Contributor Insights rule syntax - Amazon CloudWatch
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Contributor Insights rule syntax

This section explains the syntax for Contributor Insights rules. Use this syntax only when you are creating a rule by entering a JSON block. If you use the wizard to create a rule, you don't need to know the syntax. For more information about creating rules using the wizard, see Create a Contributor Insights rule.

All matching of rules to log event field names and values is case sensitive.

The following example illustrates the syntax for JSON logs.

{
    "Schema": {
        "Name": "CloudWatchLogRule",
        "Version": 1
    },
    "LogGroupNames": [
        "API-Gateway-Access-Logs*",
        "Log-group-name2"
    ],
    "LogFormat": "JSON",
    "Contribution": {
        "Keys": [
            "$.ip"
        ],
        "ValueOf": "$.requestBytes",
        "Filters": [
            {
                "Match": "$.httpMethod",
                "In": [
                    "PUT"
                ]
            }
        ]
    },
    "AggregateOn": "Sum"
}
Fields in Contributor Insights rules
Schema

The value of Schema for a rule that analyzes CloudWatch Logs data must always be {"Name": "CloudWatchLogRule", "Version": 1}

LogGroupNames

An array of strings. For each element in the array, you can optionally use * at the end of a string to include all log groups with names that start with that prefix.

Be careful about using wildcards with log group names. You incur charges for each log event that matches a rule. If you accidentally search more log groups than you intend, you might incur unexpected charges. For more information, see Amazon CloudWatch Pricing.

LogGroupARNs

If you are creating this rule in a CloudWatch cross-account observability monitoring account, you can use LogGroupARNs to specify log groups in source accounts that are linked to the monitoring account, and to specify log groups in the monitoring account itself. You must specify either LogGroupNames or LogGroupARNs in your rule, but not both.

LogGroupARNs is an array of strings. For each element in the array, you can optionally use * as a wildcard in certain situations. For example you can specify arn:aws:logs:us-west-1:*:log-group/MyLogGroupName2 to specify log groups named MyLogGroupName2 in all source accounts and in the monitoring account, in the US West (N. California) Region. You can also specify arn:aws:logs:us-west-1:111122223333:log-group/GroupNamePrefix* to specify all log groups in US West (N. California) in 111122223333 that have names starting with GroupNamePrefix.

You can't specify a partial Amazon account ID as a prefix with a wild card.

Be careful about using wildcards with log group ARNs. You incur charges for each log event that matches a rule. If you accidentally search more log groups than you intend, you might incur unexpected charges. For more information, see Amazon CloudWatch Pricing.

LogFormat

Valid values are JSON and CLF.

Contribution

This object includes a Keys array with as many as four members, optionally a single ValueOf, and optionally an array of as many as four Filters.

Keys

An array of up to four log fields that are used as dimensions to classify contributors. If you enter more than one key, each unique combination of values for the keys is counted as a unique contributor. The fields must be specified using JSON property format notation.

ValueOf

(Optional) Specify this only when you are specifying Sum as the value of AggregateOn. ValueOf specifies a log field with numerical values. In this type of rule, the contributors are ranked by their sum of the value of this field, instead of their number of occurrences in the log entries. For example, if you want to sort contributors by their total BytesSent over a period, you would set ValueOf to BytesSent and specify Sum for AggregateOn.

Filters

(Optional) Specifies an array of as many as four filters to narrow the log events that are included in the report. If you specify multiple filters, Contributor Insights evaluates them with a logical AND operator. You can use this to filter out irrelevant log events in your search or you can use it to select a single contributor to analyze their behavior.

Each member in the array must include a Match field and a field indicating the type of matching operator to use.

The Match field specifies a log field to evaluate in the filter. The log field is specified using JSON property format notation.

The matching operator field must be one of the following: In, NotIn, StartsWith, GreaterThan, LessThan, EqualTo, NotEqualTo, or IsPresent. If the operator field is In, NotIn, or StartsWith, it is followed by an array of string values to check for. Contributor Insights evaluates the array of string values with an OR operator. The array can include as many as 10 string values.

If the operator field is GreaterThan, LessThan, EqualTo, or NotEqualTo, it is followed by a single numerical value to compare with.

If the operator field is IsPresent, it is followed by either true or false. This operator matches log events based on whether the specified log field is present in the log event. The isPresent works only with values in the leaf node of JSON properties. For example, a filter that looks for matches to c-count does not evaluate a log event with a value of details.c-count.c1.

See the following four filter examples:

{"Match": "$.httpMethod", "In": [ "PUT", ] }
{"Match": "$.StatusCode", "EqualTo": 200 }
{"Match": "$.BytesReceived", "GreaterThan": 10000}
{"Match": "$.eventSource", "StartsWith": [ "ec2", "ecs" ] }
AggregateOn

Valid values are Count and Sum. Specifies whether to aggregate the report based on a count of occurrences or a sum of the values of the field that is specified in the ValueOf field.

JSON property format notation

The Keys, ValueOf, and Match fields follow JSON property format with dot notation, where $ represents the root of the JSON object. This is followed by a period and then an alphanumeric string with the name of the subproperty. Multiple property levels are supported.

The first character of the string can only be A-Z or a-z. The following characters of the string can be A-Z, a-z, or 0-9.

The following list illustrates valid examples of JSON property format:

$.userAgent
$.endpoints[0]
$.users[1].name
$.requestParameters.instanceId

Additional field in rules for CLF logs

Common Log Format (CLF) log events do not have names for the fields like JSON does. To provide the fields to use for Contributor Insights rules, a CLF log event can be treated as array with an index starting from 1. You can specify the first field as "1", the second field as "2", and so on.

To make a rule for a CLF log easier to read, you can use Fields. This enables you to provide a naming alias for CLF field locations. For example, you can specify that the location "4" is an IP address. Once specified, IpAddress can be used as property in the Keys, ValueOf, and Filters in the rule.

The following is an example of a rule for a CLF log that uses the Fields field.

{
    "Schema": {
        "Name": "CloudWatchLogRule",
        "Version": 1
    },
    "LogGroupNames": [
        "API-Gateway-Access-Logs*"
    ],
    "LogFormat": "CLF",
    "Fields": {
        "4": "IpAddress",
        "7": "StatusCode"
    },
    "Contribution": {
        "Keys": [
            "IpAddress"
        ],
        "Filters": [
            {
                "Match": "StatusCode",
                "EqualTo": 200
            }
        ]
    },
    "AggregateOn": "Count"
}