AppDynamics

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AppDynamics installation prerequisites

Before using the plugin, download and install the AppDynamics C/C++ Application Agent and SDK on Linux or Windows on the machine or within the container running Kong Gateway. To use the AppDynamics plugin in Kong Gateway, the AppDynamics C/C++ SDK must be installed on all nodes running Kong Gateway. The libappdynamics.so shared library file is the only required file.

For information about supported environments, see the AppDynamics C/C++ SDK Supported Environments documentation.

Recommended installation

If you are using Kong Gateway 3.0.0.0 or later, we recommended installing the libappdynamics.so in the /usr/local/kong/lib directory. This directory is included in the Kong Gateway search path for shared libraries, so the libappdynamics.so file will be found automatically.

Alternative installation

If you are using an older version of Kong Gateway, or if you prefer to install the libappdynamics.so file in a different location, you can do so.

If Kong Gateway is deployed on RHEL or CentOS, the libappdynamics.so file can be in the /usr/lib64 directory, which is included in the default search path for shared libraries.
If Kong Gateway is deployed on Debian or Ubuntu, the libappdynamics.so file can be in the /usr/lib directory, which is included in the default search path for shared libraries.
If above options are not available, the libappdynamics.so file can be in one of the locations configured by the system’s shared library loader.
Alternatively, the LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable can be set to the directory containing the libappdynamics.so file when starting Kong Gateway.

Enable the AppDynamics plugin

The AppDynamics plugin is not bundled in Kong Gateway packages by default. Before you configure the plugin, you must enable it:

Package install: Set plugins=bundled,app-dynamics in kong.conf before starting Kong Gateway
Docker: Set export KONG_PLUGINS=bundled,app-dynamics in the environment
Kubernetes: Set KONG_PLUGINS=bundled,app-dynamics using the Custom Plugin instructions.

Plugin configuration

The AppDynamics plugin is configured through environment variables that must be set when Kong Gateway is started. The AppDynamics plugin makes use of the AppDynamics C/C++ SDK to send information to the AppDynamics controller. See the AppDynamics C/C++ SDK documentation for more information about the configuration parameters.

All non-default environment variables in the table must be set.

The plugin uses the following environment variables:

Variable	Description	Type	Default
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_HOST`	Hostname of the AppDynamics controller.	String
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_PORT`	Port number to use to communicate with the controller.	Integer	`443`
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_ACCOUNT`	Account name to use with the controller.	String
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_ACCESS_KEY`	Access key to use with the AppDynamics controller.	String
`KONG_APPD_LOGGING_LEVEL`	Logging level of the AppDynamics SDK agent.	Integer	`2`
`KONG_APPD_LOGGING_LOG_DIR`	Directory into which agent log files are written.	String	`/tmp/appd`
`KONG_APPD_TIER_NAME`	Tier name to use for business transactions.	String
`KONG_APPD_APP_NAME`	Application name to report to AppDynamics.	String	`Kong`
`KONG_APPD_NODE_NAME`	Node name to report to AppDynamics. This value defaults to the system’s hostname.	String	`hostname`
`KONG_APPD_INIT_TIMEOUT_MS`	Maximum time to wait for a controller connection when starting, in milliseconds.	Integer	`5000`
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_USE_SSL`	Use SSL encryption in controller communication. `true`, `on`, or `1` are all interpreted as `True`, any other value is considered `false`.	Boolean	`on`
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_HTTP_PROXY_HOST`	Hostname of proxy to use to communicate with controller.	String
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_HTTP_PROXY_PORT`	Port number of controller proxy.	Integer
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_HTTP_PROXY_USERNAME`	Username to use to identify to proxy. This value is a string that is never shown in logs. This value can be specified as a vault reference.	String
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_HTTP_PROXY_PASSWORD`	Password to use to identify to proxy. This value is a string that is never shown in logs. This value can be specified as a vault reference.	String
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_CERTIFICATE_FILE`	v3.4.3.3+ Path to a self-signed certificate file. For example, `/etc/kong/certs/ca-certs.pem`.	String
`KONG_APPD_CONTROLLER_CERTIFICATE_DIR`	v3.4.3.3+ Path to a certificate directory. For example, `/etc/kong/certs/`.	String
`KONG_APPD_ANALYTICS_ENABLE`	v3.8+ Enable or disable Analytics Agent reporting. When disabled (default), Analytics-related logging messages are suppressed.	Boolean	`false`

Possible values for the `KONG_APPD_LOGGING_LEVEL` parameter

The KONG_APPD_LOGGING_LEVEL environment variable is a numeric value that controls the desired logging level. Each value corresponds to a specific level:

Value	Name	Description
0	`TRACE`	Reports finer-grained informational events than the `debug` level, which may be useful to debug an application.
1	`DEBUG`	Reports fine-grained informational events that may be useful to debug an application.
2	`INFO`	Default log level. Reports informational messages that highlight the progress of the application at coarse-grained level.
3	`WARN`	Reports on potentially harmful situations.
4	`ERROR`	Reports on error events that may allow the application to continue running.
5	`FATAL`	Fatal errors that prevent the agent from operating.

Agent logging

The AppDynamics agent sorts log information into separate log files, independent of Kong Gateway logs. By default, log files are written to the /tmp/appd directory. This location can be changed by setting the KONG_APPD_LOGGING_LOG_DIR environment variable.

If problems occur with the AppDynamics integration, inspect the AppDynamics agent’s log files in addition to the Kong Gateway logs.

Important: ARM isn’t supported when using the AppDynamics agent. The agent only supports x86 architecture.

AppDynamics node name considerations

The AppDynamics plugin sets the KONG_APPD_NODE_NAME to the local hostname by default, which typically reflects the container ID of the containerized application. Multiple instances of the AppDynamics agent must use different node names, and one agent must exist for each of Kong Gateway’s worker processes, where the node name is suffixed by the worker ID. This results in multiple nodes being created for each Kong Gateway instance, one for each worker process.