Summary

Filebeat is a lightweight shipper for forwarding and centralizing log data. Installed as an agent on the servers, Filebeat monitors the log files or locations as specified by the user, collects log events and forwards them for indexing. 

The following Filebeat v7.11 system requirements are for a Windows server and/or Windows 10 machine. (Requirements may vary between versions.) 

Hardware Requirements 

• CPU 

  • The processing power required by the agent on either customer sites or infrastructure servers is marginal; the agent will be able to perform its duties even under an stressed CPU situation. No minimal requirement.

• RAM

  • Minimal memory usage is 2MB

• Internet connection

  • To both communicate with the stack (Logstash, to be specific) and perform the agent installation itself

Software Requirements

• Windows server 2008 or newer or Windows 7 or newer or any Linux distribution with a v5.x kernel

• Filebeat agent installer, available from: Download Filebeat • Lightweight Log Analysis | Elastic

• If performing automated deployments via N-central:

  • The N-central agent must be already installed in the target device

  • The respective (scheduled) tasks must be set up to deploy the agent and the configuration file and to start the service in the target device.

Network Requirements 

• The target device must have internet access to public IP 3.141.211.3

• The target device must be able to reach the Logstash public IP on port 5043.

Basic Troubleshooting

• On a Windows system, access to the Logstash public IP can be confirmed by using the command:
  
  tracert 3.141.211.3

• On a Windows system, access to the Logstash port can be confirmed by using the command:

  
  telnet 3.141.211.3 5043
  
  

• If any of the above tests fail to reach the destination, contact either the network administrator or the ISP for the customer site where the problem is found.

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