warning

Observe Agent v1.0.0 includes breaking changes. Learn more about these changes in Upgrade to Observe Agent v1.0.0

Debian-based distributions

Upgrade the package version. The install process will ask if you want to replace your existing config file. Generally the default answer of N (no) is correct.

sudo apt update
sudo apt install --only-upgrade observe-agent

To apply the new configs and start the agent at the new version you can run the following command.

sudo systemctl restart observe-agent

RedHat-based distributions

Upgrade the package version. The install process will ask if you want to replace your existing config file. Generally the default answer of N (no) is correct.

sudo yum update observe-agent
sudo yum install observe-agent

To apply the new configs and start the agent at the new version you can run the following command.

sudo systemctl restart observe-agent