Last updated: 22.11.2024
What is the Support Collector and how does it work?
The Support Collector offers an easy way to automatically record all important information about a server and the installed software components. A ZIP file is created with just a few commands, which can then be made available to our support team. This file contains comprehensive information about the server and the software components, so that repeated requests for details such as software versions or configurations are often no longer necessary.
What data is collected?
To ensure data protection, passwords and tokens are automatically removed before the ZIP file is generated. Files with certain extensions (e.g. *.key, *.csr, *.crt, *.pem) are generally not collected. However, it is advisable to check the information collected for sensitive content before sending it.
The Support Collector supports the following modules:
- base – A module that collects basic information about the server. These are, for example, the installed operating system, the kernel version, CPU, RAM or running processes
- Ansible
- Apache 2
- Corosync
- Elastic
- Foreman
- Grafana
- Graphite
- Graylog
- Icinga 2
- Icinga DB
- Icinga Director
- Icinga Web
- InfluxDB
- keepalived
- MongoDB
- MySQL
- NGINX
- PostgreSQL
- Prometheus
- Puppet
- Redis
How do I install the Support Collector?
The Support Collector is installed via the NETWAYS package server. The following instructions describe the steps for various Linux distributions. The source code can be viewed on GitHub under NETWAYS/support-collector.
Installation under RHEL
Installing and configuring the NETWAYS Extras repository:
dnf install https://packages.netways.de/extras/epel/9/noarch/netways-extras-release/netways-extras-release-9-2.el9.netways.noarch.rpmInstallation of the Support Collector:
dnf install netways-support-collectorInstallation under SLES / OpenSuSE
Installing and configuring the NETWAYS Extras repository:
zypper ar https://https://packages.netways.de/extras/$releasever/.... .repoInstallation of the Support Collector:
zypper in netways-support-collectorInstallation under Debian / Ubuntu
Installing and configuring the NETWAYS Extras repository:
wget -O - https://packages.netways.de/netways-repo.asc | gpg --dearmor > /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/netways.gpg
echo "deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/netways.gpg] https://packages.netways.de/extras/ubuntu ${DIST} main" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/netways-extras.list Installation of the Support Collector:
apt-get install netways-support-collectorHow do you collect data and how do you create the ZIP file?
Once the Support Collector has been installed, no further configuration is required.
The Support Collector collects all relevant system information by default and saves it in a ZIP file. You don’t need to specify any additional options – everything works right after the start.
A simple call is all you need. The ZIP file is stored in the directory in which you are located at the time of execution. We recommend changing to /tmp before executing.
As soon as the process is complete, the path to the generated ZIP file is displayed. You can check this file and forward it to our support team.
cd /tmp
support-collectorA sample output of the support collector:
[root@testhost ~]# support-collector --disable-wizard
INFO[11:43:22] Detailed collection is enabled
INFO[11:43:22] Could not find ansible. Skipping
INFO[11:43:22] Collecting base system information
INFO[11:43:28] Could not find corosync. Skipping
INFO[11:43:28] Could not find elastic. Skipping
INFO[11:43:28] Could not find foreman. Skipping
INFO[11:43:28] Collecting grafana information
INFO[11:43:30] Could not find graphite. Skipping
INFO[11:43:30] Could not find graylog. Skipping
INFO[11:43:30] Collecting Icinga Director information
INFO[11:43:31] Collecting Icinga 2 information
INFO[11:43:34] Collecting IcingaDB information
INFO[11:43:35] Collecting Icinga Web 2 information
INFO[11:43:40] Collecting InfluxDB information
INFO[11:43:41] Could not find keepalived. Skipping
INFO[11:43:41] Could not find mongodb. Skipping
INFO[11:43:41] Collecting MySQL/MariaDB information
INFO[11:43:43] Could not find postgresql. Skipping
INFO[11:43:43] Could not find prometheus. Skipping
INFO[11:43:43] Could not find puppet. Skipping
INFO[11:43:43] Could not find redis. Skipping
INFO[11:43:43] Collecting webservers information
INFO[11:43:44] Collection complete, took us 22.223 seconds
INFO[11:43:44] Obfuscation replaced 32 token in 13 files (9 definitions)
INFO[11:43:44] Generated ZIP file located at /root/support-collector_testhost_20241122-1143.zipA detailed overview of all possible options can be found in the README.md on Github.
If you want to change things such as the output path or the modules used, this is possible via the built-in wizard. This appears when the Support Collector is called up without any options
[root@testhost ~]# support-collector
Welcome to the support-collector wizard!
We will guide you through all required details.
If you do not want to use the wizard, you can also pass an answer file containing the configuration.
For more details have a look at the official repository.
https://github.com/NETWAYS/support-collector
The following modules are available:
ansible,base,corosync,elastic,foreman,grafana,graphite,graylog,icinga-director,icinga2,icingadb,icingaweb2,influxdb,keepalived,mongodb,mysql,postgresql,prometheus,puppet,redis,webservers
Filename for resulting zip - (Default: 'support-collector_testhost_20241122-1142.zip'):
Which modules should be enabled? (Comma separated list of modules) - (Default: 'all'):
Enable detailed collection including logs and more (recommended)? [y/n] - (Default: 'true'):
Do you want to define some custom obfuscators (passwords, secrets etc.) [y/n] - (Default: 'false'):What do I do if I still have passwords?
The Support Collector uses several rules to try to remove passwords, tokens and sensitive files from the collected information as far as possible or not to collect them in the first place. If you still find sensitive information, you can also exclude it in the wizard.
Do you want to define some custom obfuscators (passwords, secrets etc.) [y/n] - (Default: 'false'): TheSecretIWantToHideConclusion
The NETWAYS Support Collector is a flexible, small tool that helps the customer as well as us as support engineers and system engineers to quickly and conveniently obtain important information about the server and the installation. Experience has shown that this can avoid a large number of queries and that the solution to the actual problem can be found more quickly.
