elastic-apm-docker-compose

A docker-compose setup to deploy a local stack for elastic-apm https://www.elastic.co/apm to receive and visualise metrics from instrumented applications for performance monitoring.

pre-requirements

• docker must be installed

how to start

run docker-compose up from the commandline inside of the main directory of this project. The stack will take ~1 minute to start up.

Open http://localhost:5601 in your local browser see the overview of Kibana. Select APM from the menu and follow the instructions to instrument your application.

Java instrumentation

Download the agent jar file from Maven central https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/co.elastic.apm/elastic-apm-agent and store it in a local directory. Don't add it as a build dependency to your application.

Start your application with the -javaagent flag pointing to the downloaded jar and configure the required parameters. use the same token for elastic.apm.secret_token that is configured in the docker-compose.yml

java -javaagent:/path/to/elastic-apm-agent-<version>.jar \
      -Delastic.apm.service_name=my-java-application \
      -Delastic.apm.server_urls=http://localhost:8200 \
      -Delastic.apm.secret_token=xxVpmQB2HMzCL9PgBHVrnxjNXXw5J7bd79DFm6sjBJR5HPXDhcF8MSb3vv4bpg45 \
      -Delastic.apm.application_packages=org.example \
      -jar my-application.jar

When using the Servlet API in combination with a dispatcher servlet you should add the parameter -Delastic.apm.use_path_as_transaction_name=true to name the transactions by the requested URL instead of the class/method name, which would always be the dispatcher for all requests. In addition, you can combine multiple request URLs into one group with a regex. This makes sense if changing IDs are part of the URL. -Delastic.apm.url_groups=/user/*,/model/*,/directory/*

you can find a list of all configuration parameters here: https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/apm/agent/java/current/configuration.html

After starting and interacting with the instrumented application, you should find the service name in the APM listing.

Node.JS instrumentation

Install the agent as NPM dependency npm install elastic-apm-node --save

Add this to the top of your first loaded file in your application.

import apm from 'elastic-apm-node'
apm.start({
  serviceName: 'my-nodejs-application',
  secretToken: 'xxVpmQB2HMzCL9PgBHVrnxjNXXw5J7bd79DFm6sjBJR5HPXDhcF8MSb3vv4bpg45',
  serverUrl: 'http://localhost:8200',
})

The configuration may vary based on the used frameworks:

https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/apm/agent/nodejs/current/set-up.html

https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/apm/agent/nodejs/current/es-modules.html