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Writing data from Node.js

Estimated time to read: 5 minutes

This page shows how to write Node.js application logs into EraSearch. In this guide, you'll:

  • Create a sample Node.js application with Winston as a logging framework.
  • Write data to EraSearch using the Elasticsearch transport.
  • View the logs in EraSearch.

Before you begin

This content is intended for engineers and developers using EraSearch on EraCloud or self-hosted EraSearch:

This page also assumes you've installed Node.js and jq, a JSON parser for the command line.

Instructions

Step 1: Create a sample Node.js application

  1. In your terminal, enter this command to initialize a node project in a new sample directory:

    $ mkdir sample && cd sample && npm init -y

    The command returns this output:

    Wrote to .../sample/package.json:

{
  "name": "sample",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "",
  "main": "index.js",
  "scripts": {
    "test": "echo \"Error: no test specified\" && exit 1"
  },
  "keywords": [],
  "author": "",
  "license": "ISC"
}

  2. Create a small server by adding this code to a new file named app.js:

    require("http")
  .createServer((_, res) => {
    res.end("Hello World");
  })
  .listen(3000);

  3. Start the server:

    $ node app.js

  4. To verify your setup, go to a separate terminal window and enter the command below. If the server is up and running, the command returns Hello World.

    $ curl localhost:3000

To stop the server, press Ctrl + C.

Step 2: Configure Winston

  1. In the sample directory, add Winston to your node project: 

    $ npm install winston

  2. To create a Winston logger and emit your first log message, update app.js to look like the following: 

    const logger = require("winston").createLogger();

require("http")
  .createServer((_, res) => {
    logger.info("Message received");
    res.end("Hello World");
  })
  .listen(3000);

  3. To verify your configuration, restart the server and make the same $ curl localhost:3000 request.

    The server's log output shows that it received a document but doesn't have a logging backend. You'll set up the backend in step 3. 

    [winston] Attempt to write logs with no transports {"message":"Message received","level":"info"}

Step 3: Configure an EraSearch transport

  1. In your sample directory, add the winston-elasticsearch transport to your node project: 

    $ npm install winston-elasticsearch

  2. Configure the transport and add it to Winston.

    Add the following to the top of app.js, replacing YOUR_SERVICE_URI and YOUR_API_KEY with your EraCloud account information: 

    const {
  ElasticsearchTransport,
  ElasticsearchTransformer,
} = require("winston-elasticsearch")        
const esTransport = new ElasticsearchTransport({
  transformer: (logData) => {
    const { ["@timestamp"]: _, ...transformed } = ElasticsearchTransformer(logData);
    return { ...transformed, _ts: Date.now() };
  },
  clientOpts: {
    node: "YOUR_SERVICE_URI",
    auth: {
      bearer: "YOUR_API_KEY",
    },
  },
});

    Add the following to the top of app.js, replacing:

    • YOUR_ERASEARCH_URL with your EraSearch URL. Example: http://localhost:9200.

    • YOUR_API_KEY with your EraSearch RBAC API key. If you're not using RBAC, remove the auth section from the file.

    const {
  ElasticsearchTransport,
  ElasticsearchTransformer,
} = require("winston-elasticsearch");

const esTransport = new ElasticsearchTransport({
  transformer: (logData) => {
    const { ["@timestamp"]: _, ...transformed } = ElasticsearchTransformer(logData);
    return { ...transformed, _ts: Date.now() };
  },
  clientOpts: {
    node: "YOUR_ERASEARCH_URL",
    auth: {
      bearer: "YOUR_API_KEY",
    },
  },
});

  3. Next, in app.js, update the existing logger declaration to tell Winston to use the new transport:

    const logger = require("winston").createLogger({
transports: [esTransport],
});

Note

The configuration above uses the Elasticsearch transport. That workflow is possible because EraSearch supports much of the Elasticsearch API. The example above replaces Elasticsearch's timestamp field (@timestamp) with EraSearch's timestamp field (_ts).

Step 4: View your data in EraSearch

  1. Restart the server:

    $ node app.js

  2. In a separate terminal window, send your server a request:

    $ curl localhost:3000

  3. View your data.

    Access EraSearch's UI by visiting your EraCloud account and clicking search icon. Your logs are in the index called logs-YYYY.MM.DD.

    Enter the command below in your terminal, replacing:

    • YOUR_ERASEARCH_URL with your information.
    • YYYY.MM.DD with today's date.
    • YOUR_API_KEY with your EraSearch RBAC API key. If you're not using RBAC, remove -H 'Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY' from the command.

    The request targets the logs-YYYY.MM.DD index, and returns one document with the field "message": "Message received".

    $ curl 'YOUR_ERASEARCH_URL/logs-YYYY.MM.DD/_search?q=_lid:*' \
-H 'Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY' | jq

Next steps

You can extend your existing configuration to do the following:

  • Add custom fields to your log messages, for example, logger.info({message: "abc123", customField: "value1"}).
  • Configure a static index name by adding index: "myIndex" alongside transformer in your transport options.

For other ways to get data into your database, visit the write-integrations reference. To learn more about exploring, querying, and visualizing your data in EraSearch, visit these pages:

Last update: October 6, 2022