Advanced Log Collection

Apply log processing rules to a specific log collection configurations to:

Filter logs
Scrub sensitive data from your logs
Proceed to multi-line aggregation
Tail directories by using wildcards
Encode UTF-16 format logs

Note: If you set up multiple processing rules, they are applied sequentially and each rule is applied on the result of the previous one.

Note: Processing rule patterns must conform to Golang regexp syntax.

To apply a processing rule to all logs collected by a Datadog Agent, see the Global processing rules section.

Filter logs

To send only a specific subset of logs to Datadog use the log_processing_rules parameter in your configuration file with the exclude_at_match or include_at_match type.

Exclude at match

Parameter	Description
`exclude_at_match`	If the specified pattern is contained in the message, the log is excluded and not sent to Datadog.

For example, to filter OUT logs that contain a Datadog email address, use the following log_processing_rules:

Dropdown

logs:
  - type: file
    path: /my/test/file.log
    service: cardpayment
    source: java
    log_processing_rules:
    - type: exclude_at_match
      name: exclude_datadoghq_users
      ## Regexp can be anything
      pattern: \w+@datadoghq.com

In a Docker environment, use the label com.datadoghq.ad.logs on your container to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

 labels:
    com.datadoghq.ad.logs: >-
      [{
        "source": "java",
        "service": "cardpayment",
        "log_processing_rules": [{
          "type": "exclude_at_match",
          "name": "exclude_datadoghq_users",
          "pattern" : "\\w+@datadoghq.com"
        }]
      }]

Note: Escape regex characters in your patterns when using labels. For example, \d becomes \\d, \w becomes \\w, etc.

In a Kubernetes environment, use the pod annotation ad.datadoghq.com on your pod to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: ReplicaSet
metadata:
  name: cardpayment
spec:
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: cardpayment
  template:
    metadata:
      annotations:
        ad.datadoghq.com/cardpayment.logs: >-
          [{
            "source": "java",
            "service": "cardpayment",
            "log_processing_rules": [{
              "type": "exclude_at_match",
              "name": "exclude_datadoghq_users",
              "pattern" : "\\w+@datadoghq.com"
            }]
          }]          
      labels:
        app: cardpayment
      name: cardpayment
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: cardpayment
          image: cardpayment:latest

Note: Escape regex characters in your patterns when using pod annotations. For example, \d becomes \\d, \w becomes \\w, etc.

Include at match

Parameter	Description
`include_at_match`	Only logs with a message that includes the specified pattern are sent to Datadog. If multiple `include_at_match` rules are defined, all rules patterns must match in order for the log to be included.

For example, to filter IN logs that contain a Datadog email address, use the following log_processing_rules:

Dropdown

logs:
  - type: file
    path: /my/test/file.log
    service: cardpayment
    source: java
    log_processing_rules:
    - type: include_at_match
      name: include_datadoghq_users
      ## Regexp can be anything
      pattern: \w+@datadoghq.com

If you want to match one or more patterns you must define them in a single expression:

logs:
  - type: file
    path: /my/test/file.log
    service: cardpayment
    source: java
    log_processing_rules:
    - type: include_at_match
      name: include_datadoghq_users
      pattern: abc|123

If the patterns are too long to fit legibly on a single line you can break them into multiple lines:

logs:
  - type: file
    path: /my/test/file.log
    service: cardpayment
    source: java
    log_processing_rules:
    - type: include_at_match
      name: include_datadoghq_users
      pattern: "abc\
|123\
|\\w+@datadoghq.com"

In a Docker environment, use the label com.datadoghq.ad.logs on your container to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

 labels:
    com.datadoghq.ad.logs: >-
      [{
        "source": "java",
        "service": "cardpayment",
        "log_processing_rules": [{
          "type": "include_at_match",
          "name": "include_datadoghq_users",
          "pattern" : "\\w+@datadoghq.com"
        }]
      }]

Note: Escape regex characters in your patterns when using labels. For example, \d becomes \\d, \w becomes \\w, etc.

In a Kubernetes environment, use the pod annotation ad.datadoghq.com on your pod to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: ReplicaSet
metadata:
  name: cardpayment
spec:
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: cardpayment
  template:
    metadata:
      annotations:
        ad.datadoghq.com/cardpayment.logs: >-
          [{
            "source": "java",
            "service": "cardpayment",
            "log_processing_rules": [{
              "type": "include_at_match",
              "name": "include_datadoghq_users",
              "pattern" : "\\w+@datadoghq.com"
            }]
          }]          
      labels:
        app: cardpayment
      name: cardpayment
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: cardpayment
          image: cardpayment:latest

Note: Escape regex characters in your patterns when using pod annotations. For example, \d becomes \\d, \w becomes \\w, etc.

Scrub sensitive data from your logs

If your logs contain sensitive information that need redacting, configure the Datadog Agent to scrub sensitive sequences by using the log_processing_rules parameter in your configuration file with the mask_sequences type.

This replaces all matched groups with the value of the replace_placeholder parameter.

For example, redact credit card numbers:

Dropdown

logs:
 - type: file
   path: /my/test/file.log
   service: cardpayment
   source: java
   log_processing_rules:
      - type: mask_sequences
        name: mask_credit_cards
        replace_placeholder: "[masked_credit_card]"
        ##One pattern that contains capture groups
        pattern: (?:4[0-9]{12}(?:[0-9]{3})?|[25][1-7][0-9]{14}|6(?:011|5[0-9][0-9])[0-9]{12}|3[47][0-9]{13}|3(?:0[0-5]|[68][0-9])[0-9]{11}|(?:2131|1800|35\d{3})\d{11})

In a Docker environment, use the label com.datadoghq.ad.logs on your container to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

 labels:
    com.datadoghq.ad.logs: >-
      [{
        "source": "java",
        "service": "cardpayment",
        "log_processing_rules": [{
          "type": "mask_sequences",
          "name": "mask_credit_cards",
          "replace_placeholder": "[masked_credit_card]",
          "pattern" : "(?:4[0-9]{12}(?:[0-9]{3})?|[25][1-7][0-9]{14}|6(?:011|5[0-9][0-9])[0-9]{12}|3[47][0-9]{13}|3(?:0[0-5]|[68][0-9])[0-9]{11}|(?:2131|1800|35\\d{3})\\d{11})"
        }]
      }]

Note: Escape regex characters in your patterns when using labels. For example, \d becomes \\d, \w becomes \\w, etc.

In a Kubernetes environment, use the pod annotation ad.datadoghq.com on your pod to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: ReplicaSet
metadata:
  name: cardpayment
spec:
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: cardpayment
  template:
    metadata:
      annotations:
        ad.datadoghq.com/cardpayment.logs: >-
          [{
            "source": "java",
            "service": "cardpayment",
            "log_processing_rules": [{
              "type": "mask_sequences",
              "name": "mask_credit_cards",
              "replace_placeholder": "[masked_credit_card]",
              "pattern" : "(?:4[0-9]{12}(?:[0-9]{3})?|[25][1-7][0-9]{14}|6(?:011|5[0-9][0-9])[0-9]{12}|3[47][0-9]{13}|3(?:0[0-5]|[68][0-9])[0-9]{11}|(?:2131|1800|35\\d{3})\\d{11})"
            }]
          }]          
      labels:
        app: cardpayment
      name: cardpayment
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: cardpayment
          image: cardpayment:latest

Note: Escape regex characters in your patterns when using pod annotations. For example, \d becomes \\d, \w becomes \\w, etc.

With Agent version 7.17+, the replace_placeholder string can expand references to capture groups such as $1, $2 and so forth. If you want a string to follow the capture group with no space in between, use the format ${<GROUP_NUMBER>}.

For instance, to scrub user information from the log User email: foo.bar@example.com, use:

pattern: "(User email: )[^@]*@(.*)"
replace_placeholder: "$1 masked_user@${2}"

This sends the following log to Datadog: User email: masked_user@example.com

Multi-line aggregation

If your logs are not sent in JSON and you want to aggregate several lines into a single entry, configure the Datadog Agent to detect a new log using a specific regex pattern instead of having one log per line. This is accomplished by using the log_processing_rules parameter in your configuration file with the multi_line type which aggregates all lines into a single entry until the given pattern is detected again.

For example, every Java log line starts with a timestamp in yyyy-dd-mm format. These lines include a stack trace that can be sent as two logs:

2018-01-03T09:24:24.983Z UTC Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NullPointerException
        at com.example.myproject.Book.getTitle(Book.java:16)
        at com.example.myproject.Author.getBookTitles(Author.java:25)
        at com.example.myproject.Bootstrap.main(Bootstrap.java:14)
2018-01-03T09:26:24.365Z UTC starting upload of /my/file.gz

Dropdown

To send the example logs above with a configuration file, use the following log_processing_rules:

logs:
 - type: file
   path: /var/log/pg_log.log
   service: database
   source: postgresql
   log_processing_rules:
      - type: multi_line
        name: new_log_start_with_date
        pattern: \d{4}\-(0?[1-9]|1[012])\-(0?[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])

In a Docker environment, use the label com.datadoghq.ad.logs on your container to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

 labels:
    com.datadoghq.ad.logs: >-
      [{
        "source": "postgresql",
        "service": "database",
        "log_processing_rules": [{
          "type": "multi_line",
          "name": "log_start_with_date",
          "pattern" : "\\d{4}-(0?[1-9]|1[012])-(0?[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])"
        }]
      }]

In a Kubernetes environment, use the pod annotation ad.datadoghq.com on your pod to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: ReplicaSet
metadata:
  name: postgres
spec:
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: database
  template:
    metadata:
      annotations:
        ad.datadoghq.com/postgres.logs: >-
          [{
            "source": "postgresql",
            "service": "database",
            "log_processing_rules": [{
              "type": "multi_line",
              "name": "log_start_with_date",
              "pattern" : "\\d{4}-(0?[1-9]|1[012])-(0?[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])"
            }]
          }]          
      labels:
        app: database
      name: postgres
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: postgres
          image: postgres:latest

Note: Escape regex characters in your patterns when performing multi-line aggregation with pod annotations. For example, \d becomes \\d, \w becomes \\w, etc.

Important! Regex patterns for multi-line logs must start at the beginning of a log. Patterns cannot be matched mid-line. A never matching pattern may cause log line losses.

More examples:

Raw string	Pattern
14:20:15	`\d{2}:\d{2}:\d{2}`
11/10/2014	`\d{2}\/\d{2}\/\d{4}`
Thu Jun 16 08:29:03 2016	`\w{3}\s+\w{3}\s+\d{2}\s\d{2}:\d{2}:\d{2}`
20180228	`\d{8}`
2020-10-27 05:10:49.657	`\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2}\s\d{2}:\d{2}:\d{2}\.\d{3}`
{“date”: “2018-01-02”	`\{"date": "\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2}`

Automatic Multi-line aggregation

With Agent 7.32+ auto_multi_line_detection can be enabled which allows the Agent to detect common multi-line patterns automatically.

Automatic Multi-line aggregation is in public beta.

Enable auto_multi_line_detection globally in the datadog.yaml file:

logs_config:
  auto_multi_line_detection: true

It can also be enabled or disabled (overriding the global config) per log configuration:

Dropdown

logs:
  - type: file
    path: /my/test/file.log
    service: testApp
    source: java
    auto_multi_line_detection: true

In a Docker environment, use the label com.datadoghq.ad.logs on your container to specify the log_processing_rules, for example:

 labels:
    com.datadoghq.ad.logs: >-
      [{
        "source": "java",
        "service": "testApp",
        "auto_multi_line_detection": true
      }]

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: ReplicaSet
metadata:
  name: testApp
spec:
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: testApp
  template:
    metadata:
      annotations:
        ad.datadoghq.com/testApp.logs: >-
          [{
            "source": "java",
            "service": "testApp",
            "auto_multi_line_detection": true
          }]          
      labels:
        app: testApp
      name: testApp
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: testApp
          image: testApp:latest

Automatic mutli-line detection uses a list of common regular expressions to attempt to match logs. If the built-in list is not sufficient, you can also add custom patterns in the datadog.yaml file:

logs_config:
  auto_multi_line_detection: true
  auto_multi_line_extra_patterns:
   - \d{4}\-(0?[1-9]|1[012])\-(0?[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])
   - [A-Za-z_]+ \d+, \d+ \d+:\d+:\d+ (AM|PM)

With this feature enabled, when a new log file is opened the Agent tries to detect a pattern. During this process the logs are sent as single lines. After the detection threshold is met, all future logs for that source are aggregated with the detected pattern, or as single lines if no pattern is found. Detection takes at most 30 seconds or the first 500 logs (whichever comes first).

Note: If you can control the naming pattern of the rotated log, ensure that the rotated file replaces the previously active file with the same name. The Agent reuses a previously detected pattern on the newly rotated file to avoid re-running detection.

Commonly used log processing rules

See the dedicated Commonly Used Log Processing Rules FAQ to see a list of examples.

Tail directories by using wildcards

If your log files are labeled by date or all stored in the same directory, configure your Datadog Agent to monitor them all and automatically detect new ones by using wildcards in the path attribute. If you want to exclude some files matching the chosen path, list them in the exclude_paths attribute.

Using path: /var/log/myapp/*.log:
- Matches all .log file contained in the /var/log/myapp/ directory.
- Doesn’t match /var/log/myapp/myapp.conf.
Using path: /var/log/myapp/*/*.log:
- Matches /var/log/myapp/log/myfile.log.
- Matches /var/log/myapp/errorLog/myerrorfile.log
- Doesn’t match /var/log/myapp/mylogfile.log.

Configuration example:

logs:
  - type: file
    path: /var/log/myapp/*.log
    exclude_paths:
      - /var/log/myapp/debug.log
      - /var/log/myapp/trace.log
    service: mywebapp
    source: go

The example above will match /var/log/myapp/log/myfile.log but /var/log/myapp/log/debug.log and /var/log/myapp/log/trace.log will never be tailed.

Note: The Agent requires read and execute permissions on a directory to list all the available files in it.

Encode UTF-16 format logs

If applications logs are written in UTF-16 format, starting with Datadog Agent v6.23/v7.23, users can encode these logs so that they are parsed as expected in the Logs Explorer. Use the encoding parameter in the logs configuration section. Set it to utf-16-le for UTF16 little-endian and utf-16-be for UTF16 big-endian. Any other value will be ignored and the Agent will read the file as UTF8.

Configuration example:

logs:
  - type: file
    path: /test/log/hello-world.log
    tags: key:value
    service: utf-16-logs
    source: mysql
    encoding: utf-16-be

Note: The encoding parameter is only applicable when the type parameter is set to file.

Global processing rules

For Datadog Agent v6.10+, the exclude_at_match, include_at_match, and mask_sequences processing rules can be defined globally in the Agent’s main configuration file or through an environment variable:

Dropdown

In the datadog.yaml file:

logs_config:
  processing_rules:
    - type: exclude_at_match
      name: exclude_healthcheck
      pattern: healthcheck
    - type: mask_sequences
      name: mask_user_email
      pattern: \w+@datadoghq.com
      replace_placeholder: "MASKED_EMAIL"

Use the environment variable DD_LOGS_CONFIG_PROCESSING_RULES to configure global processing rules, for example:

DD_LOGS_CONFIG_PROCESSING_RULES='[{"type": "mask_sequences", "name": "mask_user_email", "replace_placeholder": "MASKED_EMAIL", "pattern" : "\\w+@datadoghq.com"}]'

Use the env parameter in the helm chart to set the DD_LOGS_CONFIG_PROCESSING_RULES environment variable to configure global processing rules, for example:

env:
  - name: DD_LOGS_CONFIG_PROCESSING_RULES
    value: '[{"type": "mask_sequences", "name": "mask_user_email", "replace_placeholder": "MASKED_EMAIL", "pattern" : "\\w+@datadoghq.com"}]'

All the logs collected by the Datadog Agent are impacted by the global processing rules.

Note: The Datadog Agent does not start the log collector if there is a format issue in the global processing rules. Run the Agent’s status subcommand to troubleshoot any issues.