Monitoring Windows server using OTel & Prometheus

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This tutorial demonstrates how to monitor Windows Server - including IIS and MSSQL - for logs, metrics, and traces using OpenTelemetry Collector and Prometheus Windows Exporter.

Prerequisites

• admin user in Windows with the ability to install services

• tar.gz files unpacked

Configuration

Windows Exporter

STEP 1. Download the latest MSI from GitHub (0.22.0.msi as of 30 April '23).

STEP 2. Open the command line and navigate to C:\Users\Administrator\Downloads or the MSI folder.

STEP 3. Select which exporter collectors you require - including MSSQL and IIS - from this verbose list: cpu,cs,logical_disk,net,os,service,system,textfile,iis,mssql.

STEP 4. Open Command Prompt.

STEP 5. Run the following command to install the MSI with the collectors chosen:

msiexec /i windows_exporter-0.22.0-amd64.msi ENABLED_COLLECTORS="os,iis"

OpenTelemetry Collector

STEP 1. Download the latest tar.gz from GitHub (0.76.1.tar.gz as of 30 April '23).

STEP 2. Unpack the content into a C:\\cx-otel. This may require you to install a program to unpack tar.gz files.

STEP 3. Create a config.yaml based on the following configuration.

receivers:
  filelog:
    include: [ C:\inetpub\logs\LogFiles\*.* ]
  prometheus:
    config:
      scrape_configs:
        - job_name: 'windows_exporter'
          scrape_interval: 15s
          static_configs:
            - targets: ['0.0.0.0:9182']
processors:
  resourcedetection:
    detectors: [system]
    system:
      hostname_sources: ["os"]
  batch:

exporters:
  coralogix:
    metrics:
      endpoint: "ingress.eu2.coralogix.com:443"
    logs:
      endpoint: "ingress.eu2.coralogix.com:443"
    private_key: "coralogix-api-key"
    application_name: "WinServer"
    subsystem_name: "Host"

service:
  pipelines:
    metrics:
      receivers: [prometheus]
      processors: [resourcedetection, batch]
      exporters: [coralogix]
    logs:
      receivers: [filelog]
      processors: [resourcedetection, batch]
      exporters: [coralogix]

Notes:

• The example configuration captures metrics from windows_exporter and logs from IIS. Modify as necessary.

• You are required to input the following variables:

  • endpoint: Select the OpenTelemetry endpoint associated with your Coralogix domain

  • private_key: Your Coralogix Send-Your-Data API key

  • application_name & subsystem_name: Application and subsystem names as they will appear in your Coralogix UI

STEP 4. Install the collector as a service by running the following command:

sc.exe create cx-otelcol displayname=cx-otelcol start=delayed-auto binPath="C:\cx-otel\otelcol-contrib.exe --config C:\cx-otel\config.yaml"

STEP 5. Run the service.

sc.exe start cx-otelcol 

Additional Configurations

Configure Windows exporter dashboards and the OpenTelemetry Kubernetes Extension to monitor the collector itself.

Validation & Testing

STEP 1. Open Services and check that both windows_exporter and cx-otelcol service are running.

STEP 2. To validate which metrics exist in windows_exporter, navigate to http://localhost:9182/metrics.

Notes:

• windows_exporter.exe is unsafe and may require a specific "unblock" in its settings.

• Both windows_exporter and otelcol can be run without services to check for logs in the command prompt.

STEP 3. Navigate to Grafana Explore to confirm that windows_* metrics are arriving in your Coralogix dashboard.

Additional Links

Github	Official OpenTelemetry Collector with Coralogix Exporter Coralogix Windows Exporter Dashboards
Tutorials	Tail Sampling with Coralogix and OpenTelemetry
Blogs	How to Configure the OTel Community Demo App to Send Telemetry Data to Coralogix