Windows Event Log (winevtlog)

The winevtlog input plugin allows you to read Windows Event Log with new API from winevt.h.

Configuration Parameters

The plugin supports the following configuration parameters:

Key	Description	Default
Channels	A comma-separated list of channels to read from.
Interval_Sec	Set the polling interval for each channel. (optional)	1
Interval_NSec	Set the polling interval for each channel (sub seconds. (optional)	0
Read_Existing_Events	Whether to read existing events from head or tailing events at last on subscribing. (optional)	False
DB	Set the path to save the read offsets. (optional)
String_Inserts	Whether to include StringInserts in output records. (optional)	True
Render_Event_As_XML	Whether to render system part of event as XML string or not. (optional)	False
Use_ANSI	Use ANSI encoding on eventlog messages. If you have issues receiving blank strings with old Windows versions (Server 2012 R2), setting this to True may solve the problem. (optional)	False
Event_Query	Specify XML query for filtering events.	*
Read_Limit_Per_Cycle	Specify read limit per cycle.	512KiB

Note that if you do not set db, the plugin will tail channels on each startup.

Configuration Examples

Configuration File

Here is a minimum configuration example.

[INPUT]
    Name         winevtlog
    Channels     Setup,Windows PowerShell
    Interval_Sec 1
    DB           winevtlog.sqlite

[OUTPUT]
    Name   stdout
    Match  *

Note that some Windows Event Log channels (like Security) requires an admin privilege for reading. In this case, you need to run fluent-bit as an administrator.

The default value of Read_Limit_Per_Cycle is set up as 512KiB. Note that 512KiB(= 0x7ffff = 512 * 1024 * 1024) does not equals to 512KB (= 512 * 1000 * 1000). To increase events per second on this plugin, specify larger value than 512KiB.

Query Languages for Event_Query Parameter

The Event_Query parameter can be used to specify the XML query for filtering Windows EventLog during collection. The supported query types are XPath and XML Query. For further details, please refer to the MSDN doc.

Command Line

If you want to do a quick test, you can run this plugin from the command line.

$ fluent-bit -i winevtlog -p 'channels=Setup' -p 'Read_Existing_Events=true' -o stdout

Note that winevtlog plugin will tail channels on each startup. If you want to confirm whether this plugin is working or not, you should specify -p 'Read_Existing_Events=true' parameter.