What's new in Splunk App for Infrastructure

These release notes apply to the Splunk App for Infrastructure (SAI) version 2.0.0.

For compatibility information, see System Requirements for Splunk App for Infrastructure.

New features

New feature or enhancement	Description
Python 3 migration with SAI	SAI is compatible with both Python 2.7 and Python 3.7 runtimes. Consider the following information when migrating your Splunk instance to Python 3: Don't upgrade to Splunk Enterprise version 8.0.0 without first upgrading to SAI version 2.0.0. Even if your Splunk Enterprise instance is in Python 2 mode, pre-2.0.0 SAI versions break on version 8.0.0.
VMware data collection	Integrate with VMware to monitor vCenter Servers. Collect metrics, task, inventory, event, and log data for vCenter Servers, ESXi clusters, ESXi hosts, and virtual machines. Collect VMware data with Data Collection Nodes. Manage Data Collection Nodes with Data Collection Schedulers. VMware data collection requires an ITSI license. For information about VMware data collection requirements and installation, see VMware data collection planning and requirements. For information about configuring VMware data collection, see Collect VMware vCenter Server metrics with Splunk App for Infrastructure.
Linux process monitoring	When you configure data collection from a Linux system, you can monitor metrics for processes running on the system with the processmon plug-in for collectd. View processes running on each host from the Entity Overview. Specify whitelisted and blacklisted processes to filter which processes you monitor. You can also select whether to monitor IO metrics for processes you monitor. Configure process monitoring when you set up the easy install script, or set up the plug-in manually. For information about configuring the easy install script, see Collect Linux/Unix metrics and logs with Splunk App for Infrastructure. For information about manually configuring process monitoring for a Linux system, see Copy the plug-ins to collectd's plug-in directory.
Windows process monitoring	When you configure data collection from a Windows system, you can monitor metrics for processes running on the system with the Process Performance Monitor (perfmon) input. View processes running on each host from the Entity Overview. Configure process monitoring when you set up the easy install script, or set up the perfmon input manually. For information about configurin the easy install script, see Collect Windows metrics and logs with Splunk App for Infrastructure. For information about manually configuring process monitoring for a Windows system, see Manually configure metrics and log collection for a Windows host for Splunk App for Infrastructure.
Entity type for *nix systems	The write_splunk collectd plug-in includes the entity_type dimension. *nix systems you integrate with SAI have an entity_type dimension so you can search for *nix entities by filtering dimensions. For any *nix systems you've already integrated, you can manually add the dimension to collectd.conf. For more information, see Configure collectd.conf to send data to the Splunk App for Infrastructure.
Slack webhooks for alert notifications	Configure a Slack webhook you can send alert notifications to when an SAI alert meets or exceeds a certain alert threshold. For more information, see Configure Slack webhook notifications.
Custom webhooks for alert notifications	Configure a custom webhook you can send alert notifications to when an SAI alert meets or exceeds a certain alert threshold. For more information, see Configure custom webhook notifications.
Linux OS data collection support	Linux data collection supports libcurl4. Configure Linux data collection for these Linux operating systems: Debian 10 Ubuntu 18.10, 19 For more information about Linux OS data collection requirements, see Operating system support for data collection. When you run the easy install script, the script automatically determines which version of libcurl to use. For more information about manually configuring data collection for these operating systems, see Manually configure metrics collection on a *nix host for Splunk App for Infrastructure.
Alerting	Alerts run as the nobody user to avoid potential search concurrency issues.
Product telemetry	SAI collects additional metadata with the app.session.monitoringInsightsPageLoad component. The component now contains isInitialAppMount, a boolean that indicates whether a page you visit is a landing page or a page you switched from another one in SAI. For more information, see Share data in Splunk App for Infrastructure.

What's new in the docs

Topic	Description
How the easy install script works in Splunk App for Infrastructure	Example plug-ins for collectd to collect Linux, Unix, and Mac OS X metrics.
System requirements for Splunk App for Infrastructure	Requirements for configuring integrations to collect VMware data, including vCenters and Data Collection Nodes (DCNs), and support for Linux operating systems for data collection.
Collect VMware vCenter Server metrics with Splunk App for Infrastructure	Steps to configure integrations for VMware data collection, including vCenters and DCNs.
Manually configure metrics collection on a *nix host for Splunk App for Infrastructure	Updated steps to configure the processmon collectd plug-in for Linux process monitoring, including examples of possible configurations for the plug-in, and included steps for configuring data collection for Linux systems that use libcurl3 and libcurl4. Also added the entity_type dimension to the write_splunk collectd plug-in.
Manually configure metrics and log collection for a Windows host for Splunk App for Infrastructure	The Process perfmon input in the sample conf file includes new counters for Windows process monitoring.
Create and modify alerts in Splunk App for Infrastructure	Added sections for configuring default Slack and custom webhooks to receive alert notifications when an alert meets or exceeds a certain threshold.
Configure the HTTP Event Collector to collect metrics data	Requirements and steps for configuring an HEC token to receive collectd and fluentd metrics data.
VMware data collection planning and requirements	Requirements and recommendations for configuring VMware data collection.
Upgrade VMware data collection components	Information about upgrading VMware data collection components from the Splunk Add-on for VMware version 3.4.x.
Install VMware data collection add-ons and dependencies	Steps to install VMware data collection components on search heads and indexers.
Deploy a Data Collection Node	Steps to deploy and configure a Data Collection Node (DCN). You can deploy a DCN as an OVA in a VMware vCenter Server or configure a heavy forwarder to perform as a DCN.
Deploy a Data Collection Scheduler	Steps to deploy and configure a Data Collection Scheduler (DCS). You can deploy a DCS in a single instance Splunk deployment or as a dedicated Splunk Enterprise instance in a distributed Splunk deployment.
Collect VMware vCenter Server metrics with Splunk App for Infrastructure	Steps to integrate VMware vCenter Servers and DCNs in SAI. Integrate vCenter Servers and DCNs on a DCS. When you integrate a vCenter Server, you start collecting metrics, task, inventory, and event data.
Collect VMware vCenter Server and ESXi host log data with Splunk App for Infrastructure	Steps to collect VMware vCenter Server and ESXi host log data.
Install the Splunk App for Infrastructure in a Splunk Cloud deployment	Information about setting up VMware data collection in a Splunk Cloud deployment.
Install the Splunk App for Infrastructure in a distributed deployment	Information about setting up VMware data collection in a distributed SAI deployment.
Install the Splunk App for Infrastructure in a single-instance deployment	Information about setting up VMware data collection in a single-instance SAI deployment.