Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink Connector for Confluent Cloud¶

The fully-managed Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink connector for Confluent Cloud is used to export data to Amazon CloudWatch metrics from an Apache Kafka® topic. The connector will only accept Struct objects as the Kafka record. The record must consist of the fields name, type, timestamp, dimensions, and values. The values field refers to metric values which are also expected to be Struct objects. For more details about values, see Defined schemas.

The following example shows a sample input Struct object record.

{
  "name": string,
  "type": string,
  "timestamp": long,
  "dimensions": {
    "<dimension-1>": string,
    ...
  },
  "values": {
    "<datapoint-1>": double,
    "<datapoint-2>": double,
    ...
  }
}

The connector can start with one task and scale horizontally by adding more tasks. Note that even with multiple tasks, performance is limited by Amazon to 150 transactions per second. Contact Amazon to increase this transaction limit for your account.

Note

This is a Quick Start for the fully-managed cloud connector. If you are installing the connector locally for Confluent Platform, see Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink Connector for Confluent Platform.

Features¶

The Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink connector provides the following features:

At least once delivery: This connector guarantees that records from the Kafka topic are delivered at least once.
Supports multiple tasks: The connector supports running one or more tasks. More tasks may improve performance. Note that performance is limited by Amazon to 150 transactions per second. Contact Amazon to increase this transaction limit for your account.
Supported data formats: The connector supports Avro, JSON Schema (JSON-SR), and Protobuf input formats. Schema Registry must be enabled to use these Schema Registry-based formats.

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Managed and Custom Connectors section.

Limitations¶

Be sure to review the following information.

For connector limitations, see Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink Connector limitations.
If you plan to use one or more Single Message Transforms (SMTs), see SMT Limitations.
If you plan to use Confluent Cloud Schema Registry, see Schema Registry Enabled Environments.

Defined schemas¶

The connector attempts to fit the values Struct into one of the four defined schemas (Gauge, Meter, Histogram, Timer) depending on the type field. The supported types are gauge, meter, histogram, timer or custom.

Note

If the value for type is custom, there is a catchall mechanism that accounts for any type of schema, but the type field’s value must be custom.
Each value in the values Struct must be type double.

Gauge schema¶

{
  "doubleValue": double
}

Meter schema¶

{
  "count": double,
  "oneMinuteRate": double,
  "fiveMinuteRate": double,
  "fifteenMinuteRate": double,
  "meanRate": double
}

Histogram schema¶

{
  "count": double,
  "max": double,
  "min": double,
  "mean": double,
  "stdDev": double,
  "sum": double,
  "median": double,
  "percentile75th": double,
  "percentile95th": double,
  "percentile98th": double,
  "percentile99th": double,
  "percentile999th": double,
}

Timer schema¶

{
  "count": double,
  "oneMinuteRate": double,
  "fiveMinuteRate": double,
  "fifteenMinuteRate": double,
  "meanRate": double,
  "max": double,
  "min": double,
  "mean": double,
  "stdDev": double,
  "sum": double,
  "median": double,
  "percentile75th": double,
  "percentile95th": double,
  "percentile98th": double,
  "percentile99th": double,
  "percentile999th": double
}

Sample custom schema¶

{
  "posts": double,
  "puts": double,
  "patches": double,
  "deletes": double,
}

Record mapping¶

Each value in the values Struct is mapped to its own MetricDatum object using the same timestamp and dimensions fields, with the name field as a prefix. For example, the following will be mapped to five separate MetricDatum objects, since there are five values in the values Struct:

{
  "name": "sample_meter_metric",
  "type": "meter",
  "timestamp": 23480239402348234,
  "dimensions": {
    "service": "ec2-2312",
    "method": "update"
  },
  "values": {
    "count": 12,
    "oneMinuteRate": 5.2,
    "fiveMinuteRate": 4.7,
    "fifteenMinuteRate": 4.9,
    "meanRate": 5.1"
  }
}

The following is an example of how the oneMinuteRate field is mapped to a separate MetricDatum object:

{
  "name": "sample_meter_metric_oneMinuteRate",
  "timestamp": 23480239402348234,
  "dimensions": {
    "service": "ec2-2312",
    "method": "update"
  },
  "value": 5.2
}

Quick Start¶

Use this quick start to get up and running with the Confluent Cloud Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink connector. The quick start provides the basics of selecting the connector and configuring it to send records to Amazon CloudWatch.

Prerequisites

Authorized access to a Confluent Cloud cluster on AWS.
The Confluent CLI installed and configured for the cluster. See Install the Confluent CLI.
Schema Registry must be enabled to use a Schema Registry-based format (for example, Avro, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or Protobuf). See Schema Registry Enabled Environments for additional information.
For networking considerations, see Networking, DNS, and service endpoints. To use a set of public egress IP addresses, see Public Egress IP Addresses for Confluent Cloud Connectors.
An AWS account configured with Access Keys.
The Amazon CloudWatch Metrics region must in the same region where your Confluent Cloud cluster is located (where you are running the connector). Note that the hard-coded endpoint URL for the connector is set to https://monitoring.{kafka-cluster-region}.amazonaws.com. This sets the Amazon CloudWatch region to your Kafka cluster region.

Kafka cluster credentials. The following lists the different ways you can provide credentials.
- Enter an existing service account resource ID.
- Create a Confluent Cloud service account for the connector. Make sure to review the ACL entries required in the service account documentation. Some connectors have specific ACL requirements.
- Create a Confluent Cloud API key and secret. To create a key and secret, you can use confluent api-key create or you can autogenerate the API key and secret directly in the Cloud Console when setting up the connector.

Using the Confluent Cloud Console¶

Step 1: Launch your Confluent Cloud cluster¶

See the Quick Start for Confluent Cloud for installation instructions.

Step 2: Add a connector¶

In the left navigation menu, click Connectors. If you already have connectors in your cluster, click + Add connector.

Step 3: Select your connector¶

Click the Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink connector card.

Step 4: Enter the connector details¶

Note

Ensure you have all your prerequisites completed.
An asterisk ( * ) designates a required entry.

At the Add Amazon CloudWatch Metrics Sink Connector screen, complete the following:

If you’ve already populated your Kafka topics, select the topic(s) you want to connect from the Topics list.

To create a new topic, click +Add new topic.

Note

Configuration properties that are not shown in the Cloud Console use the default values. See Configuration Properties for all property values and definitions.

Select the Input Kafka record value format (data coming from the Kafka topic): AVRO, JSON_SR, or PROTOBUF. A valid schema must be available in Schema Registry to use a schema-based message format.
Show advanced configurations
- Schema context: Select a schema context to use for this connector, if using a schema-based data format. This property defaults to the Default context, which configures the connector to use the default schema set up for Schema Registry in your Confluent Cloud environment. A schema context allows you to use separate schemas (like schema sub-registries) tied to topics in different Kafka clusters that share the same Schema Registry environment. For example, if you select a non-default context, a Source connector uses only that schema context to register a schema and a Sink connector uses only that schema context to read from. For more information about setting up a schema context, see What are schema contexts and when should you use them?.
- Behavior on malformed metric: The connector’s behavior if the Kafka record does not contain an expected field. Valid options are LOG and FAIL. LOG will log and skip the malformed records, and FAIL will fail the connector.
- Transforms and Predicates: See the Single Message Transforms (SMT) documentation for details.
See Configuration Properties for all property values and definitions.
Click Continue.

Step 5: Check Amazon CloudWatch metrics¶

Check for metrics in Amazon CloudWatch.

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Managed and Custom Connectors section.

Tip

When you launch a connector, a Dead Letter Queue topic is automatically created. See Confluent Cloud Dead Letter Queue for details.

Using the Confluent CLI¶

Complete the following steps to set up and run the connector using the Confluent Cloud CLI.

Note

Make sure you have all your prerequisites completed.

Step 1: List the available connectors¶

Enter the following command to list available connectors:

confluent connect plugin list

Step 2: List the connector configuration properties¶

Enter the following command to show the connector configuration properties:

confluent connect plugin describe <connector-plugin-name>

The command output shows the required and optional configuration properties.

Step 3: Create the connector configuration file¶

Create a JSON file that contains the connector configuration properties. The following example shows the required connector properties.

{
  "connector.class": "CloudWatchMetricsSink",
  "name": "CloudWatchMetricsSink_0",
  "input.data.format": "AVRO"
  "topics": "<my_topic_0>"
  "kafka.auth.mode": "KAFKA_API_KEY",
  "kafka.api.key": "<my-kafka-api-key>",
  "kafka.api.secret": "<my-kafka-api-secret>",
  "aws.access.key.id": "****************",
  "aws.secret.access.key": "********************************************",
  "aws.cloudwatch.metrics.namespace": "<namespace>",
  "tasks.max": "1"
}

Note the following required property definitions:

"connector.class": Identifies the connector plugin name.
"name": Sets a name for your new connector.

"kafka.auth.mode": Identifies the connector authentication mode you want to use. There are two options: SERVICE_ACCOUNT or KAFKA_API_KEY (the default). To use an API key and secret, specify the configuration properties kafka.api.key and kafka.api.secret, as shown in the example configuration (above). To use a service account, specify the Resource ID in the property kafka.service.account.id=<service-account-resource-ID>. To list the available service account resource IDs, use the following command:
```
confluent iam service-account list
```
For example:
```
confluent iam service-account list

   Id     | Resource ID |       Name        |    Description
+---------+-------------+-------------------+-------------------
   123456 | sa-l1r23m   | sa-1              | Service account 1
   789101 | sa-l4d56p   | sa-2              | Service account 2
```
"input.data.format": Sets the input Kafka record value format (data coming from the Kafka topic). Valid entries are AVRO, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), and PROTOBUF. You must have Confluent Cloud Schema Registry configured if using a schema-based message format.
"topics": Identifies the topic name or a comma-separated list of topic names.
"aws.access.key.id" and "aws.secret.access.key": Enter the AWS Access Key ID and Secret. For information about how to set these up, see Access Keys.
"aws.cloudwatch.metrics.namespace": Enter a valid namespace for your CloudWatch Metrics region.
"tasks.max": Enter the number of tasks for the connector to use. More tasks may improve performance.

Note

Performance is limited by Amazon to 150 transactions per second. Contact Amazon to increase this transaction limit for your account.

Single Message Transforms: See the Single Message Transforms (SMT) documentation for details about adding SMTs using the CLI.

See Configuration Properties for all property values and definitions.

Step 4: Load the properties file and create the connector¶

Enter the following command to load the configuration and start the connector:

confluent connect cluster create --config-file <file-name>.json

For example:

confluent connect cluster create --config-file amazon-cloudwatch-metrics-sink-config.json

Example output:

Created connector CloudWatchMetricsSink_0 lcc-ix4dl

Step 5: Check the connector status¶

Enter the following command to check the connector status:

confluent connect cluster list

Example output:

ID          |       Name              | Status  | Type
+-----------+-------------------------+---------+------+
lcc-ix4dl   | CloudWatchMetricsSink_0 | RUNNING | sink

Step 6: Check Amazon CloudWatch metrics.¶

Check for metrics in Amazon CloudWatch.

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Managed and Custom Connectors section.

Tip

When you launch a connector, a Dead Letter Queue topic is automatically created. See Confluent Cloud Dead Letter Queue for details.

Configuration Properties¶

Use the following configuration properties with the fully-managed connector. For self-managed connector property definitions and other details, see the connector docs in Self-managed connectors for Confluent Platform.

Which topics do you want to get data from?¶

topics

Identifies the topic name or a comma-separated list of topic names.

Type: list
Importance: high

Schema Config¶

schema.context.name

Add a schema context name. A schema context represents an independent scope in Schema Registry. It is a separate sub-schema tied to topics in different Kafka clusters that share the same Schema Registry instance. If not used, the connector uses the default schema configured for Schema Registry in your Confluent Cloud environment.

Type: string
Default: default
Importance: medium

Input messages¶

input.data.format

Sets the input Kafka record value format. Valid entries are AVRO, JSON_SR, or PROTOBUF. Note that you need to have Confluent Cloud Schema Registry configured if using a schema-based message format like AVRO, JSON_SR, and PROTOBUF.

Type: string
Importance: high

How should we connect to your data?¶

name

Sets a name for your connector.

Type: string
Valid Values: A string at most 64 characters long
Importance: high

Kafka Cluster credentials¶

kafka.auth.mode

Kafka Authentication mode. It can be one of KAFKA_API_KEY or SERVICE_ACCOUNT. It defaults to KAFKA_API_KEY mode.

Type: string
Default: KAFKA_API_KEY
Valid Values: KAFKA_API_KEY, SERVICE_ACCOUNT
Importance: high

kafka.api.key

Kafka API Key. Required when kafka.auth.mode==KAFKA_API_KEY.

Type: password
Importance: high

kafka.service.account.id

The Service Account that will be used to generate the API keys to communicate with Kafka Cluster.

Type: string
Importance: high

kafka.api.secret

Secret associated with Kafka API key. Required when kafka.auth.mode==KAFKA_API_KEY.

Type: password
Importance: high

AWS Credentials¶

aws.access.key.id

The AWS Access Key used to connect to Amazon CloudWatch.

Type: password
Importance: high

aws.secret.access.key

The AWS Secret Key used to connect to Amazon CloudWatch.

Type: password
Importance: high

How should we connect to Amazon CloudWatch Metrics?¶

aws.cloudwatch.metrics.namespace

The Amazon CloudWatch metrics namespace associated with the desired metrics.

Type: string
Importance: high

How should we handle errors?¶

behavior.on.malformed.metric

The connector’s behavior if the kafka record does not contain an expected field. Valid options are ‘LOG’ and ‘FAIL’. ‘LOG’ will log and skip the malformed records and ‘FAIL’ will fail the connector.

Type: string
Default: FAIL
Importance: low

Consumer configuration¶

max.poll.interval.ms

The maximum delay between subsequent consume requests to Kafka. This configuration property may be used to improve the performance of the connector, if the connector cannot send records to the sink system. Defaults to 300000 milliseconds (5 minutes).

Type: long
Default: 300000 (5 minutes)
Valid Values: [60000,…,1800000]
Importance: low

max.poll.records

The maximum number of records to consume from Kafka in a single request. This configuration property may be used to improve the performance of the connector, if the connector cannot send records to the sink system. Defaults to 500 records.

Type: long
Default: 500
Valid Values: [1,…,500]
Importance: low

Number of tasks for this connector¶

tasks.max

Maximum number of tasks for the connector.

Type: int
Valid Values: [1,…]
Importance: high

Next Steps¶

For an example that shows fully-managed Confluent Cloud connectors in action with Confluent Cloud ksqlDB, see the Cloud ETL Demo. This example also shows how to use Confluent CLI to manage your resources in Confluent Cloud.