AWS Kinesis Streams logs sink

Configuration

Example configurations

{
  "sinks": {
    "my_sink_id": {
      "type": "aws_kinesis_streams",
      "inputs": [
        "my-source-or-transform-id"
      ],
      "partition_key_field": "user_id",
      "compression": "none",
      "encoding": {
        "codec": "json"
      },
      "stream_name": "my-stream",
      "region": "us-east-1"
    }
  }
}

[sinks.my_sink_id]
type = "aws_kinesis_streams"
inputs = [ "my-source-or-transform-id" ]
partition_key_field = "user_id"
compression = "none"
stream_name = "my-stream"
region = "us-east-1"

  [sinks.my_sink_id.encoding]
  codec = "json"

---
sinks:
  my_sink_id:
    type: aws_kinesis_streams
    inputs:
      - my-source-or-transform-id
    partition_key_field: user_id
    compression: none
    encoding:
      codec: json
    stream_name: my-stream
    region: us-east-1

{
  "sinks": {
    "my_sink_id": {
      "type": "aws_kinesis_streams",
      "inputs": [
        "my-source-or-transform-id"
      ],
      "partition_key_field": "user_id",
      "endpoint": "http://127.0.0.0:5000/path/to/service",
      "compression": "none",
      "encoding": {
        "codec": "json"
      },
      "stream_name": "my-stream",
      "region": "us-east-1"
    }
  }
}

[sinks.my_sink_id]
type = "aws_kinesis_streams"
inputs = [ "my-source-or-transform-id" ]
partition_key_field = "user_id"
endpoint = "http://127.0.0.0:5000/path/to/service"
compression = "none"
stream_name = "my-stream"
region = "us-east-1"

  [sinks.my_sink_id.encoding]
  codec = "json"

---
sinks:
  my_sink_id:
    type: aws_kinesis_streams
    inputs:
      - my-source-or-transform-id
    partition_key_field: user_id
    endpoint: http://127.0.0.0:5000/path/to/service
    compression: none
    encoding:
      codec: json
    stream_name: my-stream
    region: us-east-1

acknowledgements

common optional object

Controls how acknowledgements are handled by this sink. When enabled, all connected sources that support end-to-end acknowledgements will wait for the destination of this sink to acknowledge receipt of events before providing acknowledgement to the sending source. These settings override the global acknowledgement settings.

acknowledgements.enabled

common optional bool

Controls if all connected sources will wait for this sink to deliver the events before acknowledging receipt.

default: false

auth

optional object

Options for the authentication strategy.

auth.access_key_id

optional string literal

The AWS access key id. Used for AWS authentication when communicating with AWS services.

Examples

"AKIAIOSFODNN7EXAMPLE"

auth.assume_role

optional string literal

The ARN of an IAM role to assume at startup.

Examples

"arn:aws:iam::123456789098:role/my_role"

auth.imds

optional object

Configuration for authenticating with AWS through IMDS.

auth.imds.connect_timeout_seconds

optional uint

Connect timeout for IMDS.

default: 1 (seconds)

auth.imds.max_attempts

optional uint

Number of IMDS retries for fetching tokens and metadata.

default: 4

auth.imds.read_timeout_seconds

optional uint

Read timeout for IMDS.

default: 1 (seconds)

auth.load_timeout_secs

optional uint

The timeout for loading credentials. Relevant when the default credentials chain is used or assume_role.

Examples

default: 5 (seconds)

auth.profile

optional string literal

The AWS profile name. Used to select AWS credentials from a provided credentials file.

Examples

"develop"

default: default

auth.region

optional string literal

The AWS region to send STS requests to. If not set, this will default to the configured region for the service itself.

Examples

"us-west-2"

auth.secret_access_key

optional string literal

The AWS secret access key. Used for AWS authentication when communicating with AWS services.

Examples

"wJalrXUtnFEMI/K7MDENG/bPxRfiCYEXAMPLEKEY"

batch

optional object

Configures the sink batching behavior.

batch.max_bytes

common optional uint

The maximum size of a batch that will be processed by a sink. This is based on the uncompressed size of the batched events, before they are serialized / compressed.

batch.max_events

common optional uint

The maximum size of a batch, in events, before it is flushed.

batch.timeout_secs

common optional float

The maximum age of a batch before it is flushed.

default: 1 (seconds)

buffer

optional object

Configures the buffering behavior for this sink.

More information about the individual buffer types, and buffer behavior, can be found in the Buffering Model section.

buffer.max_events

optional uint

The maximum number of events allowed in the buffer.

Relevant when: type = "memory"

default: 500

buffer.max_size

required uint

The maximum size of the buffer on disk.

Must be at least ~256 megabytes (268435488 bytes).

Relevant when: type = "disk"

buffer.type

optional string literal enum

The type of buffer to use.

Enum options

Option Description

Option	Description
`disk`	Events are buffered on disk. (version 2) This is less performant, but more durable. Data that has been synchronized to disk will not be lost if Vector is restarted forcefully or crashes. Data is synchronized to disk every 500ms.
`memory`	Events are buffered in memory. This is more performant, but less durable. Data will be lost if Vector is restarted forcefully or crashes.

disk

Events are buffered on disk. (version 2)

This is less performant, but more durable. Data that has been synchronized to disk will not be lost if Vector is restarted forcefully or crashes.

Data is synchronized to disk every 500ms.

memory

Events are buffered in memory.

This is more performant, but less durable. Data will be lost if Vector is restarted forcefully or crashes.

default: memory

buffer.when_full

optional string literal enum

Event handling behavior when a buffer is full.

Enum options

Option Description

Option	Description
`block`	Wait for free space in the buffer. This applies backpressure up the topology, signalling that sources should slow down the acceptance/consumption of events. This means that while no data is lost, data will pile up at the edge.
`drop_newest`	Drops the event instead of waiting for free space in buffer. The event will be intentionally dropped. This mode is typically used when performance is the highest priority, and it is preferable to temporarily lose events rather than cause a slowdown in the acceptance/consumption of events.

block

Wait for free space in the buffer.

This applies backpressure up the topology, signalling that sources should slow down the acceptance/consumption of events. This means that while no data is lost, data will pile up at the edge.

drop_newest

Drops the event instead of waiting for free space in buffer.

The event will be intentionally dropped. This mode is typically used when performance is the highest priority, and it is preferable to temporarily lose events rather than cause a slowdown in the acceptance/consumption of events.

default: block

compression

common optional string literal enum

The compression strategy used to compress the encoded event data before transmission.

The default compression level of the chosen algorithm is used. Some cloud storage API clients and browsers will handle decompression transparently, so files may not always appear to be compressed depending how they are accessed.

Enum options string literal

Option	Description
`gzip`	Gzip standard DEFLATE compression. Compression level is `6` unless otherwise specified.
`none`	No compression.

default: none

encoding

required object

Configures how events are encoded into raw bytes.

encoding.codec

required string literal enum

The codec to use for encoding events.

Enum options

Option Description

json Encodes an event as JSON.

Option	Description
`json`	Encodes an event as JSON.
`text`	Plaintext encoding. This “encoding” simply uses the `message` field of a log event. Users should take care if they’re modifying their log events (such as by using a `remap` transform, etc) and removing the message field while doing additional parsing on it, as this could lead to the encoding emitting empty strings for the given event.

text

Plaintext encoding.

This “encoding” simply uses the message field of a log event.

Users should take care if they’re modifying their log events (such as by using a remap transform, etc) and removing the message field while doing additional parsing on it, as this could lead to the encoding emitting empty strings for the given event.

Examples

"json"

"text"

encoding.except_fields

optional [string]

Prevent the sink from encoding the specified fields.

encoding.only_fields

optional [string]

Makes the sink encode only the specified fields.

encoding.timestamp_format

optional string literal enum

How to format event timestamps.

Enum options

Option	Description
`rfc3339`	Formats as a RFC3339 string
`unix`	Formats as a unix timestamp

default: rfc3339

endpoint

optional string literal

Custom endpoint for use with AWS-compatible services.

Examples

"http://127.0.0.0:5000/path/to/service"

healthcheck

optional object

Healthcheck configuration.

healthcheck.enabled

optional bool

Whether or not to check the health of the sink when Vector starts up.

default: true

inputs

required [string]

A list of upstream source or transform IDs.

Wildcards (*) are supported.

See configuration for more info.

Array string literal

Examples

[
  "my-source-or-transform-id",
  "prefix-*"
]

partition_key_field

common optional string literal

The log field used as the Kinesis record’s partition key value.

Examples

"user_id"

proxy

optional object

Configures an HTTP(S) proxy for Vector to use. By default, the globally configured proxy is used.

proxy.enabled

optional bool

If false the proxy will be disabled.

default: true

proxy.http

optional string literal

The URL to proxy HTTP requests through.

Examples

"http://foo.bar:3128"

proxy.https

optional string literal

The URL to proxy HTTPS requests through.

Examples

"http://foo.bar:3128"

proxy.no_proxy

optional [string]

A list of hosts to avoid proxying. Allowed patterns here include:

Pattern	Example match
Domain names	`example.com` matches requests to `example.com`
Wildcard domains	`.example.com` matches requests to `example.com` and its subdomains
IP addresses	`127.0.0.1` matches requests to 127.0.0.1
CIDR blocks	`192.168.0.0./16` matches requests to any IP addresses in this range
Splat	`*` matches all hosts

region

required string literal

The AWS region of the target service.

Examples

"us-east-1"

request

optional object

Configures the sink request behavior.

request.adaptive_concurrency

optional object

Configure the adaptive concurrency algorithms. These values have been tuned by optimizing simulated results. In general you should not need to adjust these.

request.adaptive_concurrency.decrease_ratio

optional float

The fraction of the current value to set the new concurrency limit when decreasing the limit. Valid values are greater than 0 and less than 1. Smaller values cause the algorithm to scale back rapidly when latency increases. Note that the new limit is rounded down after applying this ratio.

default: 0.9

request.adaptive_concurrency.ewma_alpha

optional float

The adaptive concurrency algorithm uses an exponentially weighted moving average (EWMA) of past RTT measurements as a reference to compare with the current RTT. This value controls how heavily new measurements are weighted compared to older ones. Valid values are greater than 0 and less than 1. Smaller values cause this reference to adjust more slowly, which may be useful if a service has unusually high response variability.

default: 0.7

request.adaptive_concurrency.rtt_deviation_scale

optional float

When calculating the past RTT average, we also compute a secondary “deviation” value that indicates how variable those values are. We use that deviation when comparing the past RTT average to the current measurements, so we can ignore increases in RTT that are within an expected range. This factor is used to scale up the deviation to an appropriate range. Valid values are greater than or equal to 0, and we expect reasonable values to range from 1.0 to 3.0. Larger values cause the algorithm to ignore larger increases in the RTT.

default: 2

request.concurrency

common optional uint

The maximum number of in-flight requests allowed at any given time, or “adaptive” to allow Vector to automatically set the limit based on current network and service conditions.

request.rate_limit_duration_secs

common optional uint

The time window, in seconds, used for the rate_limit_num option.

default: 1 (seconds)

request.rate_limit_num

common optional uint

The maximum number of requests allowed within the rate_limit_duration_secs time window.

default: 9.223372036854776e+18

request.retry_attempts

optional uint

The maximum number of retries to make for failed requests. The default, for all intents and purposes, represents an infinite number of retries.

default: 1.8446744073709552e+19

request.retry_initial_backoff_secs

optional uint

The amount of time to wait before attempting the first retry for a failed request. Once, the first retry has failed the fibonacci sequence will be used to select future backoffs.

default: 1 (seconds)

request.retry_max_duration_secs

optional uint

The maximum amount of time, in seconds, to wait between retries.

default: 3600 (seconds)

request.timeout_secs

common optional uint

The maximum time a request can take before being aborted. It is highly recommended that you do not lower this value below the service’s internal timeout, as this could create orphaned requests, pile on retries, and result in duplicate data downstream.

default: 60 (seconds)

stream_name

required string literal

The stream name of the target Kinesis Logs stream.

Examples

"my-stream"

tls

optional object

Configures the TLS options for incoming/outgoing connections.

tls.alpn_protocols

optional [string]

Sets the list of supported ALPN protocols.

Declare the supported ALPN protocols, which are used during negotiation with peer. Prioritized in the order they are defined.

tls.ca_file

optional string literal

Absolute path to an additional CA certificate file.

The certificate must be in the DER or PEM (X.509) format. Additionally, the certificate can be provided as an inline string in PEM format.

Examples

"/path/to/certificate_authority.crt"

tls.crt_file

common optional string literal

Absolute path to a certificate file used to identify this server.

The certificate must be in DER, PEM (X.509), or PKCS#12 format. Additionally, the certificate can be provided as an inline string in PEM format.

If this is set, and is not a PKCS#12 archive, key_file must also be set.

Examples

"/path/to/host_certificate.crt"

tls.key_file

common optional string literal

Absolute path to a private key file used to identify this server.

The key must be in DER or PEM (PKCS#8) format. Additionally, the key can be provided as an inline string in PEM format.

Examples

"/path/to/host_certificate.key"

tls.key_pass

optional string literal

Passphrase used to unlock the encrypted key file.

This has no effect unless key_file is set.

Examples

"${KEY_PASS_ENV_VAR}"

"PassWord1"

tls.verify_certificate

optional bool

Enables certificate verification.

If enabled, certificates must be valid in terms of not being expired, as well as being issued by a trusted issuer. This verification operates in a hierarchical manner, checking that not only the leaf certificate (the certificate presented by the client/server) is valid, but also that the issuer of that certificate is valid, and so on until reaching a root certificate.

Relevant for both incoming and outgoing connections.

Do NOT set this to false unless you understand the risks of not verifying the validity of certificates.

default: true

tls.verify_hostname

optional bool

Enables hostname verification.

If enabled, the hostname used to connect to the remote host must be present in the TLS certificate presented by the remote host, either as the Common Name or as an entry in the Subject Alternative Name extension.

Only relevant for outgoing connections.

Do NOT set this to false unless you understand the risks of not verifying the remote hostname.

default: true

Environment variables

AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID

common optional string literal

The AWS access key id. Used for AWS authentication when communicating with AWS services.

Examples

AKIAIOSFODNN7EXAMPLE

AWS_CONFIG_FILE

common optional string literal

Specifies the location of the file that the AWS CLI uses to store configuration profiles.

Default: ~/.aws/config

AWS_DEFAULT_REGION

common optional string literal

The default AWS region.

Examples

/path/to/credentials.json

AWS_PROFILE

common optional string literal

Specifies the name of the CLI profile with the credentials and options to use. This can be the name of a profile stored in a credentials or config file.

Default: default

Examples

my-custom-profile

AWS_ROLE_SESSION_NAME

common optional string literal

Specifies a name to associate with the role session. This value appears in CloudTrail logs for commands performed by the user of this profile.

Examples

vector-session

AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY

common optional string literal

The AWS secret access key. Used for AWS authentication when communicating with AWS services.

Examples

wJalrXUtnFEMI/K7MDENG/bPxRfiCYEXAMPLEKEY

AWS_SESSION_TOKEN

common optional string literal

The AWS session token. Used for AWS authentication when communicating with AWS services.

Examples

AQoEXAMPLEH4aoAH0gNCAPy...truncated...zrkuWJOgQs8IZZaIv2BXIa2R4Olgk

AWS_SHARED_CREDENTIALS_FILE

common optional string literal

Specifies the location of the file that the AWS CLI uses to store access keys.

Default: ~/.aws/credentials

Telemetry

Metrics

link

buffer_byte_size

gauge

The number of bytes current in the buffer.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

buffer_discarded_events_total

counter

The number of events dropped by this non-blocking buffer.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

buffer_events

gauge

The number of events currently in the buffer.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

buffer_received_event_bytes_total

counter

The number of bytes received by this buffer.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

buffer_received_events_total

counter

The number of events received by this buffer.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

buffer_sent_event_bytes_total

counter

The number of bytes sent by this buffer.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

buffer_sent_events_total

counter

The number of events sent by this buffer.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

component_received_event_bytes_total

counter

The number of event bytes accepted by this component either from tagged origins like file and uri, or cumulatively from other origins.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

container_name optional

The name of the container from which the data originated.

file optional

The file from which the data originated.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

mode optional

The connection mode used by the component.

peer_addr optional

The IP from which the data originated.

peer_path optional

The pathname from which the data originated.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

pod_name optional

The name of the pod from which the data originated.

uri optional

The sanitized URI from which the data originated.

component_received_events_count

histogram

A histogram of the number of events passed in each internal batch in Vector’s internal topology.

Note that this is separate than sink-level batching. It is mostly useful for low level debugging performance issues in Vector due to small internal batches.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

container_name optional

The name of the container from which the data originated.

file optional

The file from which the data originated.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

mode optional

The connection mode used by the component.

peer_addr optional

The IP from which the data originated.

peer_path optional

The pathname from which the data originated.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

pod_name optional

The name of the pod from which the data originated.

uri optional

The sanitized URI from which the data originated.

component_received_events_total

counter

The number of events accepted by this component either from tagged origins like file and uri, or cumulatively from other origins.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

container_name optional

The name of the container from which the data originated.

file optional

The file from which the data originated.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

mode optional

The connection mode used by the component.

peer_addr optional

The IP from which the data originated.

peer_path optional

The pathname from which the data originated.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

pod_name optional

The name of the pod from which the data originated.

uri optional

The sanitized URI from which the data originated.

component_sent_bytes_total

counter

The number of raw bytes sent by this component to destination sinks.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

endpoint optional

The endpoint to which the bytes were sent. For HTTP, this will be the host and path only, excluding the query string.

file optional

The absolute path of the destination file.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

protocol

The protocol used to send the bytes.

region optional

The AWS region name to which the bytes were sent. In some configurations, this may be a literal hostname.

component_sent_event_bytes_total

counter

The total number of event bytes emitted by this component.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

output optional

The specific output of the component.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

component_sent_events_total

counter

The total number of events emitted by this component.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

output optional

The specific output of the component.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

events_in_total

counter

The number of events accepted by this component either from tagged origins like file and uri, or cumulatively from other origins. This metric is deprecated and will be removed in a future version. Use component_received_events_total instead.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

container_name optional

The name of the container from which the data originated.

file optional

The file from which the data originated.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

mode optional

The connection mode used by the component.

peer_addr optional

The IP from which the data originated.

peer_path optional

The pathname from which the data originated.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

pod_name optional

The name of the pod from which the data originated.

uri optional

The sanitized URI from which the data originated.

processed_bytes_total

counter

The number of bytes processed by the component.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

container_name optional

The name of the container from which the bytes originate.

file optional

The file from which the bytes originate.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

mode optional

The connection mode used by the component.

peer_addr optional

The IP from which the bytes originate.

peer_path optional

The pathname from which the bytes originate.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

pod_name optional

The name of the pod from which the bytes originate.

uri optional

The sanitized URI from which the bytes originate.

processed_events_total

counter

The total number of events processed by this component. This metric is deprecated in place of using component_received_events_total and component_sent_events_total metrics.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

utilization

gauge

A ratio from 0 to 1 of the load on a component. A value of 0 would indicate a completely idle component that is simply waiting for input. A value of 1 would indicate a that is never idle. This value is updated every 5 seconds.

component_id

The Vector component ID.

component_kind

The Vector component kind.

component_name

Deprecated, use component_id instead. The value is the same as component_id.

component_type

The Vector component type.

host optional

The hostname of the system Vector is running on.

pid optional

The process ID of the Vector instance.

Permissions

Platform: Amazon Web Services

Relevant policies

Policy	Required for	Required when
`kinesis:DescribeStream`	`healthcheck`
`kinesis:PutRecords`	`operation`

How it works

AWS authentication

Vector checks for AWS credentials in the following order:

The auth.access_key_id and auth.secret_access_key options.
The AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID and AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variables.
The AWS credentials file (usually located at ~/.aws/credentials).
The IAM instance profile (only works if running on an EC2 instance with an instance profile/role). Requires IMDSv2 to be enabled. For EKS, you may need to increase the metadata token response hop limit to 2.

If no credentials are found, Vector’s health check fails and an error is logged. If your AWS credentials expire, Vector will automatically search for up-to-date credentials in the places (and order) described above.

Obtaining an access key

In general, we recommend using instance profiles/roles whenever possible. In cases where this is not possible you can generate an AWS access key for any user within your AWS account. AWS provides a detailed guide on how to do this. Such created AWS access keys can be used via auth.access_key_id and auth.secret_access_key options.

Assuming roles

Vector can assume an AWS IAM role via the auth.assume_role option. This is an optional setting that is helpful for a variety of use cases, such as cross account access.

Buffers and batches

This component buffers & batches data as shown in the diagram above. You’ll notice that Vector treats these concepts differently, instead of treating them as global concepts, Vector treats them as sink specific concepts. This isolates sinks, ensuring services disruptions are contained and delivery guarantees are honored.

Batches are flushed when 1 of 2 conditions are met:

The batch age meets or exceeds the configured timeout_secs.
The batch size meets or exceeds the configured max_bytes or max_events.

Buffers are controlled via the buffer.* options.

Health checks

Health checks ensure that the downstream service is accessible and ready to accept data. This check is performed upon sink initialization. If the health check fails an error will be logged and Vector will proceed to start.

Require health checks

If you’d like to exit immediately upon a health check failure, you can pass the --require-healthy flag:

vector --config /etc/vector/vector.toml --require-healthy

Disable health checks

If you’d like to disable health checks for this sink you can set the healthcheck option to false.

Partitioning

By default, Vector issues random 16 byte values for each Kinesis record’s partition key, evenly distributing records across your Kinesis partitions. Depending on your use case this might not be sufficient since random distribution does not preserve order. To override this, you can supply the partition_key_field option. This option presents an alternate field on your event to use as the partition key value instead. This is useful if you have a field already on your event, and it also pairs nicely with the remap transform, which enables you to add partition-related metadata to events.

Missing partition keys

Kinesis requires a value for the partition key. If the key is missing or the value is blank, the event is dropped and a warning-level log event is logged. The field specified in the partition_key_field option should thus always contain a value.

Partition keys that exceed 256 characters

If the value provided exceeds the maximum allowed length of 256 characters Vector will slice the value and use the first 256 characters.

Non-string partition keys

Vector will coerce the value into a string.

Rate limits & adaptive concurrency

Adaptive Request Concurrency (ARC)

Adaptive Request Concurrency is a feature of Vector that does away with static concurrency limits and automatically optimizes HTTP concurrency based on downstream service responses. The underlying mechanism is a feedback loop inspired by TCP congestion control algorithms. Checkout the announcement blog post,

We highly recommend enabling this feature as it improves performance and reliability of Vector and the systems it communicates with. As such, we have made it the default, and no further configuration is required.

Static concurrency

If Adaptive Request Concurrency is not for you, you can manually set static concurrency limits by specifying an integer for request.concurrency:

[sinks.my-sink]
  request.concurrency = 10

Rate limits

In addition to limiting request concurrency, you can also limit the overall request throughput via the request.rate_limit_duration_secs and request.rate_limit_num options.

[sinks.my-sink]
  request.rate_limit_duration_secs = 1
  request.rate_limit_num = 10

These will apply to both adaptive and fixed request.concurrency values.

Retry policy

Vector will retry failed requests (status == 429, >= 500, and != 501). Other responses will not be retried. You can control the number of retry attempts and backoff rate with the request.retry_attempts and request.retry_backoff_secs options.

State

This component is stateless, meaning its behavior is consistent across each input.

Transport Layer Security (TLS)

Vector uses OpenSSL for TLS protocols due to OpenSSL’s maturity. You can enable and adjust TLS behavior using the tls.* options.