HTTP options

Also see Common monitor options.

The options described here configure Heartbeat to connect via HTTP and optionally verify that the host returns the expected response.

Example configuration:

- type: http
  id: myhost
  name: My HTTP Host
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  hosts: ["http://myhost:80"]

A list of URLs to ping.

The total number of redirections Heartbeat will follow. Defaults to 0, meaning heartbeat will not follow redirects, but will report the status of the redirect. If set to a number greater than 0 heartbeat will follow that number of redirects.

When this option is set to a value greater than zero the monitor.ip field will no longer be reported, as multiple DNS requests across multiple IPs may return multiple IPs. Fine grained network timing data will also not be recorded, as with redirects that data will span multiple requests. Specifically the fields http.rtt.content.us, http.rtt.response_header.us, http.rtt.total.us, http.rtt.validate.us, http.rtt.write_request.us and dns.rtt.us will be omitted.

The HTTP proxy URL. This setting is optional. Example http://proxy.mydomain.com:3128

Additional headers to send to proxies during CONNECT requests.

The username for authenticating with the server. The credentials are passed with the request. This setting is optional.

You need to specify credentials when your check.response settings require it. For example, you can check for a 403 response (check.response.status: [403]) without setting credentials.

The password for authenticating with the server. This setting is optional.

The TLS/SSL connection settings for use with the HTTPS endpoint. If you don’t specify settings, the system defaults are used.

Example configuration:

- type: http
  id: my-http-service
  name: My HTTP Service
  hosts: ["https://myhost:443"]
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  ssl:
    certificate_authorities: ['/etc/ca.crt']
    supported_protocols: ["TLSv1.0", "TLSv1.1", "TLSv1.2"]

Also see SSL for a full description of the ssl options.

Controls the indexing of the HTTP response headers http.response.body.headers field.

On by default. Set response.include_headers to false to disable.

Controls the indexing of the HTTP response body contents to the http.response.body.contents field.

Set response.include_body to one of the options listed below.

Set response.include_body_max_bytes to control the maximum size of the stored body contents. Defaults to 1024 bytes.

An optional request to send to the remote host and the expected response.

Example configuration:

- type: http
  id: my-http-host
  name: My HTTP Service
  hosts: ["http://myhost:80"]
  check.request.method: HEAD
  check.response.status: [200]
  schedule: '@every 5s'

Under check.request, specify these options:

Example configuration: This monitor POSTs an x-www-form-urlencoded string to the endpoint /demo/add

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  urls: ["http://localhost:8080/demo/add"]
  check.request:
    method: POST
    headers:
      'Content-Type': 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'
    # urlencode the body:
    body: "name=first&email=someemail%40someemailprovider.com"
  check.response:
    status: [200]
    body:
      - Saved
      - saved

Under check.response, specify these options:

Example configuration: This monitor examines the response body for the strings saved or Saved and expects 200 or 201 status codes

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  urls: ["http://localhost:8080/demo/add"]
  check.request:
    method: POST
    headers:
      'Content-Type': 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'
    # urlencode the body:
    body: "name=first&email=someemail%40someemailprovider.com"
  check.response:
    status: [200, 201]
    body:
      - Saved
      - saved

Under check.response.body, specify these options: positive:: This option has the same behavior as given a list of regular expressions under check.response.body. negative:: A list of regular expressions to match the the body output negatively. Return match failed if single expression matches. HTTP response bodies of up to 100MiB are supported.

Example configuration: This monitor examines the response body for the strings foo or Foo

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  urls: ["http://localhost:8080/demo/add"]
  check.request:
    method: POST
    headers:
      'Content-Type': 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'
    # urlencode the body:
    body: "name=first&email=someemail%40someemailprovider.com"
  check.response:
    body:
      positive:
        - foo
        - Foo

Example configuration: This monitor examines match successfully if there is no bar or Bar at all, examines match failed if there is bar or Bar in the response body

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  urls: ["http://localhost:8080/demo/add"]
  check.request:
    method: POST
    headers:
      'Content-Type': 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'
    # urlencode the body:
    body: "name=first&email=someemail%40someemailprovider.com"
  check.response:
    status: [200, 201]
    body:
      negative:
        - bar
        - Bar

Example configuration: This monitor examines match successfully only when foo or Foo in body AND no bar or Bar in body

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  urls: ["http://localhost:8080/demo/add"]
  check.response:
    status: [200, 201]
    body:
      positive:
        - foo
        - Foo
      negative:
        - bar
        - Bar

The following configuration shows how to check the response using gval expressions when the body contains JSON:

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  hosts: ["https://localhost:9200/_/nodes/stats"]
  username: elastic
  password: changeme
  check.response:
    status: [200]
    json:
      - description: check status
        expression: 'foo.bar == "myValue"'

Expressions can be much more complex than simple equality. They can also use jsonpath syntax. Note that strings must be double quoted with " rather than single quoted with ' in the gval variant of jsonpath. Please note that jsonpath sub-expressions must start with $., for instance '$.nodes[?(@.name=="myname")] != []' will check that the nodes map has at least one value with the name myname.

When working with responses that are returned in the form of a JSON array at the root rather than an object jsonpath can be used as well. As an example $.[0].foo == "bar" tests that the first item in the response has an attribute foo that has the value "bar".

JSON bodies can also be checked via the now deprecated condition option, which is not as powerful as expression. The following configuration shows how to check the response using a condition statement when the body contains JSON:

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  hosts: ["https://myhost:80"]
  check.request:
    method: GET
    headers:
      'X-API-Key': '12345-mykey-67890'
  check.response:
    status: [200]
    json:
      - description: check status
        condition:
          equals:
            status: ok

The following configuration shows how to check the response for multiple regex patterns:

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  hosts: ["https://myhost:80"]
  check.request:
    method: GET
    headers:
      'X-API-Key': '12345-mykey-67890'
  check.response:
    status: [200]
    body:
      - hello
      - world

The following configuration shows how to check the response with a multiline regex:

- type: http
  id: demo-service
  name: Demo Service
  schedule: '@every 5s'
  hosts: ["https://myhost:80"]
  check.request:
    method: GET
    headers:
      'X-API-Key': '12345-mykey-67890'
  check.response:
    status: [200]
    body: '(?s)first.*second.*third'

You can configure Heartbeat run monitors exactly once then exit, bypassing the scheduler. This is referred to as running Heartbeat in "run once" mode by setting heartbeat.run_once: true. All Heartbeat monitors will ignore their schedules and run exactly once at startup. This is an experimental feature and is subject to change.

Note, the schedule field is still required and is used by Heartbeat to set the expectation around when the next run will occur. That duration is encoded in the monitor.timespan field in the Heartbeat output.

# heartbeat.yml
heartbeat.run_once: true
heartbeat.monitors:
# your monitor config here...

You can configure Heartbeat to exit after an elapsed timeout if unable to publish pending events. This is an experimental feature and is subject to change.

Note, the heartbeat.run_once flag is required for publish_timeout to take effect.

# heartbeat.yml
heartbeat.publish_timeout: 30s
heartbeat.run_once: true
heartbeat.monitors:
# your monitor config here...