New Relic Metrics Sink Connector for Confluent Cloud

The fully-managed New Relic Metrics Sink connector for Confluent Cloud moves records from Kafka topics to a New Relic data ingestion endpoint. Currently, the connector is limited to ingesting metrics only from Kafka topics.

The connector uses the New Relic Telemetry SDK to post metrics to New Relic. The connector batches records to ensure that the payload does not exceed 1 MB.

Note

If you require private networking for fully-managed connectors, make sure to set up the proper networking beforehand. For more information, see Manage Networking for Confluent Cloud Connectors.

Features

The New Relic Metrics Sink connector provides the following features:

  • Supports multiple tasks: The connector supports running one or more tasks. More tasks may improve performance.
  • Input data formats: The connector supports Bytes, AVRO, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), JSON (Schemaless) and PROTOBUF input data formats. Schema Registry must be enabled to use a Schema Registry-based format (for example, Avro, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or Protobuf).

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Connect Usage Examples section.

Limitations

Be sure to review the following information.

Supported Metrics

The connector supports the Gauge, Count, and Summary metrics. The following show sample formats for each of these metrics.

Note

Confluent adds the following two common attributes to the metrics:

  • "collector.metadata.kafka.topic" : "<metric-topic-name>"
  • "collector.metadata.kafka.partition" : "<metric-partition-name>"
Gauge
{
  "name" : "service.response.duration",
  "type" : "gauge",
  "value" : 7.8,
  "timestamp" : 1655970976,
  "attributes" : {
    "host.name" : "dev.server.com",
    "app.name" : "foo",
    "collector.metadata.kafka.topic" : "<metric-topic-name>",
    "collector.metadata.kafka.partition" : "<metric-partition-name>"
  }
}
Count
{
  "name" : "service.response.duration",
  "type" : "count",
  "value" : 10,
  "interval.ms" : 10000,
  "timestamp" : 1655970976,
  "attributes" : {
    "host.name" : "dev.server.com",
    "app.name" : "foo",
    "collector.metadata.kafka.topic" : "<metric-topic-name>",
    "collector.metadata.kafka.partition" : "<metric-partition-name>"
  }
}
Summary
{
  "name" : "service.response.duration",
  "type" : "summary",
  "value" : {
    "summary.count" : 5,
    "summary.sum" : 0.567,
    "summary.min" : 0.1,
    "summary.max" : 0.9
  },
  "interval.ms" : 10000,
  "timestamp" : 1655970976,
  "attributes" : {
    "host.name" : "dev.server.com",
    "app.name" : "foo",
    "collector.metadata.kafka.topic" : "<metric-topic-name>",
    "collector.metadata.kafka.partition" : "<metric-partition-name>"
  }
}

Quick Start

Use this quick start to get up and running with the New Relic Metrics API sink connector. The quick start provides the basics of selecting the connector and configuring it to stream events to a New Relic ingest endpoint.

Prerequisites
  • 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

To create and launch a Kafka cluster in Confluent Cloud, see Create a kafka cluster in Confluent Cloud.

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 New Relic Metrics Sink connector card.

New Relic 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 New Relic Metrics Sink Connector screen, complete the following:

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

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

Step 5: Check for records

Verify that records are being produced.

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Connect Usage Examples section.

Tip

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

Using the Confluent CLI

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

{
  "topics":"orders",
  "input.data.format": "JSON",
  "connector.class": "NewRelicMetricsSink",
  "name": "NewRelicMetricsSink_0",
  "kafka.auth.mode": "<KAFKA_API_KEY>",
  "kafka.api.key": "****************",
  "kafka.api.secret": "*************************************************",
  "newrelic.ingest.api.key": "<LICENSE_API_KEY>",
  "tasks.max": "1"
}

Note the following property definitions:

  • "topics": Identifies the topic name or a comma-separated list of topic names.
  • "input.data.format": Sets the input Kafka record value format. Valid entries are AVRO, JSON_SR, PROTOBUF, JSON, or BYTES. You must have Confluent Cloud Schema Registry configured if using a schema-based message format (for example, Avro, JSON_SR (JSON Schema), or Protobuf).
  • "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

  • "newrelic.ingest.api.key": Enter the license key for the New Relic account where the connector sends data. For more information, see New Relic API keys.

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 new-relic-metrics-sink-config.json

Example output:

Created connector NewRelicMetricsSink_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   | NewRelicMetricsSink_0   | RUNNING | sink

Step 6: Check for records.

Verify that records are being produced.

For more information and examples to use with the Confluent Cloud API for Connect, see the Confluent Cloud API for Connect Usage Examples section.

Tip

When you launch a connector, a Dead Letter Queue topic is automatically created. See View Connector Dead Letter Queue Errors in Confluent Cloud 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.regex

A regular expression that matches the names of the topics to consume from. This is useful when you want to consume from multiple topics that match a certain pattern without having to list them all individually.

  • Type: string
  • Importance: low
topics

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

  • Type: list
  • Importance: high
errors.deadletterqueue.topic.name

The name of the topic to be used as the dead letter queue (DLQ) for messages that result in an error when processed by this sink connector, or its transformations or converters. Defaults to ‘dlq-${connector}’ if not set. The DLQ topic will be created automatically if it does not exist. You can provide ${connector} in the value to use it as a placeholder for the logical cluster ID.

  • Type: string
  • Default: dlq-${connector}
  • Importance: low
reporter.result.topic.name

The name of the topic to produce records to after successfully processing a sink record. Defaults to ‘success-${connector}’ if not set. You can provide ${connector} in the value to use it as a placeholder for the logical cluster ID.

  • Type: string
  • Default: success-${connector}
  • Importance: low
reporter.error.topic.name

The name of the topic to produce records to after each unsuccessful record sink attempt. Defaults to ‘error-${connector}’ if not set. You can provide ${connector} in the value to use it as a placeholder for the logical cluster ID.

  • Type: string
  • Default: error-${connector}
  • Importance: low

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, PROTOBUF, JSON or BYTES. 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
  • Default: JSON
  • 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

How should we connect to New Relic?

newrelic.ingest.api.key

Ingest API key for New Relic.

  • Type: password
  • Importance: high
newrelic.datacenter.region

New Relic data center region to which the configured account belongs to. The two possible values are US or EU.

  • Type: string
  • Default: US
  • Valid Values: EU, US
  • Importance: high

New Relic Details

newrelic.client.timeout

Time, in milliseconds, to wait for a response from the New Relic API.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 2000
  • Valid Values: [1000,…,30000]
  • Importance: low
newrelic.max.retry.time.ms

The maximum time, in milliseconds, upto which connector will try sending a batch of metrics.

  • Type: int
  • Default: 5000 (5 seconds)
  • Valid Values: [1000,…,60000]
  • Importance: low

How should we handle errors?

behavior.on.error

Error handling behavior setting when an error occurs while extracting metric from Kafka record value. Valid options are ‘log’ and ‘fail’. ‘log’ logs the error message in error-<connector-id> topic and continues processing, ‘fail’ stops the connector in case of an error.

  • Type: string
  • Default: log
  • Valid Values: fail, log
  • 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] for non-dedicated clusters and [60000,…] for dedicated clusters
  • 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] for non-dedicated clusters and [1,…] for dedicated clusters
  • Importance: low

Number of tasks for this connector

tasks.max

Maximum number of tasks for the connector.

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

Additional Configs

consumer.override.auto.offset.reset

Defines the behavior of the consumer when there is no committed position (which occurs when the group is first initialized) or when an offset is out of range. You can choose either to reset the position to the “earliest” offset (the default) or the “latest” offset. You can also select “none” if you would rather set the initial offset yourself and you are willing to handle out of range errors manually. More details: https://docs.confluent.io/platform/current/installation/configuration/consumer-configs.html#auto-offset-reset

  • Type: string
  • Importance: low
consumer.override.isolation.level

Controls how to read messages written transactionally. If set to read_committed, consumer.poll() will only return transactional messages which have been committed. If set to read_uncommitted (the default), consumer.poll() will return all messages, even transactional messages which have been aborted. Non-transactional messages will be returned unconditionally in either mode. More details: https://docs.confluent.io/platform/current/installation/configuration/consumer-configs.html#isolation-level

  • Type: string
  • Importance: low
header.converter

The converter class for the headers. This is used to serialize and deserialize the headers of the messages.

  • Type: string
  • Importance: low
value.converter.allow.optional.map.keys

Allow optional string map key when converting from Connect Schema to Avro Schema. Applicable for Avro Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.auto.register.schemas

Specify if the Serializer should attempt to register the Schema.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.connect.meta.data

Allow the Connect converter to add its metadata to the output schema. Applicable for Avro Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.enhanced.avro.schema.support

Enable enhanced schema support to preserve package information and Enums. Applicable for Avro Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.enhanced.protobuf.schema.support

Enable enhanced schema support to preserve package information. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.flatten.unions

Whether to flatten unions (oneofs). Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.generate.index.for.unions

Whether to generate an index suffix for unions. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.generate.struct.for.nulls

Whether to generate a struct variable for null values. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.int.for.enums

Whether to represent enums as integers. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.latest.compatibility.strict

Verify latest subject version is backward compatible when use.latest.version is true.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.object.additional.properties

Whether to allow additional properties for object schemas. Applicable for JSON_SR Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.optional.for.nullables

Whether nullable fields should be specified with an optional label. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.optional.for.proto2

Whether proto2 optionals are supported. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.scrub.invalid.names

Whether to scrub invalid names by replacing invalid characters with valid characters. Applicable for Avro and Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.use.latest.version

Use latest version of schema in subject for serialization when auto.register.schemas is false.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.use.optional.for.nonrequired

Whether to set non-required properties to be optional. Applicable for JSON_SR Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.wrapper.for.nullables

Whether nullable fields should use primitive wrapper messages. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
value.converter.wrapper.for.raw.primitives

Whether a wrapper message should be interpreted as a raw primitive at root level. Applicable for Protobuf Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Importance: low
errors.tolerance

Use this property if you would like to configure the connector’s error handling behavior. WARNING: This property should be used with CAUTION for SOURCE CONNECTORS as it may lead to dataloss. If you set this property to ‘all’, the connector will not fail on errant records, but will instead log them (and send to DLQ for Sink Connectors) and continue processing. If you set this property to ‘none’, the connector task will fail on errant records.

  • Type: string
  • Default: all
  • Importance: low
key.converter.key.subject.name.strategy

How to construct the subject name for key schema registration.

  • Type: string
  • Default: TopicNameStrategy
  • Importance: low
value.converter.decimal.format

Specify the JSON/JSON_SR serialization format for Connect DECIMAL logical type values with two allowed literals:

BASE64 to serialize DECIMAL logical types as base64 encoded binary data and

NUMERIC to serialize Connect DECIMAL logical type values in JSON/JSON_SR as a number representing the decimal value.

  • Type: string
  • Default: BASE64
  • Importance: low
value.converter.flatten.singleton.unions

Whether to flatten singleton unions. Applicable for Avro and JSON_SR Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Default: false
  • Importance: low
value.converter.ignore.default.for.nullables

When set to true, this property ensures that the corresponding record in Kafka is NULL, instead of showing the default column value. Applicable for AVRO,PROTOBUF and JSON_SR Converters.

  • Type: boolean
  • Default: false
  • Importance: low
value.converter.reference.subject.name.strategy

Set the subject reference name strategy for value. Valid entries are DefaultReferenceSubjectNameStrategy or QualifiedReferenceSubjectNameStrategy. Note that the subject reference name strategy can be selected only for PROTOBUF format with the default strategy being DefaultReferenceSubjectNameStrategy.

  • Type: string
  • Default: DefaultReferenceSubjectNameStrategy
  • Importance: low
value.converter.replace.null.with.default

Whether to replace fields that have a default value and that are null to the default value. When set to true, the default value is used, otherwise null is used. Applicable for JSON Converter.

  • Type: boolean
  • Default: true
  • Importance: low
value.converter.schemas.enable

Include schemas within each of the serialized values. Input messages must contain schema and payload fields and may not contain additional fields. For plain JSON data, set this to false. Applicable for JSON Converter.

  • Type: boolean
  • Default: false
  • Importance: low
value.converter.value.subject.name.strategy

Determines how to construct the subject name under which the value schema is registered with Schema Registry.

  • Type: string
  • Default: TopicNameStrategy
  • Importance: low

Auto-restart policy

auto.restart.on.user.error

Enable connector to automatically restart on user-actionable errors.

  • Type: boolean
  • Default: true
  • Importance: medium

Next Steps

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

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