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Raw logs: export CDN resource logs to a storage

Raw Logs is an option that enables an automatic export of CDN resource logs to your storage. Logs contain information about user requests sent to cache servers and pre-cache servers (if the Origin Shielding is enabled).

This is a paid feature. To activate Raw Logs, contact the Gcore support team. After activation, enable Raw Logs in the Gcore Customer Portal and configure export to S3, FTP, or SFTP storage.

Raw Logs settings

In this section, you can find general information about log settings, overview of log statuses, and details on how Raw Logs are exported and calculated.

Add logs from Origin Shielding

If you are using the Origin Shielding feature, you’ll see the Add logs from origin shielding checkbox when configuring logs. We recommend that you select this option as it ensures that the logs report will include both requests to cache services and requests to the pre-cache server. Thus, you’ll receive more detailed information on resource usage.

When setting up Raw Logs, select the checkbox to enable Add logs from origin shielding.

Raw Logs page with the checkbox highlighted

If you don’t see the Origin Shielding option on the Raw Logs page, this feature is not activated for your account. For details on how to activate Origin Shielding, check our dedicated guide.

Raw Logs statuses

You can check the status of the Raw Logs in the Gcore Customer Portal:

Pending: A status for the time interval between the connection to storage and the first log export.
OK: Logs are exported from at least one CDN server.
Failed: An error occurred while connecting to a storage, or the service failed to export logs within 24 hours.
Pause: The Raw Logs feature is paused.

Export time intervals

Logs are exported at the end of each hour. If you activate Raw Logs at 00:30, the first logs will be exported between 00:45 and 01:00 and the next ones—between 01:45 and 02:00.

If CDN servers are not requested and you didn’t select the Do not send empty logs checkbox when configuring Raw Logs, an empty log file (± 20 bytes) will be sent to your storage.

Log traffic calculation

Logs can generate various types of analytics, such as delivered traffic. To understand what the totals mean, we recommend that you familiarize yourself with the formulas for calculating logs. For details about CDN reports, check out the View statistics on CDN resources guide.

The formula for calculating traffic depends on whether you’ve selected the Add logs from origin shielding option for Raw Logs.

If this feature is disabled, the formula will look like this:

total_bytes = upstream_bytes + sent_bytes

Where:

upstream_bytes are equal to the $upstream_response_length log field and refer to the response length from an origin in bytes
sent_bytes are equal to the $bytes_sent log field and refer to the number of bytes sent to a user from the edge (cache) servers

For example, if $upstream_response_length is 10485760 (bytes) and $bytes_sent is 1514848 (bytes), the final value in the Raw logs report will be 12,000,608 (bytes).

If this feature is enabled, the formula will look like this:

total_bytes = upstream_bytes + sent_bytes + shield_bytes

Where:

upstream_bytes are equal to the $upstream_response_length log field and refer to the response length from an origin in bytes
sent_bytes are equal to the $bytes_sent log field and refer to the number of bytes sent to a user from the edge (cache) servers
shield_bytes are equal to the $bytes_sent log field and refer to the number of bytes sent to a user from the pre-cache server

The final value of log data may differ slightly from the billing statistics as there may be cases where not all logs are received, such as:

You are using the Origin Shielding feature but didn’t select the Add logs from origin shielding option.
You have a rate limit set on your storage side, and when CDN started generating logs, some logs weren’t downloaded because of the rate limitation.

Log path example

s3://log-bucket-name/2019/08/20/15/nodename_primarycname.domain.ru_access.log.gz

Log example

"0.0.0.0" "-" "-" "[26/Apr/2019:09:47:40 +0000]" "GET /ContentCommon/images/image.png HTTP/1.1"  
"200" "1514283" "https://example.com/videos/10" "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_12_1)  
AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/53.0.2785.116 YaBrowser/16.10.0.2309 Safari/537.36"  
"1514848" "[dh-up-gc18]" "https" "origin.cdn.com" "1.500" "0.445" "157" "bytes=0-1901653" "[dh]"  
"MISS" "10485760" "0.0.0.0:80" "2510" "7399" "-" "-" "KZ" "-" "shield_no" "0.0.0.0" "80" "206" "-" "0.000"  
"0.200" "0.0.0.0" "asnumber" "106980391" "1" "00-d5fe1dc9035165ce36952daf29686b6c-14330be33197dd1a-01" "-" "-"  
"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384" "28a4184139cb43cdc79006cf2d1a4ac93bdc****" "r"  
"application/json" "21" "PL" "45" "10" "100700"

Log format

"$remote_addr" "-" "$remote_user" "[$time_local]" "$request" "$status"  
"$body_bytes_sent" "$http_referer" "$http_user_agent" "$bytes_sent"  
"$edgename" "$scheme" "$host" "$request_time"  
"$upstream_response_time" "$request_length" "$http_range" "[$responding_node]"  
"$upstream_cache_status" "$upstream_response_length" "$upstream_addr"  
"$gcdn_api_client_id" "$gcdn_api_resource_id" "$uid_got" "$uid_set"  
"$geoip_country_code" "$geoip_city" "$shield_type" "$server_addr" "$server_port"  
"$upstream_status" "-" "$upstream_connect_time" "$upstream_header_time"  
"$shard_addr" "$geoip2_data_asnumber" "$connection" "$connection_requests"  
"$http_traceparent" "$http_x_forwarded_proto" "$gcdn_internal_status_code" "$ssl_cipher"  
"$ssl_session_id" "$ssl_session_reused" "$sent_http_content_type" "$tcpinfo_rtt" 
"$server_country_code" "$gcdn_tcpinfo_snd_cwnd" "$gcdn_tcpinfo_total_retrans" "$gcdn_rule_id"

It’s OK if you find a field that’s not listed in the example. We occasionally add new fields to the end of the line. If some fields are added to logs, you’ll receive an email about the update.

Log fields

The following table contains a complete list of available log fields. Fields formatted in italics relate to our internal CDN system, so you can ignore them.

You can check other fields—they can be helpful for traffic analysis or statistics.

Field	Log value example	Description
$remote_addr	0.0.0.0	User's IP address
$remote_user (internal system variable)	-	Username used in Basic authentication
[$time_local]	[26/Apr/2019 :09:47:40 +0000]	Local time in Common Log Format
$request	GET /ContentCommon/ images/image.png HTTP/1.1	HTTP method, requested file path, HTTP version
$status	200	Response status code from a CDN server
$body_bytes_sent	1514283	Number of bytes sent to a user, excluding the response header size
$http_referer	https://example.com /videos/10	Referrer - a URL requested by a user
$http_user_agent	Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_12_1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/53.0.2785.116 YaBrowser/16.10.0.2309 Safari/537.36	User agent that was used to send a request (browser or other application)
$bytes_sent	1514848	Number of bytes sent to a user
$edgename	[dh-up-gc18]	CDN server that forwarded a requested file
$scheme	https	Protocol (HTTP or HTTPS) of a request
$host	cdn.example.com	Requested hostname of a CDN resource
$request_time	1.500	Request processing time in seconds (accurate to milliseconds); time elapsed between the first bytes of a request were processed and logging after the last bytes were sent to a user
$upstream_response_time	0.445	Number of seconds (accurate to milliseconds) it took to receive a response from an origin. In case of multiple responses, commas and colons are used
$request_length	157	Request length (including request line, header, and request body)
$http_range	bytes=0-1901653	File fragment size in a Range request
[$responding_node]	dh	Responding data center
$upstream_cache_status	MISS	Status of a requested file in CDN cache: HIT is the status of a response served from the CDN cache. STALE is the status of an outdated response that failed to update because an origin was not responding or responding incorrectly. UPDATING is the status of an outdated response that is still updating since a previous request. REVALIDATED is the status of a response that is identical to the one on an origin based on the proxy_cache_revalidate directive. EXPIRED is the status of a response that has expired in cache but still matches the one on an origin. A request has been sent to an origin for re-caching. MISS is the status of a response that has been served directly from an origin rather than from a cache. BYPASS is the status of a response for the first file request after clearing the cache. This status appears when the file is requested by each CDN server. When one CDN server requests a file for the first time, it will have the BYPASS status. When the same server requests the file again, the status will be changed to HIT. When another CDN server requests the file, it will again have the BYPASS status.
$upstream_response_length	10485760	Response length from an origin in bytes. In case of multiple responses, commas and colons are used
$upstream_addr	0.0.0.0:80	Origin's IP address and port
$gcdn_api_client_id (internal system variable)	123	Your ID in our system
$gcdn_api_resource_id (internal system variable)	01	Your CDN-resource ID in our system
$uid_got (internal system variable)	-	Cookie name and received user ID
$uid_set (internal system variable)	-	Cookie name and provided user ID
$geoip_country_code	KZ	User’s country code according to the ISO 3166 standard (Alpha-2 code).
$geoip_city	-	User’s city code
$shield_type (internal system variable)	shield_no	This field shows whether the shielding option is enabled: shield_old - enabled shield_no - disabled
$server_addr (internal system variable)	0.0.0.0	IP address of an Anycast zone or CDN server
$server_port (internal system variable)	80	Requested port
$upstream_status	206	Origin response code
$upstream_connect_time	0.000	Number of seconds (accurate to milliseconds) it took to access an origin server
$upstream_header_time	0.200	Number of seconds (accurate to milliseconds) it took to receive a response header from an origin server
$shard_addr (internal system variable)	0.0.0.0	IP address of a CDN server that was first to accept a request if the Cache Sharding feature is enabled
$geoip2_data_asnumber	asnumber	Number of an autonomous system that sent a request
$connection (internal system variable)	2897494295	Connection serial number
$connection_requests (internal system variable)	1	Current number of requests made through a connection
$http_traceparent (internal system variable)	00-d5fe1dc903 5165ce36952da f29686b6c-143 30be33197dd1a -01	Unique request identifier, more info in the Traceparent guide
$http_x_forwarded_proto	-	Initial protocol of an incoming request (HTTP or HTTPS)
$gcdn_internal_status_code, (internal system variables)	-	Initial status code. Possible values are: `-`, or `100700`
$ssl_cipher (internal system variable)	ECDHE-RSA-AES256 -GCM-SHA384	Cipher name used for an established SSL connection
$ssl_session_id (internal system variable)	28a4184139cb43 cdc79006cf2d1 a4ac93bdc****	Session ID of an established SSL connection
$ssl_session_reused (internal system variable)	r	The field shows whether a session was reused (“r” ) or not (“.”)
$sent_http_content_type	application/json	Value of the Content-Type HTTP header, indicating the MIME type of a transmitted file
$tcpinfo_rtt	21	Average time (latency) it takes to transfer a packet to/from a server. The unit of time is microseconds.
$server_country_code	PL	Server’s country code according to the ISO 3166 standard (Alpha-2 code).
$gcdn_tcpinfo_snd_cwnd	45	Size of the TCP Congestion window, i.e., the maximum number of TCP segments that the connection can send before an acknowledgment is required.
$tcpi_total_retrans	10	Total number of retransmitted packets over the life of the connection.
$gcdn_rule_id	100700	Initial rule ID (beta). Possible values are: `-`, or `100700`

Export logs to S3 storage

Amazon storage

1. In the Gcore Customer Portal, navigate to CDN > Logs.

2. Enable the Receive Raw Logs toggle to open log settings.

3. Keep the Do not send empty logs option selected if you don't want to receive empty logs. Otherwise, uncheck it.

4. If you use our Origin Shielding feature, you’ll see a checkbox Add logs from origin shielding. Select the checkbox to receive logs from both edge servers and pre-cache shielding servers.

5. Select to receive logs using S3.

6. Choose Amazon as the storage type.

7. Specify your access key ID. In your Amazon personal account, it's called "AWS access key ID". For details on how to find your key ID, check the official Amazon guide. An access key ID and secret access key are required to configure log export to your storage.

8. Specify your secret access key. In your Amazon account, it's called "AWS secret access key". For details on how to find your access key, check the official Amazon guide.

9. (Optional) Enter your AWS region—the location of a server where your storage is hosted. For most storage types, the region is determined automatically, so you might leave the field empty. However, we recommend specifying the region to ensure that your logs are exported successfully.

10. Choose how to organize your storage: put logs of all CDN resources into one bucket or use separate buckets for each CDN resource.

11. Specify buckets for log export. Make sure to indicate an existing bucket. Otherwise, your logs won’t be exported.
Enter a folder name if you want to export logs to a specific folder within a bucket.

12. Click Save changes.

You've successfully configured Raw Logs export to Amazon S3.

Non-Amazon storage

1. In the Gcore Customer Portal, navigate to CDN > Logs.

2. Enable the Receive Raw Logs toggle to open log settings.

3. Keep the Do not send empty logs option selected if you don't want to receive empty logs. Otherwise, uncheck it.

4. If you use our Origin Shielding feature, you’ll see a checkbox Add logs from origin shielding. Select the checkbox to receive logs from both edge servers and pre-cache shielding servers.

5. Select to receive logs using S3.

6. Select Other as the storage type.

Raw logs settings for 3-rd party S3 storage

7. Specify a hostname—a name that's assigned to a storage server within a network and is used instead of an IP address. If you use Gcore Object Storage, you can find its access key ID in your personal account in the Hostname field.

8. Specify your access key ID. Along with a secret access key, it's required to configure log export to your storage. If you use Gcore Object Storage, you can find its access key ID in your personal account in the Access key field.

9. Specify your secret access key. If you use Gcore Object Storage, you can find its secret access key in your personal account in the Secret key field.

10. Specify a bucket hostname—a bucket ID that's used by your Object storage system in the {bucket_name}.{hostname} format. It's required to ensure that logs are exported to the correct bucket within a storage. A bucket hostname of the Gcore storage looks as follows: {bucket name}.{hostname from step 3}. For example: examplename.s-ed1.cloud.gcore.lu.

11. (Optional) Specify a regio—location ID of a server where your storage is hosted. For some storage types, the region is determined automatically, so you can leave the field empty.

If you use Gcore Object Storage, you must specify the location ID. You can find it in the Details of the storage. Your location ID is a part of your hostname to the first dot.

12. Choose how to organize storage: put logs of all CDN resources into one bucket or use separate buckets for each CDN resource.

13. Specify buckets for log export. Make sure to indicate an existing bucket. Otherwise, your logs won’t be exported. If you want to export logs to a specific folder within a bucket, specify the folder name.

14. Click Save changes.

You've successfully configured Raw Logs export to S3 storage.

Export logs to FTP or SFTP storage

1. In the Gcore Customer Portal, navigate to CDN > Logs.

2. Enable the Receive Raw Logs toggle to open log settings.

3. Keep the Do not send empty logs option selected if you don't want to receive empty logs. Otherwise, uncheck it.

4. If you use our Origin Shielding feature, you’ll see a checkbox Add logs from origin shielding. Select the checkbox to receive logs from both edge servers and pre-cache shielding servers.

5. Select to receive logs via SFTP.

6. Specify a hostname—a name that’s assigned to a storage server within a network and is used instead of an IP address. If you use Gcore SFTP Storage, you can find its hostname in the Details of the storage in the Hostname field. It looks as follows: ams.origin.gcdn.co.

You need to specify an FTP or SFTP storage port after the hostname. For example: ams.origin.gcore.co:2200. Otherwise, you’ll get the “Wrong connection settings error” and won’t be able to connect to the storage.

7. Specify a username you use to log in to the storage. If you use Gcore SFTP storage, you can find the username in the Details of your storage in the Storage/User name field.

8. Enter the password you use to authenticate to the storage.

9. Specify a folder for export. If you use Gcore SFTP storage, specify the root (home) folder where other folders originate from. You can find its name in the Details of your storage at the end of the Upload path field.

If you use an SFTP storage from another provider, clarify whether a root folder that includes other folders is created by default. If not, leave the field empty. If yes, specify a folder name.

If you’re using the Gcore SFTP storage, you won’t be able to write to the home folder. It only receives logs and can’t be manually modified.

10. Choose how to organize the storage: put logs of all CDN resources into one folder or use separate folders for each CDN resource. Then, specify a folder name. If you specify a non-existent folder, logs will be exported to a root folder.

11. (Optional) Specify the folder name where logs will be stored. If you specify a non-existent folder, logs will be exported to a root folder. For Gcore SFTP storage, you can only specify the default htdocs folder.

12. Click Save changes.

You've successfully configured Raw Logs export to FTP or SFTP storage.

Deactivate Raw Logs

To stop Raw Logs delivery, disable the Receive Raw Logs toggle.

If you disable the logs, your settings will be saved. You can always activate the same configuration by enabling the Receive Raw Logs toggle again.

If you made any changes to the configuration, click Discard changes to cancel any changes made during the editing process.

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