How to Debug the Logstash File Plugin

Better Stack Team
Updated on April 5, 2024

To debug the Logstash file plugin or Logstash configuration, follow these steps.

First, ensure your configuration file has no errors using the following command:

 
bin/logstash --config.test_and_exit --path.config <path-to-logstash-conf-file>.conf

When there are no issues, you will see the following message at the end:

Output
...
Configuration OK
[INFO ] 2024-04-04 11:31:43.968 [LogStash::Runner] runner - Using config.test_and_exit mode. Config Validation Result: OK. Exiting Logstash

If the configuration file has passed without any issues, you can debug Logstash by sending the events to the standard output like this:

 
output {
  stdout { codec => rubydebug }
}

Additionally, to debug the Logstash process itself, you can use the --debug option:

 
/bin/logstash -f <path-to-logstash-conf>.conf --debug

For further information about Logstash, refer to the comprehensive guide, which explains how to collect, transform, and forward logs.

Got an article suggestion? Let us know
Explore more
Licensed under CC-BY-NC-SA

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Make your mark

Join the writer's program

Are you a developer and love writing and sharing your knowledge with the world? Join our guest writing program and get paid for writing amazing technical guides. We'll get them to the right readers that will appreciate them.

Write for us
Writer of the month
Marin Bezhanov
Marin is a software engineer and architect with a broad range of experience working...
Build on top of Better Stack

Write a script, app or project on top of Better Stack and share it with the world. Make a public repository and share it with us at our email.

community@betterstack.com

or submit a pull request and help us build better products for everyone.

See the full list of amazing projects on github